The Ramsey Show - App - My Husband and I Disagree on the Budget (Hour 2)

Episode Date: January 12, 2022

Budgeting, Debt, Education, Investing As heard on this episode: Sign Up for a FREE trial of Ramsey+ TODAY: https://bit.ly/3rZTUAx Tools to get you started:  Debt Calculator: https://bit.ly/2Q64HME Insurance Coverage Checkup: https://bit.ly/3sXwUn5 Complete Guide to Budgeting: https://bit.ly/3utmVXi Check out more Ramsey Network podcasts: https://bit.ly/3fHhbVE

Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Ramsey Show, where debt is dumb, cash is king, and the paid off home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice. This is the show where we talk about your relationships, your work, your money, and you. George Campbell, Ramsey personality and host of The Fine Print, another Ramsey Networks production. Podcast you need to check out. Just finished up its first season as my co-host. Open phones here at 888-825-5225.

This is book launch week. The new book, Baby Steps Millionaires, is out. It is selling at an unbelievably wonderful pace. Thank you, America. Wow. Crazy. I appreciate it very much. And of course, it is how ordinary people built extraordinary wealth and how you can too. You can get the book anywhere great books are sold, includingsey solutions.com kayla starts off this hour in boston hi kayla welcome to the ramsey show hi dave thank you for taking my call sure how can georgina help so i'm just having trouble with my monthly budget um i've been budgeting for a while but me and my husband seem to not be on the same page with this one little thing. And it's when you're, so say

your first paycheck doesn't come until the middle, like six days into January, would you still put the items you're buying like groceries and stuff into December? Or would you put that into January, even if you haven't been paid in January yet? So you're saying you have a line item in your budget and the funds won't be there in time? No. So we have money that we haven't put into our savings account yet. We have leftover money and money that we budgeted for. So my husband's saying when I buy groceries on January 2nd, say,

then that should be in the January budget, even though we haven't started the January, like we haven't gotten paid in January yet. Does that make sense? Yeah, well, that's okay. I mean, you can use the money on your December 31st paycheck, and that's going to fund part of January, right? Right. So we're just getting confused because we're both doing different things, so I don't know if there's a better way you can't both do different things

that that right there tells me there's a bunch of breakdown you don't have two budgets you have one right and we have the same every dollar account so when we're putting things in it's just getting messed up and i just wanted your help to get us on the same page because we both love you so we appreciate that so um yeah number one whatever we do we both have to be doing it both of you doing two different game plans is going to screw up the math as you probably already discovered that's going to cause a bigger fight yeah that's going to set up January's budget and have some leftover money from December to fund until the first check comes in January.

But if you buy food on January 2nd, that should show up in January's budget. It should show up on the 2nd that you bought food. Now, where did the money come from? Well, there's money in your food envelope left over because you knew you weren't going to get a check when you did your December budget, and so you had money to fund into the first week of January. Does that make sense? Yeah, it does. That's what my husband was saying, but I was overcomplicating, I think. So in your case, if you said, I mean, the problem is that everything is set up on a monthly basis.

If you were just running it week by week or running it, not counting the first of the month, because you're not getting paid first and 15th, that wouldn't be unusual. But the EveryDollar software doesn't run that way, and it makes it really hard to keep up with. It really runs on the calendar, right? Right, right. And that's what we use. We use EveryDollar. Yeah, you said that.

So that's good. Thank you. And it's good software. It's very robust. It does the job. But, yeah, you've got to figure out a way to cover it. Kind of like if you got paid at the first of the month, but your cable bill comes towards the middle before the second check comes. Then you wait to pay the cable bill until out of the second check.

You don't pay it out of the first check because it's right up there on it. Right. Make sense? Yes, it does. Thank you. Okay. Hey, that's a really good question. Here's what's really important about it.

