The Ramsey Show - App - My Husband Has Complete Control of Our Finances (Hour 1)

Episode Date: December 17, 2021

Debt, Investing, Relationships 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, broadcasting from the Dollar Car Rental Studios, it's the Ramsey Show, where dad is dumb, cash is king, and the paid-off home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host, Dr. John Deloney. Host of the Dr. John Deloney Show is my co-host today. As we talk about your life and your money, it's a free call at 888-825-5225.

That's 888-825-5225. Dr. Deloney, if you aren't aware, has an unbelievably popular show on podcast, on, of course, YouTube. And you can call into his show and be a part of it, or you can call him today. If you've got questions about mental health, anxiety, boundaries, relationships, all that stuff generally pops up on this show anyway. So we're here to help you with your life and with your money. 888-825-5225. Chelsea is with us. Chelsea is in Jacksonville, Florida. Hi, Chelsea.

How are you? Hi. I'm doing good. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? I just had a quick question. First off, thank you for your show and your principles and everything.

I cry every time I watch a debt-free stream. I can't help it. Me too. I've been doing it 30 years. I have a quick question. So my husband and I are on baby step three. All of our debt is paid off. We paid off the Harley, and that was the last of our car payments and any of our debt.

We currently have our second baby on the way. And my husband recently proposed the idea of selling the bike. And I don't know how I feel about it because I bought it for him as a wedding gift. And I've been trying to get him to sell the truck for years, but I never thought he would go for selling the motorcycle. So I guess I'm just wondering what you think. Hmm. Does he want to sell it for money? Yeah, just sell it for cash.

I think he's maybe thinking more about family and two kids and potential for something bad to happen. So that's what I was wondering. Is he trying to sell it because y'all need the cash, or is he trying to sell it because, and I've heard of this. I've had buddies that said, man, suddenly riding my motorcycle felt selfish. I got two little kids and I'm putting myself in a high risk category, right?

And so I'm going to sell it because of that. But it sounds like that's why he's selling it. I think that's where his heart is. I think he's just thinking about it a little more. He loves riding it and I feel bad him thinking about it. But now that he's mentioned it, now my thoughts are turning and thinking about, well, we could get our emergency fund, I'll say, all stocked up if he sold it. So what's the bike worth?

It's an 09 Softail. I looked online. Maybe about $10,000. Okay, and what's the two cars that you're driving worth? Right now, he's got a truck, an 06 Jansby. Oh, gosh, I have no idea what they're worth. What's your household income? Household income is about $120.

Okay, so you can afford the bike. You're out of debt. You have an emergency fund. You have a ten thousand dollar toy in the garage so this has absolutely nothing to do with money right has nothing to do with money so then it comes down to why does he want to sell it and are you okay with that reason if his reasoning is what john is saying that he's showing i got two kids this feels i could lay this thing down, leave her with two kids.

I don't want to do that. It takes some of the joy out of the bike for now. I'll pick up a bike later. I'm an empty nester. We'll buy two of them and tour the world in them, you know, and send the kids off to college and whatever. But if that's his reasoning, if I'm in your shoes, I feel pretty loved. Yeah, I do. He's a good man.

Yeah. I mean, if that's his reasoning, I don't think he needs to sell it for money. You don't have a financial reason to sell the bike. If it was a boat, and it was $10,000, and it was in the garage, and you guys wanted to keep it, and it a toy and you're out of debt and you make $120,000 a year, your total of all your vehicles is less than half your annual income, which it definitely is, then you don't have too much going on here with stuff that has wheels and motors and you don't have a problem. And so $10, dollars doesn't change your life

in the positive or the negative in your situation because you've done such a good job on all the other fronts so i think it just comes down to what's his motivation and are you okay with that because i think his motivation is forward looking and your sadness is due to the nostalgia of you gave it to him from the past as a wedding gift. She was surprised that he would ever sell a gift that I gave him one time. You know what I mean? Yeah. And I get that. There's a little bit of that.

But, yeah. But if it's, you know, we don't have him on the line, so we don't know what's driving this. But no pun intended. But, yeah, you just have to decide there what's going to happen. The calls we usually take are the opposite. He won't sell it, and he's got three kids, and we need the money, and he's being reckless. And it's a $65,000 bike. Yeah, that kind of stuff.

