The Ramsey Show - App - Passion Without Hard Work Is Just a Dream

Episode Date: June 16, 2025

Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Ramsey Show where we help people build wealth, do work that they love and create actual amazing relationships I'm Dave Ramsey your host dr. John Delaney number one best-selling author host of the dr. John Delaney show on the Ramsey Networks one of our big hits and Ramsey personality he's my co-host today Jen is with Jen is with us in Seattle hi Jen how are you hi I'm good thank you what's up how are you? Hi, I'm good, thank you. What's up? Hey, so I want to know I'm not nuts. You called the wrong two guys for that one. Go for it. I think one of the biggest gaslighters I know. And so, you know, there was a few years ago, I was like, started questioning because he

came up, our 20th anniversary was three years ago, and he had withdrawn. We have a joint checking and then it's, uh, and then my checking. So we, and we see both. So we, we see what's going in and out and whatever anyway. And so in, in the joint checking, um, most of the money that we get collectively goes in there. And I started thinking, you know, it doesn't grow. Like it stayed at 28, 29, $30,000 consistently.

And I'm like, okay. So then on our anniversary, three years ago, he pulled four grand and I said, Hey, what, what, what'd you do? And he's, Oh, I knew you noticed that. Oh, I have, we have an anniversary coming up. So our anniversary gets here and he, um, has a key with a boat float and said brings me to the pier and says here honey I bought you a boat for your anniversary and I'm like oh wow so I assume this is a bass boat it's It's a 28 foot cabin cruiser at the harbor in a slip. Are you a boating gal? Well he manages a marine store and he's been involved with boats his whole life.

That's not what I asked. Are you a boating person or is this like me buying my wife a new deer rifle for her? Here and there. Here and there. You know, we go kayaking and whatever and it's like, gosh, it always would be nice, you know, I've always said it'd be nice to have like a putz around boat. So you got a $4,000 down payment, a big bunch of payments on a 28-foot cruiser. What's the story? How can we help you? No, we had cash stashed. I found out that he had hidden $ thousand dollars hidden money because I thought where did

this money come from and I started going through the closet thinking I'm gonna find it. He's got money hidden in here somewhere and I found fifteen grand a year later. In cash? In cash. So he's been hiding and being deceitful with cash. Why? And I don't know. I confronted him. I confronted him finally and I said, what the heck's going on? So he said, I thought I was doing something good. I put money away and I'm like, but you need to hide it. In the closet? In the closet, in a pouch that was very well hidden, but I found it.

And, um... Okay, so the big issue here is you don't believe his answer. No, I don't believe his answer. And when you start popping up with big ticket items and go, look, honey, I got this for you. And there's alcohol involved too. There's alcohol abuse. So, I did. Let me say it like this. I have, when I am an anxious guy, and over the course of my marriage,

when like a major world event is happening, I have told my wife, I would feel comfortable if we had some cash at the house. And she rolls her eyes and says, okay. And we agree on a number and I go get some cash because I'm dramatic. But the key there is I told her. I didn't hide it. You told her. Thank you. And so why is he deceitful with you? What's the problem? Why is he doing that?

I have no idea. Yeah, you do. You have some idea. Well, he has told me in the past that you like to spend money. And I'm like, I help my daughter or I help my mom and dad. I don't go buy. I am not a clothes and boutique in person. Do you talk to him about those purchases? Or are you both doing the same thing behind closed doors? Yeah, no, no, no, no, not behind closed doors. I'll come up with whatever and it's like, yeah,

I got this. And he's like, great, honey, or whatever, you know, and that's fine. Or my dad broke his back. I'm going to send them a mattress so that it's good for his back because they can't afford $2,000 for a Tempur-Pedic, whatever, you know what I mean? He's like, go ahead and do that and whatnot. So there's justification that I can do this, but I tell him, I tell you what I'm doing, and you're not being honest and truthful. If you're hiding liquor and you're hiding money,

I don't believe you at all. Yes, you're right to do that. Thank you. But if you, I guess the challenge for you to have is if you go to him and say, my dad broke his back, so I'm gonna do this with our money, instead of saying, I would love to honor my old man. You get what I'm saying?

But other than that, I don't know. Dave, what do you think? I mean, yeah, if he's stealing thousands of dollars and hiding them, the bigger deal is you don't trust him. If my wife found $15,000 in cash, she would have questions, obviously, but her first default setting wouldn't be, you're preparing to run away,

or you have a problem with addiction. She would think, hey, you need to go see a counselor because you're spinning out on me again. But it would not, but your default is to, I don't trust this guy and he's doing something nefarious, which like me and Dave both said, you know other things are going on, right? Right, right.

Then what makes you not trust yourself? Do you not wanna deal with what you know to be true? No, we have a tumultuous relationship anyway. You're kidding. Yeah. I'm so shocked. Is he planning an exit strategy here? But the thing that really bothers me is that $65,000

of that is for caretaking for my son that has Down syndrome. And when I met my husband, my son was 15. $65,000 of what? My son's income. No, I mean, wait a minute, I had $ husband, my son was 15. $65,000 of what? My son's income. No, I mean, wait a minute. I had $15,000 in the closet and I had a cabin cruiser. Now I'm at $65,000. What happened?

I just got lost. Yeah, where's that money? $65,000 a year goes into our account. So on a monthly basis, divide that up, but it's 65,000 total a year. That goes into our joint checking that he keeps pulling money out of and hiding. You don't need 65,000 to care for a Down syndrome child? No, we don't. Okay. So you're being melodramatic. You brought the kid in as a flag wave here.

All you've got is a husband. you and him are not in agreement on where the freaking money's going. He feels nagged about the alcohol, he feels nagged about anything you spend too much, and so he's spurred money away. So you guys need to sit down with a good marriage counselor and decide if you're going to go forward. If you're going to go forward, and I think you should, then what you're going to do is you're going to quit all these side deals both of you

You're gonna have one freaking account and both of you are gonna do one budget and you're both gonna be in agreement on Everything that goes out of this house and there's no you know There's no coming out of the closet with 15 grand right in your hand and there's no buying boats Surprise, honey. Look what I bought that i wanted and called it your anniversary gift support and there's no uh... i get i have to protect everything from you because you're deceitful you've got to get you guys gotta get on basis of trust here

and the trust is going to come from transparency and working together and both of you have a vote and that's going to come in a marriage counselor's office you If you don't do that, you're probably divorced within a year. Amen. Hey John, let's do a little mini seminar right quick. Uh oh. Well, I mean the number of times that we find people that are hiding money or buying things or doing purchases without their spouse and to me when that's happening it is not the thing

it's not the actual hiding that's the problem it's the fact that that is a symptom of a broken relationship. Always and when yes, when you can't go to your spouse and say I'm scared about something, I'm frustrated about something, I'm uneasy about something, then that, yeah, then it manifests itself in a bunch of different ways. Or because I watch you behave, you know, give money to your whoever, your family,

or because I watch you spend, I'm a saver, I'm activated, I'm gonna go over here and that's my permission then to revenge, save, deceitfully. Instead of saying, we've gotta get on the same page. Scorekeeping is one of the most devastating things to a marriage. That's what it is, that's what it is. And, cause there's always a justification.

Always. For why I deceive. You did this so I get to do this. You have the budget so tight that I couldn't breathe. So I had to hide my target purchases under the bed. Right. Or whatever. You helped out your ailing father.

So I got to buy a boat. Just nonsense. Yeah. That, which is asinine. Yeah, it's stupid. Obviously. So the, but, so what is the fix? The fix is to, if you have the, the urge to hide or, uh, or a concern about your spouse, uh, over saving, over giving, over spending,

um, under organizing, um, you have really one healthy option and that's put that in the middle of the kitchen table and set it on fire until we deal with it. That's right and the best way to do that is to start that conversation not with a you statement but with an I statement. When you sit down and say you've been hiding now we're in a war and your partner's good your spouse is gonna defend themselves. If you sit down and say, I'm feeling this, I'm scared about, I'm struggling with, then that's an invitation. It occurs to me that for most people, they see conflict as fearful.

They're fearful of doing conflict. So when that guy hides 15,000 in the closet, he's being a coward. Correct. Because he didn't have enough courage to sit down with his own wife and say, I'm not okay with the way this is going. Well, what I would say in that case, in that situation, I think there's a threshold. If you're hiding, I don't know, you're looking at websites that you know your spouse would be upset about. You're hiding things. Those are bellwether issues you got to deal with in your marriage. When you start hiding $15,000 in cash and you got a drinking problem and you're buying boats, you're hiding an addiction. You're hiding much bigger things. Right. Yeah, but what I'm saying is I'm talking to the guy or the gal that says I feel the need to do a thing on the side, whatever that is, rather than deal with my spouse.