The details of the answer don't matter. What matters is two things. One is you're actually freaking using a budget. That is huge. That's huge. And the second thing is that you are engaging in your relationship, and you're doing it with your husband. The fact, if you had not had this conflict, because you either weren't doing a budget, or you weren't doing it together and bumping into each other,

that would be a bigger danger sign than the nuances of this answer. It's almost semantics, and the fact that you guys are on the same page, both doing one budget together, willing to do it, that's huge. But, Dave, we run into this occasionally, and it comes down to having a little buffer. You know, we're not saying with zero-based budget doesn't mean you have $0 in your bank account. That's a good point, too. And so having a little buffer in there can really help. Some people like to get a month ahead if that's something that you can do, and that gives you some peace to say, hey, we've got $2,000 in our checking account.

This is if you're later on in the baby steps. But that can sometimes help couples get over the idea of we're going to run out of money mid-month. Yeah, what you do need to set is some kind of a buffer and just make that your baseline. We don't go below that in the checking account, except in dire situations. But, I mean, at least keep like $100 in there. You do not want to run the checking account on zero balance, on zero basis. Yeah, you don't want to overdraft because of 50 cents. Because you're going to be running down to zero all the time.

You're going to bump into stuff. That's not good. So you need to keep some kind of a buffer in there, and that's your baseline. And you never go below that. You treat that like that's zero. You know, if it's $100 or $50 or $1,000, whatever it is. We used to, in the old days, this was 1,000 years ago, we'd keep $1,000 in there at least because that got free checking if you left $1,000 in there.

I don't even know what it does now. I don't keep up with it that close in terms of what's free. I've got so many bank accounts and so many things here now. And we keep a lot more than $1,000 in checking these days. But the point being that that was our baseline. That was the the floor yeah so to speak we wouldn't get down below that very very good question that's very important thank you for joining us emily is in portland maine emily i'm not going to get to you i looked

up and saw the clock i'm going to bring you back up a little while so george what we've learned this budget thing and this every dollar thing is really important because we've learned in uh almost 10 000 people over six seven thousand families going through financial peace university the highest correlating behavior with success meaning if you said dave tell me one behavior that's going to cause me to become successful doing the things in financial peace university meaning getting out of debt, being generous, becoming wealthy. The number one thing that we see, and there's not even a close second, is couples doing a zero-based budget the way we teach together using every dollar. Yeah. The ones that do that, their results are head and shoulders above everybody else.

They're like, well, I'm going to take the class, and I'm going to ish this and ish that. We don't really do a budget. I kind of got it in my head. Or I do a budget, but it's not a zero-based. Or I'm not using the EveryDollar app because I don't like that. Your results are like one-tenth of the people that actually do that one thing properly. So her question is really vital. Yeah, great question.

On paper, on purpose. I heard a statistic recently that absolutely blew my mind. In the U.S. alone, over 3,000 people die every day without life insurance. Now, I don't want to sound unsympathetic, but this drives me crazy. What are people thinking? I don't understand how taking care of your family is not a top priority. Most of you probably just spent a bundle on Christmas on things you really didn't even need. And now you're making New Year's resolutions that are focused on yourself. But if you want to use the New Year as a reason to do something right, like protecting your family, then take care of it right now before

it's too late. Term life insurance is something every family needs, and that's why I talk about it every day. It's not complicated, it's not expensive, and Zander Insurance is the only place I recommend. Go to zander.com or call them at 800-356-4282 please learn from other people's mistakes and get this taken care of that's zander.com or 800-356-4282 George Tamal Ramsey personality is my co-host today. Jesse and Katie are with us from Fort Worth, Texas. It says on my screen you guys are debt-free. Congratulations. Thank you.

Hi, Dave. Thank you so much. Sure, thank you hi dave thank you so much sure thank you well done what how much debt have you paid off we paid off sixty thousand dollars cool how long did that take it took about two and a half years way to go and your range of income during that time uh we went from about fifty thousand to000 to $105,000. Good. What do you guys do for a living? I am a senior copywriter for an agency here in Plano.

