The Ramsey Show - App - My Husband Spent $14,000 on Phone Games (Hour 1)

Episode Date: October 31, 2023

Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's The Ramsey Show. We help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create actual amazing relationships. Jade Walsh, our Ramsey personality, is my co-host today as we answer your questions about your life and your money. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Ariana is with us in Portland, Oregon to start off this hour. Hey, Ariana, how are you? Good.

How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? I am trying to figure out how I can get my husband on the same page with his out-of-control spending so that we can have an emergency fund to fall on and pay off some of our debts that we have. Well, what is his out-of-control spending? What do you mean? My husband spends over $1,000 a month just on phone games.

Oh. Phone games? Like Candy Crush? Yeah, on his iPhone. Oh, wow. Yes, and I found out by looking at our statements. When you say that out loud, does it sound as crazy to you as it does to me? Yes.

Like this is like illness level. Last year. I'm sorry, you cut out, honey. What did you say uh-oh thousand you're cutting in and out you he spent what 14 000 last year yeah and what's your household income apparently your phone has not been paid um i can't oh you're back we're losing most of your phone here so okay so what is your household income 83 83 000 okay are you somewhere where you can walk and get a better signal maybe um because you're losing you about every third word85,000. How old is your husband? 29.

Okay. All right. I have a question. We have a four-year-old daughter. I have a question. It's just what I'm wondering. Something tells me this is not the only thing he's overspending on. What else is he spending crazy money on? His car. His what?

His car. His car? Car. What's that? Yeah. His what? His car. His car? Car. What's that? Yeah. He has a 91 Volkswagen. Yeah. Okay.

Which, yeah, that just screams money right there. I'm a stay-at-home mom. Yeah. And I am the one that pays the bills. Yeah. And I pinch money wherever i can okay so that we can get those paid you're you guys need to see you need to get some professional help that's what i'm thinking too yeah because this is not a hundred dollars uh and he makes two hundred thousand and it's over i know i know it's fourteen

thousand a year and the money we're spending on the car too so there's something i'm sure you're aware of this or maybe you haven't heard but in dealing with our phones what we are now discovering is that a lot of the things, the games actually have them, they've carefully designed the games to create a dopamine hit to cause you to come back again and again and again. They designed these games to be addictive. If you're not aware of that, that's very true. It's also true of, for instance, the way the videos now work on slot machines. They have carefully designed those to be addictive. It's also true of, for instance, the way the videos now work on slot machines.

They have carefully designed those to be addictive. And so your husband is involved in an addictive behavior loop because if you just say what he's doing out loud, everyone that hears it except him thinks cray-cray. Yes. They think he's nuts. I know. Okay. And so this is not a money problem this is you have a husband that is addicted problem now what do you do with that if your husband was doing cocaine if your husband was doing pornography if your husband was doing some

other form of addiction what would you do well you would demand that he gets some help and you would begin to see someone to build language and a narrative to talk to him in such a way that he starts to understand that he's destroying himself and his family with this behavior yes because i feel like at this point i'm talking at him this point what it feels like i'm talking at him. This point what? It feels like I'm talking at him. Oh, yeah, you are. You're talking to an addict. I just feel like I'm nagging.

He's glazed over. You're talking to him when he's drunk. Yeah. You can't talk to a drunk. Right. It doesn't make any sense. But what you do need to do is sit down with someone that can give you some language that says okay this is terrifying me i have a baby and i feel like i am in the house with a cocaine addict right because you are exhibiting the exact same behaviors as a cocaine addict yes and he just spent 700 in the last three

days yeah so it's getting worse. My goodness. Well, I mean, we've established he's out of control. We don't need any more evidence. That's established. Does he think that there's a problem at all, or when you bring it up, is he like, no, this is fine, there's no problem here? He's told me twice that he was going to disconnect the car from his phone,

but then that did not happen. Well, I mean, I promise you I'm not going to get drunk anymore, but I am hanging out in the bar. Right, right. And we do have a car payment every month, and with what he spent last year, we could have paid off the full balance of what we owe left. But the car payment is not your problem.

Right. The problem is your husband is an addict. Yes. And you need to start treating this situation like your hair is on fire. Okay. With lots of urgency. And so are you guys, by chance, in a good church? No, we're not.

Who is in his life that can talk to him, that will listen to him? It's not you. It's definitely not me. I think that we'd have to hire somebody that doesn't know us because he doesn't have a father figure or a mother that he'll listen to. So you need to say, honey, I'm going to marriage counseling because I'm afraid our marriage is going to end because I'm terrified that I'm married to an addict.