So, Kai, I'm with you. My first thought is, man, if he's selling it because he's starting to look forward and thinking, I need to go take up golf. This guy's a stud. I was going to say, yeah, what a good guy. Tim is in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Hey, Tim, how are you? I'm great.

Thanks, Dave, John, for taking the call. Sure. How are you? Well, my question is, my wife and I will be on step four, five, and six within a month or so. Wonderful. And, yeah, we've been working hard on it. We're behind in investing for retirement for our age. How old are you?

And my question, we're both 40. Whoopee. And, yeah, I guess, yeah, 40 isn't so bad. You've got plenty of time. Okay. I guess my question is, should we do more than 15% of our income? No. No?

Because I want the rest of it on your house to get your house paid off. That's the shortest distance to being a millionaire. That's, I was 70% sure you were going to say that. You should have been 79.99%. Yeah, because here's the thing. If you run the math out, basically you're going to use the extra pile of money. Let's say you raised it to 20%. You're going to end up using that to pay off the house anyway.

So basically what you're doing is investing in order to pay off the house. So let's just go pay off the house. Okay, well, good. We should. And we only owe $94,000. Oh, good Lord. And what do you make a year? Gross is about $120,000.

Oh, geez. Dude, pay your house off, man. You're going to be a baby steps millionaire by the time you're 50. And that reduces the retirement liability you have if you have no house payment. Exactly. Ding, ding. Yeah, which is one of the big reasons we push you to get this done. So average person doing our stuff pays off their home in seven and a half years from the time they start. And they become a Baby Steps millionaire on average in about 12 or 14 years.

And the paid-off house is a big chunk of your net worth, of course, to determine your millionaire status. Paid-off, man. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Good call, man. Thanks for calling. Most people know me as the guy who did stupid with a lot of zeros on the end. I made my first million dollars in my 20s the wrong way and then went bankrupt. That's when I set out to learn God's ways of handling money, and I developed the Ramsey Baby Steps. By following these steps, I became a millionaire again,

and this time the right way. After three decades of guiding millions of others through the plan, the evidence is undeniable. If you follow the Baby Steps, you will become a millionaire and get to live and give like no one else. And now I'm excited to share with you that I've written a new book called Baby Steps Millionaires, and it's available for pre-order right now. You'll learn how ordinary people built extraordinary wealth and how you can too. I'll walk you through how to invest, build wealth, and bust through the barriers preventing you from becoming a millionaire. For those who are ready, it's game on.

You can baby step your way to becoming a millionaire. Pre-order your copy today at RamseySolutions.com. peak real estate season is just around the corner this year things are different home prices are higher competition is crazy between buyers out there the things they're doing in some of these markets and sellers need to know what they're doing if they're going to make the most of the sale of their home if you're going to sell a home right now this is not amateur hour you need to know what they're doing if they're going to make the most of the sale of their home. If you're going to sell a home right now, this is not amateur hour. You need to be careful. You need to have a pro in your corner so you don't make a six-figure mistake. Don't jump headfirst into something you don't understand.

If you don't know where to start, you're not sure financially ready for a mortgage, you don't know what you're doing, You're buying or selling in this market. You need an endorsed local provider. One of the top real estate agents in the nation that we have vetted as not only high performing, but incredible excellence in how they take care of you. And that's what you need in your corner. One of the Ramsey trusted endorsed local providers. Go to ramseysolutions.com slash agent to connect with one of our trusted ELPs. RamseySolutions.com slash agent.

Our question of the day comes from Blinds.com. They are the number one online retailer of custom window covering. You get free samples, free shipping, and the new promos they run all the time. You'll save even more. You can find out how they became number one by dealing with them.

They're an incredible company. Use the promo code RAMSY to get the best deal on your window blinds at blinds.com. All right, today's question comes from Joanna in Oregon. I've been married for two years and we never combined our finances. I'm self-employed and expect to make $50,000 this year. My company is in my spouse's name, even though he does not contribute anything to the business. He distributes the money after I make it

and withdraws 20% for himself. We recently discussed having children, and he said I would have to save to make up for my lost salary during maternity leave just as I would for anything else that I wanted. I am crushed. I feel stupid, betrayed, and trapped. Basically, her husband's stealing from her, right? This seems messier than it's written. If I'm reading this just at face value, I would go get an attorney tomorrow.