I'm a freelance writer, and I watch our child as well. Way to go. Very cool. What kind of debt was this $60,000? Well, we had a little bit of everything. We had a handful of credit cards, medical bills, taxes from our freelance business. We had a car payment and some student loans. Wow, everything. You were normal. Yes. What woke you up? What happened two and a half years ago? Well, you know know the birth of our son uh

kind of made us just uh evaluate things uh and how how bad things had gotten and uh we got uh we talked about it and once we got plugged into an fbu class uh with our church uh we really uh started to make some changes yes sir wow okay so nothing like having a baby to uh cause you to go oh this just got real right that was exactly it yes yeah way to go guys fun so it all happens with fpu yes um we you know we had been living in colorado dave and we moved back to texas to kind of start trying to get a grip on our finances. My parents really generously let us move in with them just so we could, you know, just kind of start getting things together a little bit. And I had your name in the back of my head. And when I knew that, you know,

we needed to start moving forward, I found a copy of the Total Money Makeover. And then Jess and I, I showed it to him, and we started kind of getting those glimmers of hope. And we knew the next steps needed to be going to FPU. So we found FPU at a church that was real close to my parents. And that church is actually, it's been our home church now for years. And so FPU really led us to that. And it's just, I can't tell you what a blessing that in itself has been. But yes, FPU really got it started for us. I love it.

So what were those steps you guys took along the way? And what was that kind of turning point where you went, oh my gosh, I think this is working? Sure. You know, getting on every dollar was definitely key. Once we started to do the budget and actually see just what we had coming in, where it was going, and talking about it together, that was having just a paradigm shift when it came to debt. I just had to really change my thinking when it came to debt and accept that it really was, you know, accept that, you know, the borrower is a slave to the lender, and that's what helped kickstart it for me. Wow. So the mindset turned into behavior change. Right. Yeah, it was definitely, I always say it, I remember hearing Dave, Wow. So the mindset turned into behavior change. to people who don't manage it, flowing away from people who don't manage it well and staying with people who do.

And that was just really identifying the various forms of debt because they don't always call it debt, you know, maybe overdraft protection or payment plans or whatever. Yeah, they have a lot of way of disguising it. It's still debt. You're right. Right, right. That's good insight.

So what's the name of the church that drew you guys in? It's First Baptist Wiley wiley oh very good we would we would love to just give a shout out to the um the teachers of our class uh mike and ronda logston um they took us through fbu they still teach fpu at our church and they are just really incredible we still get um emails from them like monthly encouraging all of the students who have gone through their class. And they were just really incredible. Sounds like super coordinators. And they're ending up recruiting people for the church, too. That's wonderful.

Yes, absolutely. Very good. Good job, guys. Good job. Proud of you guys. Well done. Who was your biggest cheerleaders? Your coordinator, for sure.

Who else? Yes, absolutely. Our coordinator, I really, we owe a lot to my parents. They definitely supported us in this journey along the way. And we also want to give one other shout out to Alex and Cheryl Klager, who went through FPU with us. And they actually came out to Nashville not too long ago. And they did a debt-free scream in the Ramsey parking lot, which was really special for them. Yeah, they brought their family out. Nobody home, we're going to scream in the parking lot.

That's good. I like it. That's fun. We've got a copy of the new book, Baby Steps Millionaires, for you because that's the next thing that's going to happen for you guys. You're going to move on and continue this journey and start putting your 15 percent away into retirement and uh boom get the house paid off you're going to be baby steps millionaires that's your next thing we're also going to send you a copy of the total money makeover so you can give

that away and be an encouragement to someone get someone else started on their journey okay all right awesome thank you so much dave thank you guys i'm proud of you well done all right jesse and katie in fort worth texas sixty thousand dollars paid off in two and a half years making 50 to 105 count it down let's hear a debt-free scream three two one we're debt free yeah that's how that's done I love it our question of the day comes from blinds.com find out for yourself why blinds.com

is the number one online retailer of custom window coverings, free samples free shipping, always use the promo code Ramsey to get the best deal today's question comes from Sarah in Georgia. We are paying off our student loans, and it'll take us another two years to get that completed. We'd like to get a will in place since we have two young children. We spoke to several lawyers, and they each quoted over $2,000 to get one done.

We don't have that much extra cash and want to put money towards debt. We also have looked into online wills but have been told by our CPA and others that this is like throwing money away, Your CPA's an idiot. You need a new CPA because they don't know what they're talking about in this, and it scares me that they won't know what they're talking about on something else. Or they're trying to sell you their will. I know. I'm curious, is there a relationship here with the CPA and the attorney? This is interesting.