You are completely out of control. I'm going to go see a marriage counselor to try to save our marriage. I hope you'll come and set an appointment and go. Okay. Regardless of whether he goes or not, you go without him. Okay. And have that person start to teach you how to speak to an addict to give you any possibility of getting through the fog of this into his brain,

and he remembers that he's a husband and a father more than he is a game player on a freaking iphone right i'm sorry he defies it because he works so much i don't care how much he works it doesn't mean you don't just because you work a lot doesn't mean you get to do cocaine sorry that's not how this this works. There's not a trade-off here. I think if I were in her shoes, his phone would suddenly go missing tonight. You think it would? Just look at you. It's almost like it ended up in the river

and no one knows how it got there. I have no idea where it is. You know, after I dropped it out of the car doing 95, I have no idea what happened to that phone. Exactly. It's somewhere between one of those mile markers back there. I know that's right. I have no idea, but to that phone. Exactly. It's somewhere between one of those mile markers back there. I know that's right. I have no idea.

But he'll have another one by morning if he's not well. That's true. This is The Ramsey Show. Jade Warshaw, Ramsey personality, is my co-host today. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Josh is in Indianapolis. Hey, Josh, how are you? Good, Mr. Ramsey.

How are you doing? Better than I deserve. What's up? So my wife and I are planning on making a baby soon. And the question is, how much money should we have saved up for our future before doing that? Well, at the very least, I would say if you're on the baby steps, whatever baby step that you're on, I would pause that. And then whatever money that you can stack up, stack up as much money as you possibly can.

And then once the baby is born, you can take that money and throw it on whatever baby step you're on. What baby step are you on? Well, so we have no debt. I'm 21. She's 20. We've been married you on? Well, so we have no debt. I'm 21, she's 20. We've been married for almost a year now. We have $8,500 in a cash emergency fund. So that's about three months of our fixed expenses. And then beyond that, we have just about seven grand in the bank and two paid-off used cars.

What's the other $7,000 for? What was that earmarked for? Well, so we have that sort of earmarked in three different buckets. We have a birthing fund. We're going to have a fully funded birthing fund of about $5,000. That's the goal. Is that like your deductible? So we're planning on doing sort of an at-home birth, which some of it will be covered, not all of it. So there's that.

So we have that bucket. We have a beginning of a Roth IRA. That's another bucket. And then we have a down payment for a house bucket. Josh, few humans in the history of mankind are as ready to have a child financially as you are. Is she even pregnant yet? No, no. We were thinking, we have, so Dave, we had a plan.

I got okayed by both the dads, my dad and her dad. I wanted to see if Uncle Dave would approve of this plan and if you would make any tweaks to it. I would make some tweaks. The prerequisites financially was it's a total of $28,000, $15,000 in house and investments savings, $5,000

for a birthing fund, and then $8,500 emergency fund. Let me make some tweaks. Do you mind? Yeah, go for it. Alright you're she's not pregnant yet so let's no let's wait until she's pregnant to pause but you've got money laying around here so i like the 8500 that's your three months um is she planning on working after the baby is born yeah she'll she'll have six weeks PTO. We have a grandma and a mom on her side that are both sort of on our way to work.

Okay, so she does plan on going back to work. She does, yeah. Okay, so you've got the $7,000 here. Whether or not you want to keep that for your home down payment fund, I actually think that's the best place for it. You mentioned that some of it was supposed to go into a Roth IRA. Yeah, i've been in talks with smart investor pro people and edward

jones uh interviewing all sorts of people trying to see who could manage the money the best okay the minimum it seems to be is five thousand to get it into one of these at least uh guided account management you know accounts so that's kind of the goal there so your goal is to say for baby step three be in do baby step four investing 15 at the same at the same time yeah yeah okay for down payment and would like to start investing okay sort of and then also you know how much money just in general should we have playing around before uh putting a kid in this world yeah you're good yeah i think Yeah. I think so too. I mean, once she gets pregnant, I like that you have some of this money set aside for Baby Step 3B

and investing. And if you wanted to save up your deductible, once she gets pregnant, I'm not mad at that either. Dustin's in Salt Lake City, Utah. Hi, Dustin. Welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hi, thanks for having me. Sure. Yeah, so about six years ago, I received some company stock on loan that I would be able to pay off in the previous six years. And it's coming due, and I'm a little bit unsure if I should have them take the stock back or if I should pay off the loan. That's a very unusual transaction. Are you sure you don't have options to buy the stock? Well, I was given options to buy the stock probably about 11 years ago, and then at the end of those, it expired in five years.