I mean, it sounds like this marriage is over. It sounds like she's being held hostage. There's got to be more to it than this. Yeah, the language that she's using, it has him at such a level of control that i worry about him hitting her too oh this this just screams abusive yes screams toxic control yes crazy she's not allowed to you know pick her own lipstick color type stuff you know this is just strange my name goes on your business that you work at

and that you pay me from. And you give me a tithe because I'm the guy. The guy tax. The guy tax. And if you want to go do things like, I don't know, have a kid, then great. You can have a kid. You're going to have to be able to take care of that because I can't have my

lifestyle. You can't affect my husband tax. Or my lifestyle tax.'t you can't affect my husband tax or my lifestyle yeah my expense all that money you make for me right i mean dude this sounds whacked yeah something's not right here but if this is me i would go see an attorney tomorrow i don't know i don't know another way to do this because this this just reeks of major problems here's the thing joanna he does not hold all the cards the only thing he holds is emotional control over you and uh he doesn't really have much legal control because that business that you started and he has to be put in his name

uh divorce court will undo all that and they'll probably hand you the keys the whole thing but certainly hand you keys to 50 of it anyway so he's not in as much control as he thinks he is or that you have allowed him to have. And so that's the thing. He doesn't hold all the cards. Now, and no, you do not need to have a child. No. Not in this situation. Now, so I'm going to do two things.

I'm going to go ahead and contact a marriage and family therapist, a marriage and family counselor, and you go talk to them and invite him into that conversation, and I also would go and have a consultation with an attorney. The attorney will teach you what I'm telling you, that he does not hold all the cards. The marriage and family therapist can sit down with you and unpack long-form what's going on here and may just simply reinforce what John's saying, and that's activate the attorney.

Or they may say there's a glimmer of hope here, and if he did these five things, then we could save this. And with an amount of work called counseling, marriage counseling, then, you know, maybe this is saved. And maybe we talk about kids down the road. But no kids right now. Not in this situation. The way this is written, it is written as if you're being abused. It has abuser language.

That's what I'm reading. that's why you're that's why you're activated anytime i yeah i'm i'm dave you probably feel me seething here i i i hate this scenario whenever i hear somebody say crushed and stupid and betrayed and trapped those words together tell me somebody's literally trapped well somebody's feeding her that word that's right she doesn't feel that way on her own she's been those are those are actual emotions right that she she she's been told that she's owned and that she believed it it's got too much domestic violence language in it um and so now if he is joanna i'll i'll escalate if he's hitting you, you can play with that if you want to. I don't think I would.

I'd just be done with it. If you were my daughter, there'd be other things involved. But aside from that, I'd be telling you, as a part of the other things, I'd be telling you to get away. I'd probably drive you to. Yeah, that way you don't get caught in a crossfire. I'd probably drive you to that way you don't get caught in a crossfire so i'll probably drive you to the attorney yes yeah well and you know just call the homicide detective over so but yeah but uh we'll call granddad that's right we have ways of dealing with you boys but um yeah that's uh that's old school but uh yeah i um yeah you don't you

don't you don't you don't, this is wrong. Everything in this language that you wrote, honey, is bad, and you're worth more than all of this. And so get some help. Get an attorney. Get a counselor. Get a good pastor in your corner. Get some community around you. You are not trapped.

You are not stupid. You are betrayed. But You are not stupid. You are betrayed. But that's just confirmation. Anybody sitting out there listening to this that feels this way, crushed, stupid, betrayed, trapped, go talk to somebody. Dave, you said it best. You got one tiny, quick life. And, man, you're worth more than spending that life feeling stupid and betrayed and trapped. Go talk to somebody, whether it's a marriage counselor, whether it's a pastor, whether it's an attorney,

whether it's a friend that knows your story. Go, man, go take action. You are worth more than being trapped. I hate it. I hate it. He's obviously in some kind of bully mode at a minimum. And the bullies are not, they're never made happy by you going along. No.

It puts gasoline on a fire. And so the only thing you can do is set boundaries and separate with a bully. That's all you can do is set boundaries and separate with a bully. That's all you can do. And then they can decide with those healthy boundaries in place, are they going to continue or are they going to heal? Yeah. Whatever's broken inside of them that's causing them to bully. But you said it right. They have to heal.