Yes, so it's either cowardice or it is fear. Like you're going to hurt me, you're going to take everything and leave me, or it is I'm scared that I'm not going to get my way. Cowardice is fear. There you go. So both of them are fear. So in other words, it requires more courage to do it, to put an issue on the table and solve for unity. Correct. Than it does to do this nefarious crap off to the side. Yes. Or have my own account. I need my own account because I can't be with you on this. The most courageous thing you can do is put on a table and deal with it. And solve for unity. That's right. And solve for that. Because that level of conflict is not as devastating,

but what it does is it forces you to say, okay, really at the core of this is I don't trust you. At the core of this is I don't respect your earning ability. I don't respect your, you're not being a grown up with the handling of the money. You're immature. Or I'm not getting what I want, so I'm going to do this thing, which goes against what you said, solve for unity. If I could get every couple in America to solve for unity, you'd do away with a lot of challenges. Most people are solving, most people use their marriage as a way to self-actualize themselves, and so they're not solving for unity. They're solving for what can I get away with so I can get what I want? And that's not how healthy marriages last over time. Yeah. I mean, I remember like I was buying a

we had a couple C dos down at the lake and They broke down two times in one summer and I can't stand a dad-gum boat that doesn't work drive me nuts So you don't spend enough time there anyway, you don't want to be working on a stupid boat So I told Sharon I said I think we need to upgrade these C dos So when the grandkids and everybody's down here the stupid things work. And she's like, Oh, what's that going to cost? And I told her and she's like, I don't think so. I'm like, yeah, but I think so. I would love to, I would pay, yeah, but I mean, but I don't think so, but I don't think so. But the other option would have been, she just shows up and there's two C-dos sitting there, correct?

Which I could easily do right from a tactical stance. She probably wouldn't notice. But here's the, yeah, she wouldn't notice. Okay. She would have. Yeah. That one wouldn't have but here's the yeah she wouldn't notice okay she would yeah that one wouldn't got by her no but the but the point is is that it was more important to force ourselves into a unified decision than a purchase was important I love that yes and that's what you've got it you got decide, which is more important. What's more important, having savings or being unified? That's right.

Being unified. And you know, every spouse is different, you know, when I put this on the table, this is going to be three hours. I know this. Or it's going to cost me X. And that is worth it so that we are together on this. Yeah, I mean, yeah, I have to deal with all the feelings like I have to get my wife's permission. I must be a wuss.

No, I don't. I have decided that the best way to handle money and marriage and to have a great life is to be unified in these decisions. That is a decision I made. I have a better life when I solve for that than if I just do whatever I want to do. Then a temporarily comfortable life that then explodes on you. Exactly!

It's short-term thinking. That's right. It's Michael Ischer. We're going to do hard stuff day by day so that we don't have nuclear implosions at the end. Well, and then wonder why we don't...but these little...the Bible says the little foxes spoil the vine. These little details just swept under the rug, swept under the little foxes spoil the vine, these little details

just swept under the rug, swept under the rug, swept under the rug, and then we're griped because we got a lumpy rug. That's right. The best we have ever heard it said is, conflict deferred is conflict amplified. Yeah, yeah. You're going to have a bunch of little skirmishes, that's fine. That's it. If you don't, you'll have a world war.

My point is you're kidding yourself when you think you got away with this. Right. Or you think that running it in a disunified chaotic manner is actually working. It works for us. I've heard people tell me that on the air. Oh, that system works for us. No, it doesn't. No, it doesn't. It just means you don't have to deal with it right now. It preserves false peace. These things have a high, as Les Perott says, a high rate of resurrection. Yeah. These zombies come back to life and they will

come through and choke your family out. I mean. And look at this guy here. It's very similar to when you sit down with folks who have done pretty big white collar crime. It started with, I ran up on the weekend to grab a thing and I went ahead and grabbed this too. And I was gonna pay it back. My petty cash on the desk, I grabbed my neighbors because I needed this thing, but I'm gonna pay it back. And this guy pulled, I guarantee you, he pulled a couple hundred bucks and put an envelope and put another hundred bucks and then put a thousand bucks

and then bought a wife a boat to look over here. And all of a sudden you look up and you've got $15,000 that you're hiding. You can't just pull that in one fell swoop and it just builds on you look up and you've got $15,000 that you're hiding. You can't just pull that in one fell swoop and it just builds on you and builds on you and builds on you. The Mansfield talks about the leaders that fail, but it also, I think it applies to just people that fail, marriages that fail too, is they, sometimes the person builds a side

secret life. And so when I see hidden alcohol, that's one thing, when I see hidden alcohol that's one thing when I see hidden alcohol and I see hidden 15,000 and I see the third piece is a surprise boat I'm betting on an affair big time I would percentage wise absolutely because he's building he's built his side life he's got another world got a separate life over there, a second world. And when you, you know, it's almost like these video games where you build your own little world thing,

but people literally physically do that in the real world. And they build a side life that they think is a secret life. And buddy, when those things come out, everything melts down. It all does. There's too many, too many different secrets in that story that I didn't get a check. What'd you get? Oh, he's got another world. Yeah, he's got a whole other planet.

Yeah, a whole other planet that's his. But if you find yourself having to create an alt universe to survive in, you got to deal with that. You should have dealt with your main universe is our point. You took the coward's way out, hiding the stuff on the side. Erin's in Los Angeles. Hi Erin, how are you? I'm good. Thank you for having me. Sure, what's up? So, my husband and I got married two years ago and we both have started late with retirement savings. We're in baby steps too. And I, a year ago started a really lucrative position and it's just going to

grow over time to even more lucrative, which is wonderful. But, and I love the job, but it's not my dream. Our dream is to move to the Caribbean and start a bed and breakfast and, um, maybe an off road company. But we don't have a lot in retirement. So, um, I'm just wondering how soon I could quit the lucrative job and how much I need to have in reserves before I can do that. We have a, we have a child, so I don't want to be irresponsible, but we do want to chase that dream someday.

Okay. What do you make? So right now I'm making around 150 and my husband makes around 130. Okay, so we got 280 to work with in Los Angeles. Okay. So you're not rich. So you're about minimum wage, yes. Yes.

And how much debt do you guys have? We have about $50,000. It sounds to me like what I would be doing is first you need to go through baby steps 1, 2, and 3. You need to get out of debt and have an emergency fund before we even start talk about any of these things I assume quitting your job is simultaneous with you moving to the Caribbean and doing that and building the business there right right okay all right and so I would be putting 15% of my income away and baby step four into retirement and then I would be saving like a crazy person

aside from that into an investment For to buy the B&B and to start the four-wheel business Mm-hmm, and you need to probably go to the Caribbean on some of your vacations and talk to people that have got businesses like that for sale or on some of your vacations and talk to people that have got businesses like that for sale or B&B, you know, look at look at properties in the particular island you're thinking of, learn what the regulations are for operating on those islands, what the governmental structure looks like and so forth because it is different from island to island for sure and the market, real estate market would be different, the B&B market would be different and you know develop a business plan while you're on vacation mess around with it because it's gonna take a while and go okay what

do we need well we need a half million dollars or we need a million dollars or what do we need to do this and then that becomes your savings target and you start working towards that okay you don't like that answer? No, it's not that. I was just hoping for more of an, I know everyone's different, but like while we're in this position, I want to stack up money cause we don't have long in retirement. And I'm 43. So it's like, if we stack up, do we need a million dollars before I can quit the job? Well I don't know. I don't

know what you need to start the other business down there. That's what I'm telling you to go do the research and find out. Okay, because we have a good match with the 401k so I'm just wondering, you know, how much we need there before I can quit a lucrative job and take a risk. You can't quit a lucrative job and take a risk because You can't quit a lucrative job and take a risk because you don't have the money to start the next gig if it's all in the 401k. Oh, right.

So that's what I'm telling you, put 15% of your income into retirement in 401k and then above that, start saving to buy the first B&B or to buy the B&B and then figure out what it's gonna take to add a four-wheeler operation. You could add that as phase two of this. You could move down there, start the B&B or to buy the B&B and then figure out what it's going to take to add a four-wheeler operation you could add that as phase two of this you could move down there start the B&B live on that now if you're 59 and a half before this happens you could use some of the 401k money to do that yeah but okay but that's 15 years so I don't know that that takes this long. But the more, you know,

the way I start looking at that one, because I have a business goal if I'm you, and I've been in the exact same situation, I've got a set of money here beyond my retirement that I can do something with. I'm already putting 15% of my income into retirement and I got a set of money I can do something with and I can spend it, I can give it, and I could squirt it away for the Caribbean B&B. So every dollar you spend vacating, buying cars, other LA crap is another day you're delaying quitting your job and going to the Caribbean. So these are trade-offs.