And at the end of the five years, I said, I don't have $30,000, but I'd love to be a member or a part owner of the company at that at that time so you borrowed thirty thousand dollars from who from the company oh oh who won't do your well no you're obviously not the owner of the company okay uh oh definitely um i mean can you not sell the stock it's it's privately owned it's uh yeah so i can't go so if you have you been paying payments or interest on the 30 000 yeah i've been paying uh about 600 a year what happens if you give up the stock to the money you've paid in? They just take it back.

So you're going to lose money on the transaction? Yeah. I've gone back and talked to them. They said, well, maybe this and maybe that. Maybe they'll give me stock to the the amount of the interest I've paid but nothing's definite at this point. How much has the stock

grown since you've borrowed to get it? It has gone up from 66 cents a stock to two dollars and 20 cents a share. But you can't do anything with it because it's privately held and it's restricted. Right. So it has no value at all to you except the cash that it creates. Have they been paying you dividends out on it while you were the owner of it, borrowed against? No, no dividends. Has it paid dividends to the other stockholders? No, not that I know of. Okay, I'm turning it in. Yeah. Here's the situation.

You have zero control over this, whether it makes money or doesn't make money. You can't sell it ever, except back to the company. It's a restricted, privately held company. It does not have a public exchange to it. And you have absolutely no control over its value none whatsoever so i you know if they want to give me some stock oh sure i'll take that i mean a free gift of anything i'll just about take as long as it's moral but the uh um but the but investing

in this you're a minority shareholder you have zero power to tell anybody what to do with anything. You're at their mercy, at the mercy of the handful of people that make the decision whether this goes up in value due to the way we run the company and make the decision as to whether there's any dividend distribution or not. And so I don't want to own any of that personally. And I'm certainly not going to pay for the opportunity to sort of own it by borrowing it. No, I think we'll just let him have it back, man. That's what I would do.

I have a question about this. What did he, because based on everything you're saying, this sounds horrible. What did he think he was getting? Because if he buys it, let's pretend he didn't borrow the money. Let's just say he bought into it and there's no dividends paying out there is no what did he think he was going to get well the company um they set the stock price it's not set by the marketplace because there is no marketplace because it's not publicly and so what you and when you own a company that's privately held um you you think the company is going to be successful and so the value of the

stock the stated value went from 66 cents to two dollars or something so if he had actually owned it and could sell it for the triple it went up triple 30 000 would have become 90 000 right but but he has to have a place to sell it and they that's my question and if you get ready to sell it you can't sell it on your schedule you have to scale it on when they're willing to buy back and do so they got to give him they got to be willing to hand him 90 000 to take his ownership portion away from him which is the stock so it's just it you don't have um any flexibility with this right and let's say he wanted to leave the company but he had all this company stock they would buy him out they would buy him out so they would have to at that point

pointing up the because they're not going to let a non-employee be walking around with this privately held stock in most cases anyway yeah it depends on i don't know his exact situation but that's most of those things are very it's tightly closely held that's what they call it privately held closely held and so um what he was hoping was to ride the value up as the value of the as the company becomes more successful and cash out someday someday and but but the day you don't have control over is the problem and you don't have control over is the problem. And you don't have control over how much it goes up in value. Because the company could actually grow a lot,

and the stock price not go up. That could happen. Interesting. This is The Ramsey Show. Thanks for joining us, America. This is The Ramsey Show. Jade Walshaw, Ramsey personality, is my co-host today. If you're joining us live from anywhere in America, you're joining us on Halloween.

Boo. The National Retail Federation believes Americans will continue spending this holiday season despite inflation. And they have proven it halloween alone is expected to reel in 12.2 billion dollars with the average participant spending 108 dollars and 24 cents this marks the a two billion dollar jump compared to last year for halloween frightening two billion That is frightening. Boo. Americans are expected to spend 4.1 billion on costumes alone. Wow. Pet costumes have become a recent trend that real dealers are capitalizing on. Pet owners are expected to spend around 700 million on dressing up their pets.

I'm a gas. I know. I can't get my... It's not good. It's a catastrophe. What do you think about that? Guys in the booth like that one. Catastrophe.