No, don't spend $2,000 on a will. No. I mean, most attorneys will do them for $300 to $500 on a basic thing, and you can go to Mama Bear Legal Forms for, I don't know, what is it a will no i mean most attorneys are doing for three to five hundred on a basic thing and you can go to mama bear legal forms for i don't know what is a hundred bucks hundred twenty nine dollars or something yeah the full will kit and we have that as a benefit there's the the wills are organized online the good ones like mama bear legal forms are done state specific and if you follow the the steps for the state that you live in yes it will hold up in court no you can't go down to staples and buy a will packet off the shelf that works in every state that part your cpa would be right about but what tells me is is that your uh cpa does not know anything about

online wills a few years ago i didn't either but uh we've gotten to be knowledgeable about them because i had the same discomfort. But there are several companies, including Mama Bear Legal Forms, that do state-specific. That's what you're always looking for. Because Will's probate law is state law. It is not federal law. So it is specific to your state. For instance, Louisiana, a lot of their law is very French-based,

where a lot of the rest of the U.S. is English-based law. California, weird, because it's California. Who knows what country that is? Yeah, we don't even know what country that is. But different states have different laws. Some states are similar to others, and some of them are just completely whacked. So you need specific to the state you are occupying at the time of your death. What is your resident?

So if you change states, you need a new will, by the way. MamaBearLegalForms.com. Come on, people. That's the one we use. Me and my wife use it as a product benefit through Ramsey. And it's legit. We give it to everybody here free as a benefit. So we wouldn't do that to our employees if we didn't think it worked.

There you go. Good point. This is the Ramsey Show. Thank you. In the lobby of Ramsey Solutions on the debt-free stage, Erin is here with her daughter, Maddie. Hi, Erin. How are you? I'm fantastic. How are you? Better than I deserve. Welcome. Where do you guys live?

We live in Lee's Summit, Missouri. The Kansas City area? Yes. Awesome. Very cool. Welcome to Nashville. How much debt have you paid off? Paid off $40,000. All right. How long did that take? 24 months. Good job. And your range of income during that time? $48,000 and ended at $56,000. Cool. Very cool. So what kind of debt was this? One was a brand new SUV and two credit cards. Wow. Okay. Very cool. So what caused all this to happen two years ago? What was your revelation, your lightning strike moment? Well, I had bought a new house and I had gotten some estimations on the cost of living. And unfortunately, a couple months in, I was getting real numbers and it wasn't matching up with what my estimations were.

Hundreds of dollars actually over what I was budgeting at the time. Ouch. And I didn't have... Sinking fast. Yes, yes. And I was panicking. And I was running out of savings. I'd used up almost all of my savings for the down payment.

And there was a point where I had $2 left in my checking account and had almost no money left in my savings. And I was like, how am I going to do this? How am I going to live? How am I going to support my daughter and just keep the walls up um the rumor is maddie she likes to have like a heater that works and clothes and food and stuff like that oh yeah these teenage daughters they're hard to get along with that way right oh yeah yeah they like they like to eat regular and yeah oh yeah okay yeah every once in a while what do you do for a living i'm a health care

interior designer okay health care interior what the flip is that um i help design hospitals oh okay that makes more sense all right i was somehow a visualized health care at home i don't know what to say home interior designer but as soon as i hear interior designer my wallet twitches so uh so next time you're in the hospital it's my wife's favorite category but yeah someone shows this couch right here all right there you go there's something like that good okay cool so you get in this fear mode it's caving in on you what'd you do how'd you find us so the church i was attending at the time was one of the host churches for margin kansas city yeah and i'd like to say i signed up at the

time but i couldn't convince myself that i could afford a hundred dollars to take class and i it was just something that god put on my heart if you'd asked him they'd have probably given it to you probably yeah i wasn't wise enough at the time. So I just kept wrestling with it and wrestling with it. And I finally, you know, I have to do this because I have no other options. I have to make a decision now. And so that's when I decided, okay, well, I'm still going to do FPU. It's just going to have to be independent. and I started on September 1st 2019 and just stuck with it for the next 24 months and I made some mistakes in there brought a brand new SUV because I had a um another vehicle that was so you really didn't go through the class how do