And so once I've got that identified, then I'm gonna be trading off like crazy. I'm gonna be going, no, I'm working towards this goal, and so I don't really need to go on that vacation. So Dave, help me with this, because I'm developing a strong allergy to the words, I wanna follow my dream or follow my passion. I'm hearing it more and more as a hack to life. I don't wanna do this, so I'm just gonna chase this thing.

One of the things I've learned sitting ringside with you over the last five years is people who go chase a thing, it does work, but those are the ones that Supernova, but a lot of those things, when you try to, like I wanna have a coffee shop in this city. Nobody ever asks or a few people ask, does the people in that city need another coffee shop? And what I've learned by sitting with you is,

it was, I wanna teach this stuff about how to get out of debt and you look up and you have a Sunday school class with a thousand people showing up every week, or people keep asking me, how do I do this in my business? Like, I'll start talking about leadership then, and then entrees born. And then, man, I wish we taught this in high schools, but it's a constant response to the market,

not a, I wanna go out and do a thing. Cause man, I just feel like you get yourself in a lot of trouble. And I don't wanna tell people, don't follow your dreams, cause that's important. But man, you gotta understand also that people have to be asking for this thing. And I don't know how tell people don't follow your dreams because that's important, but man, you got to understand also that people have to be asking for this thing. I don't know how to find that matrix.

Mm-hmm. Right? Because I'm sure people told whoever, if you start this company, you're an idiot. I wouldn't do that. And they just kept pressing and pressing, and it works. But man, there is a trail of people who just wanted to go start a candle company, and it didn't

work. And well, they had a, uh, an incomplete picture of starting a candle company or starting an Airbnb. So the thing is when it's at the stage she's at, it's at the dream stage and it's so dream is probably the right word. The trick of changing it from a dream into a

vision is a goal and then into a goal and then put work clothes on it and break it down into tactical pieces of how we're going to execute. And then you start to realize this dream is not all unicorns and skittles. There's actually freaking work involved in the Caribbean. You have governments that are unstable and you have, I don't know, if you had something like COVID happen, you could be completely bankrupted if you did the Airbnb wrong because nobody's allowed on or off the island for a year and a half. Or you get it all lined up and it's perfect and you realize, oh, our take home is going

to be $19,000 this year. Yeah. That's it. Because we didn't do the- And we're used to 280. Right. You know, and so these dreams can become nightmares if you don't walk through them like a grownup. But sometimes when you say, I just want to live my dream, and she wasn't saying that.

I'm making fun of her, but I'm with you. I get that a lot these days. Follow your passion. And my crow always laughs and says, no, why don't you try working? And so, but I wanna follow my dream. It's like sometimes when someone's saying that, and I'm not accusing, this is the last caller of this,

she may or may not be, but I'm not accusing her, but in general, the revulsion you have to this same one I have have is it's like, okay, because I have a dream, the rules don't apply to me. The world needs to bend to what I... I can just go do this tomorrow. I can microwave it because it's in my heart and I want to do it. And that's a child. Gotcha.

That's a childish behavior. And so the adult reaction to that is, okay, I'm gonna take it from a dream to a vision to a goal. I'm gonna put work clothes on this thing and find out how you get bugs out of a house in the Caribbean, because there's gonna be bugs there. And I can't have them in the bed with those people that are staying here,

because I'll get a bad TripAdvisor review and the whole stinking thing is going up in flames. Yeah, hello, how do you kill bugs? And so, I mean, you're gonna get down into that kind of stuff before you find out that this dream actually is a business and it's like, it's not always fun. Or what I hear often is people love a small subsection

of people, myself included, love going to coffeeshops, love the feeling of going to a coffee shop. And the thought is, I want this to be my life all the time. And they think buying a coffee shop and running thought is I want this to be my life all the time and they think buying a coffee shop and running one is going to feel like that or I had a great experience at a B&B in the Caribbean a few times. This is the life I want to live. That's different than running a business there. Yeah.

I mean, four wheelers, 100% of them roll over and you have medical bills. Always. 100% of them roll over and you have medical bills. Always. 100% of them break down. 100% of them have to be replaced about every three years if they're in a rental program. So it's- But they are fun, right? Yeah, but for the 30 minutes you're on one, it's a blast.

It's 100% though. This is the Ramsey Show. Scott's in New Orleans. Hey Scott, how are you? Hey, good afternoon Dave. Thanks for having me. Sure. What's up? I was wondering, my stepdad is in his 80s and my mom is in her 60s and he is likely

to pass before her, but through their pre-nup he will not be leaving her anything and she is not that well off. I was wondering if that's right or not. How long they've been married? Five years. Okay. Um, well I mean it's what she signed up for. So it's not it's not morally wrong. Um, uh, but I would, you know, I would come down on the side of I wouldn't do that to my wife. So right, I don't think she needs to be treated like one of his kids equally, maybe, but maybe to leave her something so that she's not a destitute widow.

Yeah, well, she they've been married. They've been married for how long? Five years. Okay, so she's 60 and she was 55. She had no money when she was 55? She has no savings. She went into this, she went into this marriage destitute. Pretty much. Well then she's not net destitute now, she would be pretty much now. Unless she spent that money or something. What'd she do with it? Well it's all wrapped up in her house. Okay, where's, she owns a house.

Right, but she's going to have to sell it out eventually. The only reason that she's still in it is because he doesn't want to move right now So they live in her house correct, okay, and His assets have been supporting that a Lot of it. Yeah, okay, so she can't afford to live there without him, correct Okay, how was she affording to live there before him? That's why she has no savings. She wiped it out staying in that house. I think Correct. Okay, how was she affording to live there before him? That's why she has no savings.

She wiped it out, staying in that house, I think. Okay. All right. Did your dad leave or pass away? They got divorced. They got divorced, okay. Yeah, so she held onto a house, kept a house she couldn't afford all that time and drained herself down.

We were out of high school, but she never got rid of it after we left. Yeah, she drained herself down. We were out of high school, but she never got rid of it after we left. Yeah, she drained herself down. Okay, so I can go back to being on the side of I want him to leave or something, but I also want you to reframe this in your mind. She's not destitute. She owns a house. So you need to quit saying that. And she can sell the house and she can have a life and if she doesn't have any money it's because she never handled the

money right to start with not because of him mm-hmm the fact that she's not set up okay at this stage of the game is her fault not his I agree with that okay so Okay so let's not make him a villain in this because it was a little bit felt that way for a minute. I was getting ready to call him a villain for a second there but I'm not. So now and so she signed up and said okay pre-nup is I keep my house you move in we do expenses you cover expenses or whatever but whatever wealth you have attained will go to your children upon your death

And you're 20 years older than me, so you will probably pre-decease me statistically So that's what that's the deal they signed up for five years ago Okay, are his kids gonna Sue her for his part of that house. He doesn't have any part of that house It was hers before they got married. Preenup says she keeps her house. Okay, okay. But he's paying into it.

He's paying the bills. Yeah, but she's not going to have that anymore, so she'll have to sell the house. And she's 60 years old. So what's the house worth? Probably $700,000. Is it paid for? No, she owes $250 owes 250. Okay. All right Do you not like this guy

No, I just don't think that she's getting the full benefits of a marriage By not having financial security if he were to leave. I mean she would have to change her lifestyle completely and Probably but she was going to anyway. She's gonna have to anyway. I guess so, yes. Yeah, because she could... what she was doing wasn't sustainable. You already said that, right? Right. Before this guy. Right.

So she was getting rid of changing her lifestyle anyway. So the fact that he came along actually extended her ability to stay in a property that she couldn't afford. So, if I'm in his shoes, I would want to make sure she was better taken care of than what you're describing. So I agree with your sentiment on that. You're asking this as a question, but you're really making a statement. And I'm okay with both. So, yeah, I would, if I was in his shoes. Now, if I'm not in his shoes and I put on her shoes, this is the trip she signed up for. And so she needs to start making plans now to be ready to sell that house when he dies. And move to a property that she can pay cash for with the equity of the house. Hopefully he lives a few more years and the house is worth a million and the debt goes down and so

she's going to clear 800 instead of clearing 500 like she would today. I mean if he lives, every year he lives the debt goes down the house goes up so her asset is increasing in value and her livelihood which is her entire livelihood. I assume she's not working. Correct. Okay. And she's gonna have to change that because she's got this looming math problem over her head. Oh, she just changes the perception of when he dies, the house is sold. And the longer he lives, the more money that means for her. Because the is going to go up in value that it's

going to go down because this is the deal she signed up for. But you don't think she needs to get a job now too? Yeah she probably should. Start sucking some money away? Yeah she's 60 years old, you know go work five years and put you know put a couple hundred thousand bucks in a bank in a 401k and then when he dies you're okay. And if he doesn't want her to go to work, then he needs to change his will. It's pretty nice. You know, if she, he needs to stay home, she needs to stay home and take care of me, I'm old. Okay, cool. Then you need to change your will. And you know, the caretaking is going to cost you some money, buddy.