And often folks who find themselves like Joanne on the other side of this think they are contributing to the healing of somebody else, and you're not. No, that's called codependency yeah you are you are oh you are trying to throw sand into a hole that can never be filled that way man um he's gonna have to do his own healing he's gonna have to decide there's really one thing you can do with domestic violence let's get away from it yeah that's all you can yeah that's it and once you get away it, then both parties have somewhat of a chance of putting something together that looks like health. Yeah. But at least you stay alive and you're not a punching bag anymore. And this has, again, all of the language.

Let's get away, get away. Yeah. You know, a thousand years ago, I think I've told you this. I don't know if I said it on air or not. There was an old show called Sally Jessie Raphael Show. Oh, yeah. I remember that. It was on that show several times. And they had an on-staff counselor that would an old show called Sally Jessie Raphael Show. Oh yeah, I remember that. It was on that show several times and they had an

on-staff counselor that would come on the air with us, a lady. And I got to talking to her off and she showed me this piece of research. All this data where someone is super hyper-controlled with the money, the husband is, there's a high correlation with that in domestic violence. Absolutely.

Like he wouldn't let her buy a certain cereal. Every little detail. hyper-controlled. It's financial abuse. Yeah. Well, it's correlated with him using her as a punching bag. And it's just, it's a real indicator. This is the Ramsey Show. We'll be right back. Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. This is the Ramsey Show, where we give you common sense for your dollars and cents and your life.

Ed and Liz are with us in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Hey, guys, how are you? Great, how are you? Better than I deserve. It says on my screen you're debt-free. Congratulations. How much did you pay off? $335,000. How long did that take? Nine and a half years. All right, and your range of income during that time? $96,000 to $144,000. Good for you. What do you guys do for a living? I'm a teacher. And I'm a physician assistant.

All right. Well, I'm guessing since it took nine and a half years and it was a lot of money, maybe you paid off the house. We sure did. All right. Talking to weird people. Way to go, you guys. How old are you guys? 34. and you have a paid for house that's ridiculous what's this house worth about 350 and you're 34 freaking years old wow that's so awesome man i'm so proud of y'all. Well done, well done. Touchdown.

All right, tell us your story. What happened nine and a half years ago that put you on this Ramsey-type journey you're on? Sure. So after we got married, we kind of wandered in and out of debt with home improvement loans, car loans. We were still paying off student loans, using credit cards. And, you know, we thought that we were doing well because we would pay it off before the interest started or, you know, immediately after. And, you know, we were just kind of playing with fire because all it would have taken was one loss of a job or a big expense and, you know, things would have gotten ugly real quick. So we really didn't start the kind of gazelle and tense until we found out that we couldn't have biological children, and we realized we'd need about $25,000 for each adoption,

and we were planning on doing it twice. And we didn't want to go into more debt with our children, so we did fundraising and we did extra work to cashflow both of those during while we were paying everything else off. And around that time, we found you guys and we paid off the rest of our debt and mortgage in a short period. So it had taken us seven years to pay off all those things in our $75,000 mortgage, and then two and a half years to pay off the other 75 of our mortgage that we did the last 46 in the past nine months.

Yeah, when you could see the finish line, you sprinted, huh? We started. Wow. That's incredible. I know most of my friends in my life can't do a workout program for nine days. How did y'all stay on this for nine years? So we started, I guess, just before we even knew about the kids, it was, well, let's just pay off our house. And we threw extra money at that for a long time,

having that kind of be our ultimate goal to get that paid off. And then, you know, when we kind of saw, well, we started watching the amortization schedule, we're like, hey, we could have this paid off by this time. And then it was like, well, maybe we could have it paid off by this time. You know, we just kind of watched that, and it really motivated us to see we were so close. Let's keep going. My motto was debt-free by 33. Okay. And you made it, huh?

Or real close. We did. All right. So you've been married, what, 10 years? Yes. Yep, 10 years. And you found us how long ago? Four and a half, five years ago. Okay.