you mean you just started doing like you started watching youtube videos or what are you saying so i brought the the ramsey uh plus membership and got all the tools and the book when you can watch fpu in that that's how it works right yeah okay so so yeah i just got my hands on anything i could and just just listened to everything and um i just you know i i really I really just kept with it because 20 out of the 24 months, I had major financial things that came up. Some planned for, most not planned for. I had a knee surgery. I had a dog attack. Emergency vet bills. My car was vandalized.

My kitchen flooded. Absolutely everything was coming in. I was like, I can't give know, I can't give up. I can't give up. You're a fighter. So September 8th of 2021, I finally got some checks from a life insurance policy that I decided to cash out to help end my debt payoff process and get me into baby step three. Finished it. And it did.

And it was two and a half months of fighting with the life insurance company to try to get it closed out. And I was just weary. I was so exhausted. Good. And that's really where my cheerleaders came in and really encouraged me at the end. Who were your cheerleaders came in and really encouraged me at the end. Who were your cheerleaders?

So family, mom, dad, stepdad, my good friend Ashley here, my daughter, and my financial advisor. Because in the middle of all of that, when they made the mistake of buying a brand new car, one I shouldn't have, I realized I need someone to speak specifically to my situation and so that's when i hired um a ramsey financial coach yeah and he helped me make better decisions very good good very good cool cool well you've done it uh so after the weird thing is is that when you finally get the other side of the debt and you finally get control of your money it's funny to me how the emergencies leave right it gets real calm yeah um scary almost calm yeah it wasn't

wasn't as intense with the emergencies that came up i still had some that that came in but i was able to pay cash for it um and that was the big difference because i cut up the credit cards and i've never been in a position where i felt like I needed to get a line of credit or use a credit card after I got those baby steps down. I got the emergency fund and knew where every single dollar was going. But it truly is Murphy's Law that when you're broke, and I remember that for sure to me, when you're broke, your life looks like a country song.

I mean, the knee goes out, the dog gets bit. I mean, it's like a chorus in a song. It's yeah it's like how do you make this stuff up you can't make it up i mean it's like only the devil is this creative i mean it's unbelievable so yeah it's uh but then when you get the other side of it you look back and you go well look at there right it's just kind of like the the storm clouds part and it gets a little calm and the sun comes out oh you know, I mean, it really does happen that way. It's really strange. Well, I'm proud of you. You're a scrapper, girl.

Resilient. You are a scrapper. And I'm sure Maddie's been watching you. She's got a good model now in how to be a warrior woman. You're awesome. That's good stuff. That's good stuff. It's good to have a mom that you can look up to that's like that.

Very, very cool. Good stuff. That's good stuff. It's good to have a mom that you can look up to that's like that. Very, very cool. Good stuff. All right. So what do you tell people the key to getting out of debt is now that you've actually done it? Commitment. You have to know what your plan is and keep that in front of you. I had the scripture up on my refrigerator. So that way I was looking at every single day, this is what helped keep me committed and writing stuff on my mirror in the

morning to remind me where I was at, who I was as a woman and where my path was going. And just know that challenges are going to come up and you have to decide, is it going to get you down or are you going to dig in and keep going? So you have to be committed. Wow. Was it a specific scripture that you had up? Yes. The poor are always ruled over by the rich.

So do not borrow and put yourself under their power, which is Proverbs 22, 7. Good stuff. That sounds like contemporary English version. i like it i like that version that's good that's the old rich rules over the poor the borrower is slave to the lender is the old king james yeah way to go that's good i like it boom kick it yeah done well done all right we got a copy of baby steps millionaires for you that's the next thing on your list for sure. Go on and be a millionaire now. And then you can really, really, really be in charge. This is awesome.

Well done. And a copy of Total Money Makeover. You can give it to somebody that's starting their journey. Stir them up. Cause a holy ruckus. That's what we're here for. Yeah. Well done.