You know, because otherwise I don't have a sustainable thing, because I signed up for a deal. You signed up. We both signed up for a deal here with our eyes wide open that's a bad deal, yeah. Yeah, the prenup is different than the will too, by the way. So prenup would not, but prenup probably addresses the will, but in terms of prenup would be not upon death, it would be upon divorce.

The will actually would be the dictating document. Yeah, he, I would want to say if I was married, you know, something happened to Sharon, I got remarried, that I would want that person to be taken care of and I would assume that my children, if I'm, if I marry a lady, it means I love her, that my children would want her to be taken care of. Right. But, but not to have the full extent of, of the... if I marry a lady, it means I love her, that my children would want her to be taken care of. But not to have the full extent of the- That's fine, yeah, he didn't have to get a full half cut or a full cut. The Ramsey, yeah,

the fortune, right? No, no, no. But we're not gonna do that. But actually not. Yeah, make sure she's okay. But also, again, man, I always hate talking bad about somebody's mom, so don't hear me say, talk about her, but she has a pattern of pushing off reality. Kicking the can down the road. And like we were talking about earlier in this show,

like it's, that conflict will come up and it's just gonna be, she's gonna be 75 and he dies at 95 and she'll have nothing and then she won't be able to just go get a job like you might be able to when you're 60. Yeah, I would go create an income right now. Right now, yeah. And I would start- That's my mom,

I have to say. I would have a, go through the mental exercise of if he dies this year, what is my plan? There you go. And if he dies next year, what is my plan? And it sounds like the plan is you're gonna be selling the house. Well, no matter what, we're selling that house, but if we have to buy a condo with cash,

then maybe we only have 300,000 left or 200,000 left. And so we need to have some more money in the account when that day comes. Yeah, yeah, but yeah, I left or 200,000 left. And so we need to have some more money in the account when that day comes. Yeah, yeah, but yeah, I think it is, so I agree with your sentiment that, if I were in his shoes, I would wanna make sure she was taken care of. And that's Scott's sentiment,

and I don't disagree with that, but it doesn't make the guy a villain because your mom signed up for this. This is the deal she signed into. And she's kicked things down the road. because your mom signed up for this. This is the deal she signed into. And she's kicked things down the road. So she needs to come up with a plan to take care of herself,

which is what she should have been doing five years ago anyway, sustainable situation, because he's not gonna be here. And he's not leaving or anything. The calls I'm increasingly getting are from children are children are have two young kids or three young kids and their finances are tight and

they're staring down the barrel of a parent or parents who just refuse to acknowledge reality and they're starting to say I see myself becoming a caretaker like the trains coming at me and mom and dad won't do anything about it. Sandwich generation stuck between my kids and my parents yeah that's the money going both directions that's a problem but I think the way you deal with it I think it's a real good idea since they were so smart to put everything on paper up front let's just go and talk about the implications of that

mom he dies yourself 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. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host, Dr. John Delaney, number one bestselling author, host of the Dr. John Delaney Show on the Ramsey Networks. Ramsey personality, he's my co-host. Katie's in Spokane. Hi, Katie.

How are you? I'm doing great. Thank you, Dave. Thanks for taking my call. Sure. What's up? So, I have kind of a tricky situation with my mom. My husband and I are doing great.

We are on baby step six. We're debt free except their mortgage. Um, and we are in the position of, um, we provide a home for my mom. She was widowed in 2013 and my father passed away, leaving her with a mountain of debt, medical debt, that they'd accrued over the years and she filed bankruptcy and then later sold her house. So she is sitting on about a hundred thousand left from that but we provide a home for her

we charge her like a quarter of the rent that she would because we built a mother in law when we built our house my question is so she lives next door to you or adjacent to you yes we have like a shop apartment that she lives in currently. Oh, I got you. Okay, so she's on your property that you're not providing her a standalone separate home. I got you. Okay. Yeah, it's like an apartment on the property. It's separate from the house. And how old is she? She is currently, I believe she'll be 69 this year. Okay. Cool. All right. Yeah. So can she, when my father passed away, she decided not to get a job again. Um, she wanted to be there for grandkids. There's, you know,

seven children in our family and lots of grandkids. Um, we've tried to advise her to get a job. She has not. Um, so we provide her a place because she can't really afford ranch. So my $2,000 social security. My problem is I have an older sibling who her whole life has been a series of just unfortunate decisions and she's in a one financial problem after another. And we found out that my mom has been paying bills for her and loaning her money We found out that my mom has been paying bills for her and loaning her money and

all of this out of pretty much a tiny nest egg that she hasn't invested. She's just sitting on and we feel my husband and I feel that we are supporting her financially and finding out that we have siblings who are taking advantage of her financially. who are taking advantage of her financially. I don't really know how to address it with her in a respectful way that I love my mom I don't want to you know come down hard on her but it's just tricky because we know we're gonna be caretakers for her eventually she really doesn't have much to support herself with. So basically the hundred grand that she has she's going to burn through it supporting the parasite siblings.

Yes, yes that's our concern. Have you talked to her about that? Then you're going to be stuck with mom in the house and you're going to be caring for your mom and she's going to have social security checks off, she's got to blow now. Yes. How close are we to that? Is 100 gone yet? I just recently talked to her. She said she has like 109 and she's very cagey about being open with me about how much she's helped, but I do know she's providing bills and this sister,

she's recently divorced, she has two kids, she refuses to go to work more than two days a week because she wants to keep her government aid Etc. Etc. Yeah, and Well, I guess you got two choices. You just tolerate this crap or you tell mom you're gonna stop this or you move out Those are your two choices, right? Yeah, they're They're hard but listen your life right now every minute you wake up you're thinking about this and every time when your siblings text you or calls minute you wake up, you're thinking about this. And every time when

your siblings text you or calls you, you get in to rage. And every time you ask your mom a question and she's cagey, you say something like, well, you're in my house. Like you're making yourself crazy. You're already having a hard life is what I would say. And so you can keep having that hard life or you can choose another hard life, which is to put all this junk on the table and deal with it but either path is hard one of them is going to bury you one of them may clarify the whole thing or blow up you can just make peace with it and go she's gonna piss the money away to the parasites and and she's gonna live with us and I'm gonna go with that and I'm gonna quit worrying about it you make nice with it and let it run that's not

my style but you could do that. That's a valid option. Staying where you're staying is not a valid option. You either need to put up some ultimatums and say, we're going to conduct this situation properly and you're not going to support the parasites while you live here for free or virtually free. That doesn't work. If you're going to do that, you're going to find another place to live.

Mom, I love you, but I'm not going to tolerate this behavior because I feel like I'm supporting the parasites and it's against my morals to do that. How much of this is you're not mad at your mom but you're mad at your siblings? Yeah. It's not my mom at all. My mom, she's meaning well. Most enablers are sweet people. They're just enablers. Yeah, have you ever my question? Well, I'm wondering if I should address my mom more with this or should I? It's the only way to start only way to stop it a lion the sister. No, it's the only it's the only way to stop it Have you ever had a conversation with your siblings when they were like, you know what, you're right.

Ever. No. No. They're not going to start now. They're not going to take a stop. You want me to quit being a parasite? I'm going to quit asking for free money. You're right.

That's not going to happen. That's not going to happen. The only thing you can do is convince mom to cut them off. And probably the only way that's actually going to happen is if she believes she's going to going to happen. That's not going to happen. The only thing you can do is convince mom to cut them off. And probably the only way that's actually going to happen is if she believes she's going to have to move. And you're not going to do that. Yeah. You're not.

And so one more second spent thinking about your siblings is a second wasted on loving your husband, loving your life, doing something. You're just wasting your energy because they're never going to change. Paras parasites like that don't change Yeah, I proof is in the history yeah, yeah, they're not going to and So, I mean you can address it with your mom and say listen I know this is going on and I think you're out of control and I really think you should stop because I think you're harming them

Because enabling is always harming the recipient too. Because by giving your sister money, you are giving a drunk a drink, because she refuses to work and now she gets to refuse to work. But if she didn't have the money, then she would go to work. Or she'd sit on government assistance or whatever she was was gonna do, but your mom's not helping her She's harming her Enabling always harms the recipient and enablers always think they're sweet kind people, but they're not they're harmful people Your mom thinks she's sweet, but she's not she's harmingming. She's harming her own children and she should stop it.