So you were already kind of on the general path, and all we did was just help you tighten it up? Is that how this works um yeah i mean i think we were still like i said using credit cards and things kind of prior to you guys um i think you know we were kind of playing with with fire we were doing okay but we weren't in in good habits i would yeah and how'd you find us radio or financial peace university or what yeah through podcasts and the radio show I was listening to. Okay, cool, cool. How much is in your retirement?

Right around $100. Okay, so your net worth is about a half a million already and you're 34. So that means you're probably going to be millionaires by 40 or so. We're hoping. Yeah, that's the track you're on. You'll be baby step millionaires you've done this stuff the way we teach i'm so proud of y'all thank you what do you tell people the key to getting out of debt is you're 34 with a paid four hours you actually know

well i think uh it's just having the budget and we have meetings weekly still used to take a lot longer and um when we look back at our first couple of budgets that we did once we found you guys um they were really ugly and messy um and now it's just kind of habit and the budget is so important and um i also teach your foundations class at the middle school that i teach at thank you uh and yeah and uh the one episode where rachel talks about driving in reverse that's what we were doing with our credit cards when we were using them um you know we were Yeah, and the one episode where Rachel talks about driving in reverse, that's what we were doing with our credit cards when we were using them. We were driving in reverse and always looking at what we had paid. Now that we use just the debit cards or just cash,

now we can actually see forward, and it's a lot easier. Powerful. Very cool. Very cool. Yeah, you've got to be careful what you teach because you'll learn it. Right. Yeah, nobody holds you accountable like a room full of middle schoolers either right right yeah they're savages man yeah so teach you really do this or not huh huh huh tell the truth what's it really like yeah yeah they are savages 13 year old savages

yeah wow way to go you guys so proud of you of you. What are the kiddos' names and ages? So Eddie is four, and Elliot is two. Joy of your life, huh? Yes, yes. It was a long road to adopt them, but it's a beautiful gift from God, and we are just so, so blessed. Yeah, you received a beautiful gift, and you gave one, too. Yeah. Fabulous. So beautifully well done. Well done, well done. Yeah, their received a beautiful gift and you gave one, too. Yeah. Fabulous. So beautifully well done.

Well done, well done. Yeah, their pictures are showing up on the YouTube feed. We're seeing them here. They're great-looking young guys. Look like full-on boys. I love it. Very good. They are 100% boys.

Yeah, I love it. Well, congratulations, you guys. We're so proud of you. We got a copy of The Legacy Journey for you. That's the next chapter in your story as you're on your way to baby being baby steps millionaires and of course we'll give you another copy of the total money makeover as well uh so you can give it away to someone and get them started on their journey because that's the as you know that's the roadmap the blueprint on how to get where you are at 34 years old you guys are so impressive

all right count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Three, two, one. We're debt-free! Yeah! I love it. So, you know what my problem is? One? so you know what my problem is one i have talked to ed and liz 70 000 times in 30 years so when josh calls it just wells up in you and i know he should be them

instead of him yeah i it i i'm already over there and i have to stop a minute and try to get Josh to go with me. Yes. Because I already go over there, and I'm like, I'm just going to kill you. That's right. I'm just going to kill you right here on the radio in front of 22 million people. And that's not fair to poor Josh, because he's new to the game. He's just figuring it out. That's right.

He's just getting there, and it wasn't fair to him to just take his head off, and I didn't. But here's where Ed and Liz. They're 34. He's 30. They make about the same amount of money. They make about the same amount of money, and their house is paid off. And four years later, if he sells the boat, he does this stuff. That's why I – and the problem is, and you've done this in counseling as well,

sometimes you want it for them more than they want it. And you can't – yeah, I can never get myself in that trap because then I start wearing other people's garbage and you can't do that. No, I'm not wearing his garbage. No, not you. I'm just saying. I can see it. I know. I can see he can do it.

I can feel it for him. I know he can do it. I mean, I know because I've got more data stored in my brain on this subject than any human walking the planet. He's taking these $5 checks from Discover and thinking, you know know what i'm really hooking my son up for the future don't get me started oh what if you didn't have a house payment you give that to that little boy right or instead of giving him a uh or how about adding a hundred or fifty thousand dollars to the equation for adoption while you're on the journey oh yeah and go ahead and knock it all out, baby. That's exactly right. Let's just put that in there, too, while we're at it. Ding, ding.