What a bum. Okay. That's why you get the big bucks. Well, here's the thing. It says there are countries with lower GDPs than 12.2 billion. So we spend more on Halloween than some countries even spend to just be there. Yeah. Listen, I'm not buying my pet a costume. If you want to buy your pet a costume, that's okay.

But let me tell you what you shouldn't be doing. Okay. You should not be buying your pet or yourself a costume if you're whining about student loan forgiveness. Uh-oh. You should not be buying your pet or yourself a costume if you've not been generous and given more than that amount away to someone, a human being that's in need like a hungry child versus your shih tzu with a tutu. I'm glad you said shih tzu. I'm just saying. Unbelievable.

Yeah, it's okay if you want to dress your pet up, but if your generosity factor is lower than your personal costume combined with your pet costume you have issues if you're broke and your kid is taking out a student loan because you don't have any money and they're going to college but your labrador retriever or worse your golden doodle is all doodled up yeah then i mean again it's not the issue is not actually the actual spending the issue is what you're not doing while you're spending that's right yeah that would drive that's that's you know in a country where all we hear about is all this drama about how house prices are so high you boomers don't understand you were able to buy a house for 13 and now you don't understand you're you're right

we don't understand while you're dressing up your golden doodle for halloween we don't understand you're right we we think you're nuts that That's true. Look, where I come from, if you had a roll of foil and a couple of old toilet paper rolls, you can make a costume. Well, I like a party, and I'm pretty much into candy and free candy coming from other people. I like the program. The program is a good program. I like the program. But if inflation is your problem, if you're worried about living paycheck to paycheck. You can't sit around and whine about wealth inequality when we spent $4.1 billion on costumes. But Americans are, the poor is getting poorer and the rich is getting richer.

Oh, my God. You just can't have both these things coming out of your mouth. It makes you look stupid. Yeah. It makes you look as stupid as you are when you do that stuff. So it's okay. Celebrate Halloween. Celebrate Christmas.

Celebrate your pets. Spend money on your pets. I don't care. But then don't tell me that there's hungry children in your neighborhood or within 25 miles of where you're sitting right now, and you haven't done something about feeding them.'s very good that's just wrong i mean we live in the wealthiest nation the world has ever known in terms of total dollars and and we prove it with this these kinds of numbers and so i i really am not the grinch i'm not against christmas and i guess the grinch

was probably for halloween i don't know how i don't know i don't know his exact stance on the grinch i haven't checked the grinch on halloween but he's probably pro halloween yeah he's probably pro halloween but um you know either way i'm not i'm not against all this i don't not against fun i like fun fun's a good thing but you shouldn't do it at the expense of the things that should be a priority yeah and you can't do it at the expense of the things that should be a priority. Yeah. And you can't do it while you're whining and complaining about. About the world coming to an end because it's so unfair out there while I'm running around chasing my own stupid tail. And you certainly shouldn't be putting it on credit cards.

Because I know some of y'all went over to Home Depot and those big giant skeletons that I see in everybody's yard and those tombstones. Those things are cool. They're giant. They're amazing, but they're like 500 bucks a pop. Yeah, my grandkids saw that the other day. Papa Dave, you got to get one of those. I didn't, but they told me I got to get one. Papa Dave, you didn't get one?

Papa Dave didn't get one. They're expensive. It's not that I'm not against large skeletons. I'm perfectly good. If you're a large skeleton, you're on my team. I'm just saying. I'm perfectly good. If you're a large skeleton, you're on my team. I'm just saying. I'm for you. I'm for the large skeleton union, and Dave, we're in good shape.

I support the union. Oh, boy. Oh, my gosh, y'all. Seriously. 12.2 billion. Billion. Billion. Billion.

It's a lot. That's 1,000 million. It says it's record spending. it says it's record spending oh it is record spending in one of the worst economies i mean the economy this time last year was boomtown compared to right now well you know what that's an interesting thing dave because you ever go out to dinner and it's like a tuesday night and it's not you can't get in a restaurant it's totally full can't get in a restaurant i'm like is this a Can't get in a restaurant right now. I'm like, is this a myth? Because when I go to Home Depot, people are buying the skeletons.