That's what I would tell her. Or in a- Don't disagree. In a even further extension of that, your mom's actually a parasite in a way too, because she's using her kids to feel better about herself, because she won't have that hard conversation. You see how this just continues downstream?

Yeah. She's using them to feel good about herself because she won't have that hard conversation. You see how this just continues downstream? Yeah. She's using them to feel good about herself because she says it has to live in her other kid's house. You know, at a minimum I would say you're gonna have to do two things, probably for sanity's sake. You do what you want to do. I'm just putting myself in your shoes because I don't think you're gonna tell her to move. Might be the best thing that happened to her, but I don't think you're gonna do tell her to move. Might be the best thing that happened to her, but I don't think you're going to do it. And so I think you got to make peace with it, number one. Number two, I think you need to have a very clear,

calm, but very direct conversation with your mother about her misbehavior. And she should stop it. This is The Ramsey Show. and she should stop it. This is The Ramsey Show. Buying or selling a home is a big deal. With all the clickbait headlines that are out there and confusing data and friends with an opinion it's tough to know what's actually really going on because everybody dramatizes it. Well here's some real numbers. The average house price in

America went up slightly last month. It's about 440,000 right now. And we just hit over a million homes for sale. That's the most inventory we've had since 2019. House prices have not fallen. They have continued to rise. The average 15-year fixed rate is a little bit up. It's still under 6%, 5.95. And so if you're ready and you want to learn something about buying a home right now or selling yours, you can check out everything about the market trends and everything else with confidence at ramsesolutions.com slash market or click the link in the show notes. Our question of the day is brought to you by WhyRefi.

WhyRefi works with borrowers who have defaulted private student loans, even when other lenders have said no with a lower payment and a low fixed rate. You could have a clear path forward. You could get out of this mess. Visit whyrefi.com slash Ramsey, that's the letter y-r-e-f-y.com slash ramsey might not be in all states. All right today's question comes from Nikki in Georgia.

Nikki writes, I'm reading Building a Non-Anxious Life but getting over anxiety is hard. Our annual income will be a hundred thousand dollars soon as my husband is changing jobs. He was laid off during COVID and our debt spiraled from there. We worked hard to recover from that setback and will be debt-free by December. My father never handled money well with my family suffering the consequences. I know my husband's a good provider but how do I get over my fear that things will go south again?" Dave, I guess first and foremost I'll tell you, Nikki, things will go south again. A hundred percent chance things will go south again. The question your body's trying to solve

not as if things are ever going to go wrong, it is what will happen to you when those things do go wrong. And to go back when you got laid off during COVID, what your body is remembering, your childhood, your body remembers that when COVID, when a bad thing happened, y'all started borrowing a whole bunch of money. And debt doesn't happen to you. It's a choice y'all made to continue a certain life as that was happening. So your body just is remembering. And so it's just sounding the alarms, right? And so a great first step, I'm proud of you guys, being debt-free by December. I promise you when you cross that threshold,

your body will exhale a little bit because you'll be a little bit safer. Then you get an emergency fund, it will exhale a little bit more. And then y'all commit to each other. We will never put ourselves in a position financially that we're not gonna be okay. Your body will go, okay, good, good.

And then something's gonna go south and then you're gonna keep your promise to yourself. And bodies don't go, okay, good, good. And then something's going to go south and then you're going to keep your promise to yourself. And bodies get nervous, they get scared. If you talk to elite military guys, they're scared, they're nervous, but they're not anxious because they've drilled that thing so many times, then everybody knows where everybody's going to be at all times. And if they're not, they know what to do next. And so they're not anxious about stuff. And so that's what we're doing here. We're just going to keep doing the next right thing over time, but you've got to give your body a chance to not be sounding every alarm, which means you can't owe people money.

You've got to trust yourself and on and on. Yeah, building a non-anxious life tells you exactly how to do that. You make deposits in those six areas. And that's why we're never going to do an anxiety-free scream. I don't want to live in a house without a fire alarm, right? I want my body to be anxious when it should be. Uh, but I'm going to do all of the things I can every day to know that if I am anxious, it's for something real, right?

Not for all of these, these things I've created in my world. Yeah. Yeah. You, you, you really do want to, um, be anxious at the appropriate times. Yeah. Like a friend of mine showed me a picture this weekend, I was playing golf with him. He was in Africa doing one of these safaris. So the major male lion in the pack comes up and

just lays beside the car and it's open car. You know, one of those things, and they're taking pictures and he's got the picture right, you know, at his feet almost there. And the guide is like, don't worry about it. He just lays, he'll lay there a minute. And then the, the female, at his feet almost there. And the guide is like, don't worry about it. He's just lazy, he'll lay there a minute. And then the female, the mom starts coming over, moving towards the truck, and the guide goes,

okay, time for us to move now. But I mean, yeah, you want your body, you want to go, this is a wake up call here. Right, and so if the guy knew, hey, this is not safe, and I'm still gonna keep sitting here, and then he sees that line getting closer and closer. I don't have any anxiety. His body would be failing him

if it wasn't ringing every alarm off the hook. Yes. Exactly. And so if you're broke, you have no money, and everything that happens is an emergency, then it is good to have anxiety. Anxiety is telling you to straighten up. Go get your house in order. Get your crap together. Anxiety is telling you to straighten up. Go get your house in order. Get your crap together.

Anxiety is your friend then. But also if you have a fully funded emergency fund, a half million dollars in mutual funds your house is paid for, everything is paid for, you have zero debt, and you're making up stuff, you're catastrophizing in your mind, now that's not good anxiety. Absolutely, go sit with somebody. There's something wrong there. Yeah, the alarm's not working right, it needs to be recalibrated and that's not good anxiety. Absolutely, go sit with somebody. There's something wrong. Yeah, the alarm's not working right. It needs to be recalibrated and that's all good.

Go get that work done. But I think, I think, Nicky, I think, to be honest with you, I think your body's working perfectly right now. You should be anxious. You've been through this road before. You grew up in this world. You, it happened to you again. And then you did it again during COVID.

And then you did it. Yeah, and so your body's trying to get your attention as it should. Just keep doing the next right thing. Be out of debt. Work a stinkin it. Yeah. And so your body's trying to get your attention as it should just keep doing the next right thing. Work the stinking baby steps, work six jobs. And you know, a little desperation is good for the soul. Yes.

It'll cause you to go out there and bust it, sacrifice and win. And some good hard work is good for the soul. Yeah. Tara is in Evansville. Hi Tara. Welcome to the Ramsey show. Hi Dave. Thanks for taking my call. Sure. What's up?

I'm in a really tough spot and I need some help. I went through divorce in September of 2024 and as part of that settlement, I was ordered to pay my husband $170,000. So it's been almost a year and I've paid down. Why? Because we have a business and a house and they're intertwined so the house is on personal acreage with a barn and then we have seven cabins that we owned so his buyout portion was 170 but you kept all that I

kept all of that and you have to buy him out okay all right I'm with you and how were you planning to do that so I did pay I was able to pay off a hundred thousand to him of course I borrowed it from other people because during our marriage I traveled and I'm I travel as a quality directors nursing and so I've traveled a lot and paid for a lot of our our bills that personal bills and then I supplemented the business if I needed to and so I really didn't have the inter workings of the business very very well. He stayed here, he didn't work or do anything, he just took care of this place. And so we came to a hundred and

seventy as an agreement. I paid the hundred. When I took over the business it was like thirty five thousand dollars in arrears. There's three thousand dollars in the account. When you agreed to pay him one hundred and seventy thousand dollars last fall, where were you planning to get that money? We financed the house and then the loan the loan is separate so we had an LLC at that time. Did you do that? The LLC, I haven't been successful yet. Why? The business is not a problem. I went back to the same bank that has our loan right now and I asked to refinance and to take the additional money out and they declined and said, I do have

one other loan besides the property, the SBA loan. And they said, no, we won't do it. Now I, there's a lot of personal things as far as I'm concerned, like I live in a super, super small community and I know like my husband and him are best friends so that's some of it but either way and so I went to know you would think he would want his your his best friend to get a hundred seventy thousand dollars so I don't agree with your conclusion they want to know my ex-husband wants me to fail so but then the other part what I guess I didn't know much about the business to be out and I did go out to another place and I got all the way through the whole entire

process with the house and they would do the refinance but they would not give me the extra 70,000. Now a couple reasons I am a contract worker. So what do you make contracts? Right 200,000 a year. Okay and why are you holding on to this piece of trash land that drags, that's dragging everything in your life down? The seven cabin rental business? Yeah. Why? It doesn't make money. It loses money. Why would you want to keep it? It actually used to bring in a lot of money. We make

about 250,000 with growth and then we make about $30,000 a year. Yeah, but there's nothing in this. There's no fun anywhere in this discussion. I'm sorry. This thing's killing you. Why don't you just sell it? Well, one thing I put all my retirement and everything into it. It is. Well, it'll come out when you sell it. Won't it? Or have you leveraged it all up to the eyeballs?