See, the point being, folk, you can do this, but you know what the number one barrier of you doing this is? Is you believing you can do it. That's right. Number one. And I can't make you believe. I can teach you. I can show you.

I can be funny. I can yell at you. But I can't make you do it. But there they are. I can show you. I can be funny. I can yell at you. But I can't make you do it. There they are, the two bookends. Right here in one hour. One hour, man. This is the Ramsey Show. We'll be right back. Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey personality, is my co-host today. You can join him on the Dr. John Deloney Show, which is a massively popular podcast produced by the Ramsey Networks here. Call in at 844-693-3291, 844-693-3291, or email, and Kelly will get back with you and set you up to be on the show.

Email at askjohn at ramseysolutions.com, askjohn at ramseysolutions.com. Lindsay is with us. Lindsay's in Houston, Texas. Hi, Lindsay. How are you? Hi. Doing well. Excited to be on. Just a little bit nervous, but thank you for having me. Well, we're honored to have you. Well, I completed FPU in 2017, and after doing so, I paid off my car. I've increased my savings and investments. I don't have any other debt and I'm currently renting. I am going back to school to get my PhD and my school will be completely paid for through grants and graduate assistantships. And I will also have a monthly

stipend, but that means I'll be on a fixed income. So, and I'm also needing to move to August, I mean, to the area in August. And so the rental rates are pretty high in college students. So I'm also needing to move to the area in August. And so the rental rates are pretty high in College Junction, so I'm looking at purchasing. My parents are being extremely generous and offering to help me buy a house. They're actually also debt-free and went there to see you in 2014 to do their debt-free screen. So you're going to A&M to get a Ph.D. in what? Educational psychology. And then what are you going to do?

I want to teach at the college level. Where, at A&M? I don't know. How long does a Ph.D. program take? I'll be there for three years. Don't buy a house. Okay, yep, that was my question. Okay.

Because, listen, a Ph.D. program, I don't know anything about it. I've only got one, you know, I've got a Ph.D. in DUMB, but John's got a couple of them, and rumor is it that they're tough to get. It's a lot of work. Yes, the jobs after. No, no, the getting of the degree, the whole process, the dissertation, the whole thing, right? Yes. Yeah, and then being an educational psychologist, that's a, yeah, to get a tenure track job is going to be tough.

And you know that walking into it. But the chances of you landing in College Station and working there after that degree are very, very small. I don't want you concentrating on home ownership. I want you concentrating on home ownership. I want you concentrating on the completion of the Ph.D. and then quickly moving to the place that gives you a job. That's right. Okay.

And that was my question was with the short-term nature, if it was smart to buy or not. Exactly. It's a college town. So that makes sense. It's a college town. And college towns are going to go through a metamorphosis in the next five years because people are not going to college like they used to. Right.

So it's going to affect real estate in a small town like College Station. In a major way, yeah. Okay. Okay. I do have one other question. Should I stop? I know it sounds silly, but do I stop contributing to my Roth IRA since I'm going to be on such a fixed income,

or do I try as best I can to continue that? Your stipend, do you have to pay taxes on that? Is that considered earned income? It is? Yes, it is. Then you do have an earned income. You can do a Roth. You can only do a Roth, though,

if you are guaranteed that you're not going to have any debt due to this education. Because I want you to invest in you before you invest in mutual funds. Right. Okay. Yeah, I should not have, everything should be covered because I'm technically working as well for the university, and that's paying for my school. Yeah, and if that ended, what would you do? If then paying for me ended, I would have to get another job, yeah. Okay, and so you'd find another way to pay for it. You know, I don't mind if you stop your retirement temporarily and pile up cash to complete this this education and not that you're necessarily going to need the cash but if you end

up with 15 or 20,000 bucks or 50,000 bucks or whatever in a savings account when you come out it's not going to kill you no that's that's your house down payment yeah right if wherever whatever you're going to live or you roll that over into your retirement once you get settled somewhere yeah yeah that's that's the process hey but that man, talk about you doing it right. There's not – that's an outstanding school. That's an outstanding program. One of my mentors graduated from that very program from that very school. It is top-notch. Well, and when you can get a fellowship like that and they pay you to go.

That's what I'm saying. You get through that debt-free, you've won. That's the touchdown. That's outstanding. Touchdown, Aggies. Good for you. Reggie is with us. Reggie's in Chattanooga.