All right. Erin and Maddie from Lee's Summit. $40,000 paid off in 24 months, making $48,000 to $56,000. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Three, two, one. We're debt-free! Yeah!

Well done. Man, I love stories like that. It's wonderful. Pastor Randy Frazee and our buddy up there in Kansas City got the whole city. Well done. Man, I love stories like that. It's wonderful. Pastor Randy Frazee and our buddy up there in Kansas City got the whole city. Yes. Like 30 or 40 churches to go through Financial Peace University at one time, and they called it Margin.

That was the campaign. I went up and spoke for them, and I went up and spoke to the group of pastors. It was an incredible movement. Incredible time. Incredible movement. He'll be proud to hear that he had a little part of that story. Very, very well done. Good job, Aaron. You're a rock star.

This is The Ramsey Show. Thank you. George Campbell, Ramsey personality, is my co-host today. Open phones as we talk about your life and your money here on The Ramsey Show. Steven is with us in San Diego. Hi, Steven. Welcome to The Ramsey Show. What's up? Hey, Dave. Hey.

Hey, Dave. Good. Thanks for taking my call. Sure. How can we help? So, I am looking at paying off my house in the next few months, but I wanted to ask you if my money situation is where it should be

in order for me to do that. Okay. What's left on the mortgage? About $95,000. All right. And how much do you have in liquid cash right now? About $135,000. Okay. And what's holding you back from paying it off? I don't know. Is it just emotional? You have other debt? Yeah. No.

Nope. I've never owned a credit card in my whole life. What would a three to six-month emergency fund look like for you? Well, that was kind of my question because once the house is paid off, I imagine my six-month emergency fund would go down slightly because I don't owe anything on the house. Agreed. Sure. So if you paid off the house today, you'd still have 40 grand sitting there as an emergency fund, which I'm guessing is good for you? Yeah. I mean, according to my wife, that's not quite what she wants. she would like to have a little

more but when i look at it you know just from a money standpoint from a number standpoint it makes sense what's your household income um about 125 okay well i wouldn't disagree with your wife um if you wanted to have a little bit more, that's not a problem for me. But what I would do is say this, let's pay off the house today, and our first goal is to raise it from $40,000 to $50,000. That was my thinking. You also don't have a payment in the world. We can raise it back up pretty quick. It sounds like the security gland there is flaring up for her, but when you don't have a mortgage payment, man, it's going to open you up to a lot of options and very little stress. Yes. Yes. Our original plan was to have it paid off by April, which would be my 40th birthday,

which I was excited about. But when I sat down and started looking at the numbers, I was like, we can do this a little sooner if we really wanted to. Tonight. And I wasn't kidding. I sat down and started looking up the numbers. I was like, we can do this a little sooner if we really wanted to. Tonight. I wasn't kidding. Then you can plan a celebration trip on your 40th birthday instead of having to go to the bank. Yeah, tonight, and then let's just scratch and claw and get her done, man. I mean, knock this out.

Build up that emergency fund a little bit more, and then say, okay, now what's our next trip? What's the next thing we're going to do? Yeah. Well, the funny thing is we've been planning this for so long. We've already spent so much money and the house isn't even paid off yet because we're planning all these trips and all these ideas that we want to do once the house is done. We've been, you know, sacrificing for so long and we're right there. Yeah. Wow.

It's time. It's time. And, of course, you can tell her the same thing I always tell everybody. If you hate being out of debt, you can go get you a mortgage. Nah. You know that's not going to happen. Way to go, man. Yeah.

Way to go. You've done really well. And you saved up all this money for what? Let's pay off the house. I feel like, George, we're the two guys on the bungee jumping off the side of the bridge, and we just tie people to the bungee, and they stand up there and look at us till we push them yeah yeah do it go right now i'm scared of heights dave so i'll let you be that guy oh no we you're we're not jumping we're pushing oh yeah i like that plan a lot better we've already done our jump we're both that free man way to go steven

that's awesome well done sir emily is with us in Portland, Maine. Hi, Emily. Welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hi. Thanks so much. It's great to talk to you. I've been listening for about six months, so I'm new. I have a question about money in Canada. I lived in Canada for nine years, and I'm recently back in the U.S. Canada allows you to catch up in retirement if you didn't put enough money in in the past. And so I'm trying to decide whether to put, catch up, I didn't do a very good job with retirement up till now, catch up some of what I didn't put in in the past, so in my Canadian retirement, versus bringing all of that money into the U.S. and to put toward a house, my first house.