No, oh no, no. I have, it's 1.6 and I owe right now on 800. I don't think there's, you're not making money on an asset that size. That's scary. I think I would consider selling it. The 70,000 is not a big deal, but I'm getting out of this mess.

In the lobby of Ramsey Solutions, on the debt free stage, Alan and Sabrina are with us. Hey guys, how are you? Awesome. Welcome, welcome. Where do you guys live? Casper, Wyoming. Ah, fun. Welcome to Nashville.

And how much debt have you two paid off? $208,000, $5.25. Okay, good. And how long did that take? 58 months. Good for you. And your range of income during that time? So during this process we started at $140,000 and then we went up to $280,000 but in six months of this we were down to 72,000. Now you're at 72? No, during our process we were at 72,000. At one point. Oh, I see. So we went up to 140 down to 72. Up to 280. Okay, what do y'all do for a living now? I'm a project manager in pipelines. And I'm an engineer in the oil and gas sector. Oh, thus the volatility in the... Okay, I got it. Okay, cool. Oh thus the volatility in the okay. I got it Okay, cool in Casper, Wyoming no less all right very cool Yeah, you have had a boring four or five years there in Casper, so it's been up and down

So what kind of debt was this 208? It's our mortgage you paid off your house Looking at weirdos how old are you two weirdos? I'm 36 44 all right and a paid for house nice house Look at it, weirdos! How old are you two weirdos? I'm 36. 44. All right, and a paid four house. Nice house, we're seeing a beautiful pop up here. Little snow on the ground there in that pick. What's this house worth? Well, we actually, we got a mortgage for 235,

so that was back in 2015, and it's probably worth over 400, 450 right now. Yeah, I bet it is, I bet it is. And I saw a picture you're standing in the snow with your bare feet to see if the grass feels different. That was two days after. Pretty cold. Yeah, two days after so Dave I thought you appreciate it. The snow is whiter. Yeah, there we go. Okay, there's the grass. All right. I like it. Very good. Very good. Fun. Fun. Way to go guys. Okay, so how much in your

retirement mistakes? We about about $250, $ pushing three quarter mil. Yeah, you're bumping towards a million real quick You're gonna be baby such millionaires and in your 30s Wow way to go y'all proud of you. What started this whole thing? How'd you do this? What got you on this Ramsey train? Well, we were quite stupid when we both graduated from college. We took out a lot of debt. We financed snowmobiles. We paid for a wedding, took out a loan for furniture. We bought our house, wedding. And so we kind of financed everything at that point.

And then- You were kind of normal. Yeah, we were very normal. And then Alan lost his job probably about two later, and we were living off my income, which was about 70 at that time, and we couldn't pay our bills. So we panicked. So when we first came across to you, it was actually me,

I was out in the oil field consulted to our producer and broke country, you can only listen to so many of those songs as they be repeated, you know? Kind of like King George and Alan Jackson said, murder on country road. But anyways, our blade operator had to run and go listen to a talk show. And I was like, well, I'll listen to it. And two hours later on the way back into Casper from the field out in the Powder River Basin, there was a guy named Dave Ramsey that came on. And I looked into the rear view mirror and he was talking to me. And when you're an oil and gas, you know, you depend on that drill rig.

If they're not drilling, you don't have a job. So I came home, talked to Sabrina. She created a spreadsheet that just, it was a forecast system of what we were able to put in every month. And we were trying to improve it, trying to prove it, it wasn't there. And every week, you know, I was like, hey, let's try this out, try this out. And we finally both got on board.

Did that, and then I managed to break my foot at my grandfather's funeral. And so we were living off of Sabrina's income, plus the insurance coming in from the company. But then I got on with a new employer and paid off our consumer debt. Went refinance the house at 2.375. And then I don't know if you're around here

around the world in 2018, 2019, there's a thing called COVID. Tell me more, tell me more about that. Yeah, so I worked for a Canadian company and they sent us home for two and a half years. And I'm a person that has to be around anybody. I don't care if I like you or not. I got to be around somebody just to interact.

And so it was driving me, I had some mental issues going on. And I looked at Sabrina and I said, I can't do this no more. I said, I need a break. And we looked at everything and luckily all we had was our mortgage. So I was able to take life off for six months, recuperate and that's where the $72,000 came in when we were 72,000 when we were doing our mortgage. And recuperated in life, got employed and that's where the income came back in and we created a mortgage tracker and just tracked it down. Everything, all our savings went or extra from every month went towards the mortgage.

And this was about the time when we left my Excel spreadsheets and kind of got onto the every dollar budget and really started using that pretty hard. So that was a big transition for us going from Excel spreadsheets to the every dollar. That's hard for an engineer to say, I'll try somebody else's pass. I mean, I liked my spreadsheets and Alan didn't, and so we kind of had to make a compromise and go to the every dollar budget tracker. There we go, all right.

And then here we stand just a few months later and the house is paid for. Cause really about the time you leaned into the house, it only took about two years. Yeah, Yeah. If I got the story right on that. You are correct. If I followed that. And you and you've come back big time with the new job and a new salary crushing it huh? Yep. Yeah my salary pretty much almost tripled after I took the six months off. Wow. Good for you man. Well your timing was good too. Very good. God's opened a lot of opportunities up for us since then.

Now amen. Amen. So what do you tell people the key to getting out of debt is? I think you have to be on the same page as your partner. I mean you know that communication between spouses as far as spending and you know the budget, that was probably one of the biggest challenges for us was communicating and making sure that we knew purchases and where we were headed. So you have to be on the same page in a marriage. Just open communication. Don't be afraid to say, hey, I wanna buy this or no, let's push that off till next month. Yeah. So what's the big thing you're going to do now that you're 100% debt free and almost millionaires?

We're going to go get a steak dinner tonight at Perry's. That'll do. Yeah. That'll do. We got some work to do on the house. Some siding, fencing, back patio needs to be refurbished, kitchen. So. All right. But also a little bit of playtime in there too. Yeah, amen. Sabrina, what do you tell the person in the marriage that is the spreadsheet person that continues to say,

no, no, no, my way is gonna work, just trust me, it's gonna work, it's gonna work. Is there a hack to that conversation that will help somebody? The move should have every dollar. Exhale and say, you know what,, it's gonna work. Is there a hack to that conversation that will help somebody? That helps them move through to every dollar? Exhale and say, you know what, we're just gonna do regular budget.

I think you have to be open-minded. You just have to be flexible. I think for me, I understood my spreadsheet really well, but I didn't communicate it to Alan very well, so he would ask questions and question the numbers, and I didn't communicate him well, so I think just finding what works for you as a couple and how your minds can kind of work together but definitely be open-minded you know if somebody has different you know numerical ideas or

different tracking ideas than you you know it's okay so brother what did you do that six months did you go to a counselor did you go hit the gym what did you do um actually I was sitting counselor short before then, but I increased my visits with him. But we, I volunteer for animal rescue resonation at Sabrina's on the board. So I transported dogs from Casper, Wyoming up to Billings, Montana, Reno, Nevada, Bozeman, Boise. So I was all over the road. Just go out and do something. But you had a purpose. Yeah, good for you, Nevada, Bozeman, Boise. So I was all over the road, just go out and do something. But you had a purpose, yeah, good for you.

Yeah. Good for you. So. Good for you. You didn't just take time off and just stare off into space and hope it all got better. No. You got after it.

I went out. I'm proud of you, good for you. Yeah, way to go. That's hard work right there. That's very good work, very good. Proud of y'all, way to go. Thank you. Who was cheering you on along the way?

I think each other. I mean, we were each other's biggest cheerleaders. You know, we had a couple neighbors that kind of knew that we were on the Dave Ramsey program and you know, they were egging us on at different times too. One of our neighbors brought us cookies after we paid the house off. Yeah.

I like it. Well, you need to take a mistake back. Yeah. Dave, since you mentioned that, the funny thing was the consumer debt. I was the nerd, she was the free spirit. I was the spender. We flipped on the mortgage.

We did. I wanted to go play, watch football, buy guns. And she won that. We gotta get going, because we're running up against the clock here. I like it. All right, count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream.