Hi, Reggie. How are you? Hey, thank with us. Reggie's in Chattanooga. Hi, Reggie. How are you? Hey, thank you, Dave, for taking my phone call. Sure. The question I have for you, sir, is your Vesta Pro, smart Vesta Pro, went on your website, looked for some in my area, found a handful of them. One actually maybe not a mile away from me. What process do you use to find and endorse a SmartVestor Pro? And is there a number that I can call with your company if I choose to use a Vestor with you?

Okay, well, SmartVestor Pros don't work for us. They are independent financial advisors. We we vet them meaning we interview them and find out about them so that we feel good about endorsing them does that make sense okay got you and uh there's no one on there that we haven't spent extensive time vetting uh however they are humans and we are humans and sometimes we we screw that up, but not very often. We've been doing it a long time. I'm very proud to endorse the people that are SmartVestor pros. And 99.9% of the time, we have zero issues with them. So then it is on you to say, okay, Dave Ramsey, the guy on the radio that I trust, has said this is a guy that he trusts,

and I'm going to sit down and see if I share that trust. You don't blindly go off of anyone's endorsement ever on anything, but it's a good way to open a door. Just like if your friend says, hey, this is a good movie, and you go, and the movie sucks. Well, next time you don't take your friend's movie advice, right? But the same thing. So this guy, every movie he's ever, every book he's ever told me to read was a good book. So his book reading endorsement is worthless. We all got friends like that, and i'm just your friend that way so you still sit down use your own freaking brain though and you interview

two or three of them for your own sake and you decide uh does this person share my values do they i agree with uh everything dave ramsey says and i'm following the baby steps but this person doesn't seem to i'm not going with that one which by the way let us know that one and we'll cancel that one because we want to endorse people that are going to tell you to do the stuff that we do here so that you get a consistent experience. Does that make sense? It does. So that's one of the things I should see when I'm interviewing them,

that they are actually going through your baby steps, correct? They should know the stuff, and they should not recommend something to you that is opposite of what you're hearing here. Otherwise, the endorsement wouldn't make sense. It wouldn't have integrity. Agreed? Yes, yes. I'm just trying to be sure of what I should be seeing and what I should be hearing.

And you should be looking for someone that has the heart of a teacher. You should feel taught and coached, not slimed. Yeah. And there's a lot of sliming in the financial world, a lot of sales in this financial world. But if you feel like you've got to go home and take a shower after you, don't use them. And, Reggie, I'll tell you this. They are trained to expect that you're going to be shopping around. A close friend of mine who is a Smart Investor Pro,

that I didn't even know was a Smart Investor Pro until I started working here, I said, hey, I need some help. And he said, I'm going to walk you through how we do introductions, but at the end of it, you need to make sure you're comfortable with me. And we might be great friends and not so great mixing this part of it up, right? So I feel completely at ease to walk in and let them know hey i'm shopping around i want to meet with a couple of interviewing three people and i'm going to pick one they're not going to get their feelings hurt no bring you on and you should do

that with a real estate endorsed local provider too you should do that any i mean you know these are people they're going to be teaching you and coaching you and making suggestions about your freaking money so yeah you need to be real comfortable with them and have interviewed more than one and don't blindly follow anything and so it always tickles me when someone writes this hate mail says you know i trusted you when you endorsed such and such and such and such heating and air company in timbuk2 and i'm like yeah we checked them out they were good folks but you're also supposed to use your brain right you know in the process and if you're getting slimed and you go well dave said sliming is good no it's not that's not what dave says you know i mean it's just but you're supposed

to also be grown-ups and i'm a grown-up when i take someone's endorsement and um and sometimes i don't take their endorsement seriously because i don't think that much of that person so you know that we all do that, right? That's what you're supposed to do. So what we have here is trust, and we do our best to be worthy of your trust. But I can also promise you it is a freaking imperfect process. Oh, my God. James Childs is our producer.

Kelly Daniels is our associate producer and phone screener. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host, and we'll be back. Hey, it's Kelly, associate producer for The Ramsey Show. This episode is over, but if you heard about an event, product, or service and didn't have a chance to write it down, don't worry. We list everything you've heard about during this episode in the podcast show notes section or head to theramseyshow.com. Thanks for listening.