You're going to stay in the U.S.? I'm staying in the U.S. now, yes. All right. Yeah, I'm going to do everything in the U.s i'm just going to move everything here okay and manage your retirement accounts here and manage your house here and so forth if that's where you're going to be because it's going to be hard to manipulate a retirement system in a country you don't live in anymore right it's going to be a process and and it's harder to keep up with what's going on with it and so on so yeah i'm going to use that how old are you i'm 51 okay do you have

other retirement money yeah so i have um the equivalent of about a hundred thousand already in canada um and then about 60 000 in the uS. I'm just starting again in the U.S. Okay. If we get you in that house, then you can start on your U.S. and get a little bit more jacked up about it, right? Okay, yeah. I have about 100,000 saved in the U.S. for a house so far. Oh, wow. Okay, so that'll give you a couple hundred then. A couple hundred will buy a pretty good house in portland won't it yeah yeah pretty good uh although portland's pretty expensive it is yeah maine in general is expensive but portland's a it's a wonderful town i love it it is

it is i love it too yeah really hard to stay away from it's pretty much it's pretty much a postcard every time you turn the corner right yes it's a good way to put it yeah beautiful beautiful well hey congratulations a good job yeah that's fun interesting i never thought about the canadian retirement and i don't know the stipulations when it comes to retirement converting that to u.s dollars i don't either what that looks to be honest with you and i guess the conversion rate would play into it but it's just kind of where you're going to make your home you know we don't either, to be honest with you, and I guess the conversion rate would play into it. But it's just kind of where are you going to make your home? You know, we don't buy rental properties in another state. We buy them in our neighborhood.

You know, where are you going to make your nest? Make your nest. It's kind of that's more of the philosophy rather than the technical details that were driving my answer there. Yeah. But I like the idea of her getting the house, getting that thing paid off, and then really jacking up the retirement for, you know, 10 years. Makes a lot of sense. Jacob is with us in St. Louis.

Hi, Jacob. Welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hi, Dave. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? My dad had a stroke back in August of last year, and my mother relies on his pension.

And with his mental status right right now she's pretty much a full-time caretaker and he's becoming really hard to deal with and so I'm trying to think of what's the best situation to do um and I've I've been kicking around ideas of you know she could go to uh or she could send him to a nursing home and she could come live with us because she's got debt and what her fear is that if he goes to a nursing home she's going to lose everything because she can't afford it and the nursing home is going to take all the money and so i mean it would take us a little bit of money but we could we could uh add on to our house and she could stay with us for a time being, and she could get a job.

I'm also worried about her well-being, and I'm just trying to think of the best route to go. How old are they? My dad is 65. My mom is 55. Okay. And they don't have any any savings at all okay so the only thing that she would lose would be her home and she's not going to lose that here's the thing nursing homes you know they're a simple transaction uh they don't take things you choose to buy their services or not buy their services

and you pay them for their services it's like you if you don't want to go if you don't want to the restaurant to take something for from you don't go over there and eat you know so they're not they don't have a gun they're not you know they're not forcing you coercing you in any way if your uh dad and mom are meet the medicaid guidelines for the poor welfare nursing home is basically available which is government welfare nursing home is basically available, which is government-funded nursing home, in other words. And they have guidelines for that that allow the spouse to keep the house, keep the primary residence, and up to a certain amount of cash. So if they don't have much cash and she wants to hold on to the house,

that's probably doable for him to be on Medicaid nursing home. But you have to prove, like you do with anything with welfare, what your asset base is and what your income is to work with. And I don't know with his pension if he's going to qualify for Medicaid or not. That's what you have to look into. So I guess you've got to just continue gathering information and exploring your options out there. This is the Ramsey Show. we would love for you to come to Nashville and tell Dave your story