Three, two, one. We're debt-free scream. Three, two, one, we're debt free! Yeah! 208,000 paid off in 58 months. Quite a story. Way to go heroes. We're proud of you. Woohoo! Well, so many of you out there trying to share Ramsey with people like our last debt-free screamers are telling their neighbors that they're getting out of debt, that kind of stuff. It's kind of hard sometimes to explain all this stuff. If you want some help, we put together the new Ramsey one-on-one playlist. We made it easy for you.

And so this playlist is filled with classic Ramsey clips like the baby steps, how that works, paying off debt with the debt snowball, how to have an emergency fund, how to work together with your spouse, all those kinds of things. Click the link at the top of the show notes, open Ramsey 101 playlist on YouTube, text it to someone, DM it to someone, send it to a group chat, say hey, think this might help, just trying to be helpful here. Don't say you're stupid, listen to this. Don't do that. If you're listening on the radio, we've got a playlist featured at the top of our YouTube

channel. Check it out. Who's the one person you're going to share this playlist with? It's one share, one step that could change everything for one person. Hector is with us in Scottsdale, Arizona. Hey Hector, what's up? Hey, how are you doing Dave? Better than I deserve.

How can I help? So, oh and by the way, how you doing Dr. John? I actually have your book right next to me and I started reading it this morning. I got it on Saturday, so it's going well. Thanks brother. Yeah, so I'm 24 years old. I have $16,000 saved up. I am going to Europe in less than a month because one of my

best friends is getting married there and I'm spending, then I'm going backpacking so I'm going to spend about, I'm budgeting like five to six thousand dollars. My current job as a server, the restaurant is closing right before I leave so when I come back from Europe I'm'm gonna be jobless as well as I'm resuming my career in aviation. So I'm gonna be taking on a lot of debt when I come back. So my question is how do I manage my money which is gonna be almost less than ten10,000 when I get back. Do you know what show you're calling? Yeah.

All right, all right, good. Just before we get going, just wanna make sure we're on the same page, man. I would tell you that you call your friend and you tell him you love him, I can't make it because I'm about to be unemployed, don't have any money. And I would- We actually work the same don't have any money and I would actually

work the same job too I know I would tell you I'll be looking for a job yeah ASAP you know you can't go backpacking bro it's just not the season 24 and broke yeah yeah I mean I already bought my ticket and everything so yeah it's all good I'd rather you lose $2,000 than $10. Yeah. Life happens. I mean, I figured you guys would say something like that. Well, we've lived it, man. It's not just like, we're trying to have fun. Listen, nowhere in this description of anything you laid out was making money. All of it was spending money and going in debt and destroying savings. Everything in your story was no money, no money, no money, no work, no money.

That's your whole story that you just told us. Yeah. So everything's going the wrong way, man. This is not going to end well for you. We're going to hang up with you and our lives are going to go on. We're going to be fine, okay? But I'm worried about you, honey. Yeah.

I mean, your plan sucks it's a plan for it's a plan for anxiousness and miseries what it is man not good for you going deeply in debt to be an airline pilot is not a plan because you'll get to be an airline pilot for many many years so no you don't need to go a hundred thousand dollars in debt to resume my aviation career. Bull crap. What you need to do is resume working. Yeah. I mean, well, technically I'm going to be working until they close and they close a week after I leave. So technically look for a job. Yeah. Because you're getting right to lose yours. I know when I'm in Europe, I'm gonna be, I mean, I'm already looking at other serving jobs.

Hey, Hector, you do whatever you wanna do, honey. You called us and asked and we told you what to do. There's nothing in this, you're not gonna be able to talk your way to where, John and I think this is smart, we are worried about you, honey. I think this is not gonna end well for you. This time next year,

you're gonna be sitting in neck deep in poop, and just cause you've been shoveling it on yourself, and that's what you're heading towards. So you need to rethink this. You act like this is, kiddles and unicorns are just gonna pop out from somewhere and they're not. Or this thing, like, that you get to do what you wanna do and that math or these other things

will just circle around you. I tell you right now, if I was about to lose my job and I had $16,000 to my name I'm not taking the trip. I call my friends I can't make it man. I'm going on a European vacation to celebrate. Yeah I've got it yeah and maybe Dave I don't know you know what maybe this is one of those situations where you're 24 and dude I thought I was really a tough guy until I walked into an MMA gym at about that age and got my head handed to me a few times and realized oh I need to I need to listen to some of these other guys who are

wiser than me but maybe this one like me that would have told you not to go over there hit on the chin a few times but goodness man it's not gonna work don't do this Hector please you can you can play this back in six months and see if we came true or not. I don't know. There's nothing in this that you described that sounded like a good ending to me for you. I'm worried about you. If you're tired of living paycheck to paycheck, you're wondering where your money's going,

our team is hosting a free budgeting training this month. You'll learn step by step how to make to and make and stick to a budget, a plan using the EveryDollar app, the world's best budgeting app, and it's also going to guide you through the baby steps and everything else. Plus you can get your biggest budgeting questions answered in a live Q&A. Spots are limited. Sign up for free at EveryDollar.com slash webinar. Jake is in Chicago Jake go straight to it I'm short on time all right hey guys just wanted to say happy

Father's Day got a girlfriend that I love with godly relationship go to wrap things up call it a night last night and she popped the question of whether or not I want to get a prenup and And I respond. A prenup for being a girlfriend? Yeah, right. No, we're talking about getting married. Oh, okay. Working towards that. Working towards that goal of getting married,

starting a family. Why do you need a prenup? There's just assets that, I probably have more assets than her, more or less. What are your assets, how much are you worth? About six hundred thousand, you know cash and assets. Yeah All right, and what do you make? Make about a buck ten to a buck twenty a year. What's she make?

She's a school teacher. She makes under 70. Yeah, probably like sixty five. Have you all been married before either one of you? Nope, I'm 29. She's 30. We've've both been engaged though and it did not work out. The only time I recommend a prenup is with extreme wealth on one side versus the other and 600k is not extreme in my mind. It's a lot you've done very well I'm not making fun of you but if it's six million I'd probably say yeah. Okay. But if it's 600k I probably wouldn't I'm just gonna combine my assets and bet my life on this girl perfect and uh side note she got uh we got a we got her out of a car payment all right yeah we all

we she ordered we knew that she had a car payment you're not married not married you know I did your advice and her money. Yeah, yeah, my advice and her money. Good. Okay. I like that formula. You using the tools from my mentors that I watch and it's my second time calling in. You guys helped me out about three years ago in a predicament with finances and I'm debt free. Good.

We're working on her getting debt free. She owes about 5,000 in student loans. Awesome. Awesome. That federal government's going to help her out with at the end of the year. What do you think, you keep saying we're working towards getting married. What are you waiting on, man? Waiting on, I gotta go get, you know, do the cordial and polite thing and ask your parents.

Do it this weekend. All right. Just do it this weekend. How long y'all been dating? We've been dating for about eight months. Okay, nevermind, I back up. I thought you were talking, I thought you were already together for like five years.

My bad, take your time, bro. Take your time. No. That one's on me. Jake, you're good. You're good, man, way to go. I would not worry about a prenup at that level. It's okay to discuss these things and talk about them.

Even document that you came into the marriage with the premarital assets. That's an okay thing to document and but because in most states that would be respected anyway in the event of a divorce but I I don't think there's enough money there that it's going to create weirdness in your extended family which is usually my primary concern with a prenup is it's not you and her it's her crazy brother that thinks he got up that it thinks he hit the goldmine because his wife married a guy with assets her sister married somebody yeah some parasite in the family decides they're gonna latch

on and that's the only and you can just look at him go I can't do that I got a prenup it's the only that's what it's mainly good for And of course the end of a marriage those kinds of things, but yeah, I wouldn't Jake in this case. Thanks for the call brother This is the Ramsey show Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Ramsey show where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create actual amazing relationships. Dr. John Delaney, number one bestselling author and host of the Dr. John Delaney Show on Ramsey Networks, Ramsey Personality, he's my co-host today.

Jessica is in Missouri. Hi Jessica, how are you? I'm good, how are you Dave? Better than I deserve, what's up? I just got married in March and my husband and I, thank you, my husband and I have been working on BabySet number one but as we approach BabySet number two I've been getting a ton of phone calls and letters in the mail from, um, different organizations offering personal debt consolidation loans. And it is becoming more and more attractive to me to consolidate all of our debt

into just one monthly payment, um, to help manage our monthly budget a little bit better, possibly lower our interest rate on the debt. I just want to know what you think of a personal loan for debt consolidation. I would not do it. No. Under no circumstances. Unless it was to avoid bankruptcy.