And when I go to dinner, it's packed full in there. It's the Walmart measure of the economy. If the economy is horrible, but the Walmart parking lot is full, something's wrong with your measure. Because Walmart customers are not usually known as the same customer as nordstrom that's true so if the walmart people are out there spending uh that tells you the economy's probably not as bad as somebody saying it is so i i think the economy is very slow right now i think it's very sluggish it is we've got these ridiculous high interest rates on houses right now. So let's dress up like a kid and have a party.

I guess that's the plan. It's kind of like during the Fauci pandemic when the booze sales. Oh, yeah. Wine and booze sales went through the roof. The liquor stores racked up. I mean, very few people made more during the Fauci pandemic than the liquor stores stores except the plexiglass people well it really goes to show that glass people cashed in now people will figure out a way to cope with whatever it is obviously in covid people did wine and beers and things like that that's what it is we traded one mask for another yeah oh whoa okay that's what

it is that's profound dave who knew so we got used to covering our faces that's what it is. That's profound, Dave. Who knew? So we got used to covering our faces. That's what it is. That's profound. I like it. So increase of $2 billion in Halloween spending this year. Interesting rant. Interesting discussion. It is interesting. The thing is, all we want you to do on all of these things is think.

I know it's a strain, but put down your phone and think think because if you in one breath are saying how horrible the world is and in another breath are spending 800 for a giant skeleton in your front yard something's off in your little deal right there baby you you need to think you need to think this through and so taking care of your kids taking care of your adult responsibilities and having a party can all happen at the same time there is not a problem with that got no issue with that at all but you can't just you can't have it both ways not Not in look intelligent. I mean, you look foolish when you try to do it both ways. It just doesn't play through for you. So consumers will be shopping early for festive decor and other related items.

Retailers are prepared with the inventory to help customers and their families take part in this popular and fun devil worship. I mean, tradition. You sounded like my parents. We couldn't resist. We couldn't resist. We made it too easy. It's an underhand pitch.

It was. This is The Ramsey Show. Jade Walsh, our Ramsey personality, is my co-host today. Kyle is in Nashville. Hi, Kyle. Welcome to The Ramsey Show. Hey, Dave. It-host today. Kyle is in Nashville. Hi, Kyle. Welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hey, Dave. It's an honor to talk to you.

You too, man. What's up? So I have two questions today. One is a little bit more straightforward. The other one probably a little bit more complex. So the short one is, I'm 29. I have a seven-month-old baby, and I have another baby coming in May. Yay!

Which is very exciting, yes. But with that, I'm struggling to figure out, given that and also being an entrepreneur, I feel like I should have more than six months' emergency fund saved. So I'm trying to figure out what's the right number there, and I'm kind of feeling like no matter where I get it to, I feel like it's not enough. So I'm curious. What event in your mind could occur or would occur that would require more than six months of your expenses to be covered?

You know, as an entrepreneur, I feel like I'm always thinking worst-case scenarios. I'm like, if there's a big recession or who knows if all of our business what is the likelihood you're going to go six months with zero income probably pretty unlikely yeah like because as an entrepreneur you would like get a job true before that happened right yes sir are you start you close that business start another one i don't know but i've never i've been an entrepreneur in my whole life i've Yes, sir. Yeah. And I've been through some pretty catastrophic bull crap, but I still didn't go without an income.

What do you do? What's your self-employed work? What do you do? I have a video production firm. Does your business have savings? It does. We try to keep three months of runway on hand in cash. Yeah, then I think you're good.

I think if you have your six months. How old are you? I am 29. 29 with a seven-month-old and a baby on the way. Yes, sir. You know what you are? You're a good dad. That's what you what you are? You're a good dad. That's what you are. No, you're a good dad.

That's why you're thinking about this, because you're concerned about taking care of your babies. That's what's making you think about this. But your math is fine. But the fact that you're worried about this, it doesn't mean your system's broken. All that means is you're a good man. You just looked around and went,

I've got responsibilities and I need to act like it. So you're good. You're good. Okay, awesome. And so with that, if I have extra in my current emergency fund, should I reallocate that towards something else, put it into investments, put it on the mortgage? It's not going to kill you. kills you is the concept okay let's say you had seven months instead of six

months and you didn't reallocate it that's not going to keep you from becoming a millionaire you understand but continually adding to that and looking up there's a hundred and seven thousand dollars in there because you continually haven't dealt intellectually with this emotional concern, then yeah, then you've gotten yourself over into stupid land at that point, right? Yes. Well, I feel like I am in stupid land because that's exactly how much I have in my birth to keep on right now. $107,000.

I have in a high-yield account, but yeah. Hold on. Hold on. hold on. Oh, wow. In what planet is $100,000 six months of your expenses? It's not. I was shooting for a year, and I justified it by saying, hey, well, I'm self-employed. My wife's only working part-time now,

so I should have more than the normal person. So on what planet is $50,000 six months of expenses? You have $10,000 a month of expenses? Well, that kind of leads into my next question on whether or not my wife and I need to downsize our house. How much is your house payment? House payment is $4,200. Okay, then $50 50 000 would be there okay huh all right yep and so with that what do you make a year

so uh with bonuses uh take home is between like 300 honey you own the company what's your taxable income that That's it. It's what? So my personal take-home pay combined with my wife, like our take-home after taxes is $300,000 to $350,000 a year. Way to go. Okay. All right. Then maybe $100,000 is not too much. If $100,000 represents six months of expenses and you have $48,000,

well, that's annualized. No, you have $24,000 as your house payment for six months of expenses and you have 48,000, well, that's annualized. No, you have 24,000 as your house payment for six months. So 50 or 60 grand is probably enough. The point is you can't keep doing what you're doing. You can't make 100 into 200, into 300, into 400 in savings and high-yield savings. That doesn't make it smart. High-yield savings isn't even keeping up with inflation. So, I mean, you've got Biden inflation at 9%, high-yield savings paying 4 or 5.

So you're running backwards on every one of those dollars. Are you investing at all? I am, yes. I've started doing 15%. Yeah, and you've got a house payment. So I'm going to take $40,000 or $30,000 of that. I'm going to decide $60,000 or 30 000 of that i'm gonna decide 60 or 70 is my emergency fund anything beyond that i'm gonna throw it at the house and i'm

gonna start throwing everything at the house from now on beyond 15 following the baby steps exactly so yeah your income was a little skewed more than i thought for some reason i had a more normal income in my head but you're making a lot of money he's doing good you're doing really doing so well yeah you're doing really good but yeah the point is a tiny bit more or less of something is not what's going to kill you it's the concept that'll kill you if you extrapolate it you know and extend it out into the into oblivion caroline is with us in chicago hi caroline how are Good. Thanks for taking my call. Sure. What's up?

So I am about my lease on my car is going to be up in a couple of months. Yay. And I don't haven't listened to your show a whole lot. You've probably covered this, but I'm 64. Right around the same time my lease is up. I will, you know, turn 65, go on Medicare. I'm semi-retired. I have a little business I run out of my home.

So I'm trying to decide. This is my fourth lease in a row. What's your net worth? I'm not sure. How much do you have in savings? Investments and savings in retirement. I've got about $175 in investments. In cash, I've probably... Hang on, let me look at my stuff here. I mean, in cash,

I have $50,000 to $60,000 in cash. You have any other investments? Like retirement investments or 401k or Roth IRA or something like that you're not telling me about yet yeah I mean that's part of the 175 I've got so if we cashed if we cashed you out you're you got 200 grand my house is paid off what's it worth um 375 okay all right so Caroline let me give you a couple of guidelines since you're not a normal listener. Okay? Okay. A car lease, we call them car fleeces because they're the most expensive way to operate a vehicle. You basically are borrowing the money at an average of 14% interest.

That's what they come, 14.2% is the average capitalization on the American car lease. All right. Okay. And so if you backed into the actual interest that you're paying, and you can back it out of the numbers, if you know how to run the numbers on this, that you're going to find, you know, 10% to 20% interest somewhere in there is what you're paying. The average nationally is 14.2%. So consumer reports, many other people have documented that the car lease is the most expensive way to operate a vehicle. Never lease a car. Okay. Rule number two,

never invest in a brand new vehicle unless you've got a net worth in excess of a million dollars. And the reason is that new vehicles go down faster in value. You lose more money and you don't have the money to lose. In your case, you don't have the money to lose. You're 65 years old. You've got a paid for home. You got $200,000 to your name. You don't have $2 million to your name.

And so you don't need to turn a $50,000 car into a $10,000 car over the next six years, which is what's going to happen if you're driving one. So buy a one or a two-year-old used car and pay cash for it for the rest of your life, unless you inherit some money or get some money and end up with over a million dollar net worth. Do not buy new cars, folks. You can't afford the loss. And you certainly can't afford to lease them and get fleeced. It's the most expensive way to operate a vehicle. Drive a one or a two-year-old car, perfectly fine, and pay cash for them.

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