And you're not bankrupt. That wasn't why you called. You think it's, you've made the mistaken assumption that one payment gets you out of debt faster than 16 payments and 16 payments added together is equal to more than the one payment which means you're gonna get out of that faster continuing to work the debt snowball and You're gonna you're gonna get the feedback loop of paying it off The problem with debt consolidation is number one people roll end up rolling lower interest rates into it then they're actually going to pay on it. Number two that because they they started out with I got this 26% credit card and I can get it get it down

to 12 okay but then they roll some of the 5 and 6 percent stuff and 0 percent medical bills and other things up into it because they want this convenience of a single payment. That's problem number one. Problem number two is 88% of the time, that's nine out of ten times that people do a debt consolidation loan, they don't change their habits. And if you don't change your habits, what you're gonna do is run up more debt. So you end up at the end of the story running up all the debt again and you've still got the debt consolidation loan. So you end up doubling debt because you don't change the habits because the problem is not interest rates the problem is the person in your mirror. Yeah. You've got to

get them changed and so you and your new husband have to sit down and say we're gonna sell so much stuff that the dog is hiding. We're gonna take an extra job we're gonna live on less than we make we're not going on vacation and we're not eating out. And we're going to get rid of this stinking debt so we can have a life. How much debt have you guys got? Including my husband's loan, it's $76,000. Okay and what do you guys make? What's the household income now?

Our total household income is $97,000 annually gross. Okay, and so if you paid it off in two years, that'd be $34,000 or it'd be like $40,000 a year. Yeah. Okay, so we're talking about three, four thousand bucks a month. You gotta put four thousand bucks a month and you'll be out of debt in less than two years. And you make $97,000, so all I'm asking you to do is put $40 less than two years. And you make 97, so all I'm asking you to do is put 40 on it and live on 57. Yeah, yeah, nothing. How much of that? How much of the 76 is cars? 11. 11, so cars aren't the problem. How much of it's the student

loan? 40. Okay, good. And so you get out the credit cards tonight, you have a plastic surgery party, light a candle, chop them up into little bitty pieces. No more borrowing money. Yeah, we haven't borrowed anything new for the past year. So we did that a while ago, you know, got rid of all the credit cards that we have. So you quit digging the hole. That's good news. That's a good start. Yeah, we have. And so I'm telling you, if you'll take the debt snowball, list your debts smallest to largest,

pay minimum payments on everything but the little one, attack the little one, what's your smallest debt? I have $795 in a medical bill as my smallest debt. What's your next one? $1,500 of a medical bill. Okay. Yeah. Those two need to be gone this month. Um, in one month, we've got to pay three to $4,000 a month on this debt. You're going to crunch it.

I don't know how to crunch numbers to get an extra three to four thousand. Like I can cut out a ton and get maybe an extra thousand dollars a month to pay towards it we also have four kids and I just don't know how to keep on cutting more and more do you not think a family of with four kids can make it on fifty seven thousand dollars in Columbia Freak in Missouri so our monthly I think no listen listen listen listen you've got to work backwards into this because you're all you're doing is looking down the barrel of your normal life in your normal life sucks it has to

change right yeah because you make ninety seven thousand dollars if I need forty out of that that leaves me fifty the right forty seven on if I need forty thousand bucks out of that I got fifty seven left over ninety seven minus forty If I need $40,000 out of that, I got $57,000 left over. $97,000 minus $40,000 for two years. And that's not counting taxes.

We got taxes coming out of that. You got to stop your 401K contributions. You have to correct your W-2s to where you're not getting a refund. Have you got any money in savings? Not retirement savings? Nope. We're working on the first thousand dollars. So you don't have a single

you don't have any money stock you don't have some stupid stock or Bitcoin or something laying around? No but I was curious about taking out a loan on my 401k I have about $25,000. No no no no no no quit borrowing your way out of debt. Well, just to pay off the debt. I know you're trying to borrow your way out of debt with a debt consolidation on your 401k loan. You're, you know, the problem is you've got to cut this to the bone and you got to find $3,000 a month and you'll be out of debt in two years. If you do that,

that's where you're going to be. And you may need to work extra. You all may need to do some other stuff. The kids, you know, the travel team may not be able to do travel ballet or whatever the flip you're doing over there. Okay? So, you know, you got it. This is the kind of stuff, this is when you got to decide, this is what's holding us back. And the more intense that you get, faster you're gonna get out and the faster you get out the higher the probability is you're actually gonna get out you're still looking for a pill to take an easy pill you're still looking for an easy button there is not an easy button this is

growl I'm pissed I'm not living like this anymore I'm stopping this until you get that thing going in your voice and you don't have it yet, you're not going to get out. You're still trying to wander, find some easy way. And I'm not accusing you of being lazy or something like that, I'm just telling you, the magic formula is when people lose their dad gum minds. When people go crazy and their friends think they joined a cult and their mother thinks they need counseling. These are the people that get out of debt. You got to go nuts for a short

period of time here because you guys have been living in stupid land long enough. It's time to get out. It's time to get out. Yeah, Dave, I hadn't considered this before because I've talked about this with marriages, but I think it's the same. It almost needs to be a moment when you say, the life we had is over. Yeah. We are now doing a new life. We're building a new life because I think people want to, how do we keep our life going and do this crazy Ramsey thing? No. And you can't. The life you had is over. The crazy Ramsey thing involves a death and rebirth. That's it. A phoenix. Our life was over. It was fun and it's exhausted now. Now we're gonna live a new life. Yeah. Not only did we cut up the credit cards,

we're selling everything in sight. The kids are next. I mean, everybody in the house is going to work. Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches are now your new friend. No fancy shoes for two years. Everybody's going to live. You're going to be all right. We're going to get it done.

You can't jump that much higher in Air Jordans anyway. I mean, you can, but it's cool. No, you can't. Two Weekends are now on sale for the Money and Marriage Getaway. You can spend three incredible days here in Nashville with your spouse, learning the tools to strengthen your connection, deepen your intimacy and money with Dr. John Delaney and Rachel Cruz. Now this will be seriously fun. It's in November or in February. Two different events we're doing and they're a weekend long events here at the Ramsey campus and

right here in Nashville. Tickets start as low as $7.49 per couple. Get the tickets for the lowest price before the end at ramsesolutions.com slash ramsy or slash getaway or click the link in the show notes and you can check out all the possible options there and get signed up. You do want to do this. John, you guys have a lot of fun at this. It's my favorite thing that I'm a part of here. Yeah, we have an absolute blast and they always sell out. People come from, we have people from different countries last year. We have people who are engaged. We have people who have been married forever. Like, it's

awesome. I love it. All right, up next is going to be Jane in Fort Worth. Hey Jane, what's up? Yes sir, my name is, you know my name, sorry. I have questions regarding what to do about my mom and my two youngest sisters who just graduated high school and college they're in a bad situation and they're trying to get out here to us and we were looking at out here from where sorry from Oregon to Fort Worth. Okay, and why are they in a bad situation? Abusive, sir. Okay, so like a stepfather or father? Yes, sir. Okay, have they left yet? No, sir, we've been trying to financially get them where they can leave and we've been offering to take them in and we're finally in a situation where we can do that and a better,

um, so we were looking at either renting another place to help them initially, uh, for them, like first and last set them up. Um, and they're, they're actively looking for jobs or, or we could go ahead and buy a place that we could all live in because that's our goal anyways and eventually we're gonna take in my mom. No let's get them into a rental and get us get a sustainability and get them out of the abuse now. Okay. They don't need to be there another minute. Yes sir. They need to leave. Tell them to get down there

this week and you'll find them a rentalnal property. It's that simple. And then they get jobs and they create a sustainable life and they begin their healing process. Yeah. There's a world of hurt going on here and there's a process they're going to go through to heal after this John.. Yeah, and this is gonna sound counterintuitive, but part of their healing will be their bodies learning to trust them again too. And that sounds like a mess, we don't have time to go into it all.

But you saying that we've set you up, we've got your first month's rent taken care of, it's super generous, and we paid the deposit, which is the last month's rent. The first thing y'all need to do is get here and get a job. Even if it's just a, not a forever job of course, but just something and it will give them something to go towards, not just running from an awful situation and just sitting. You get what I'm saying?

So that would actually be a blessing. But you, them staying there for another day while you put your house on the market and you'll look for a house and it closes in 30 to 60 days. Well, and you don't need to be living with people that are going through this healing process. They need to be doing, it's good for them in the healing to stand alone and create a sustainable environment.

The dignity of that will help heal from the abuse. And you'll be over there all the time anyway, right? Yes. Yeah, y'all are a good family. Man, is this your brother or sister? Who is this? It's my mom and my two youngest sisters. Okay, how old are the power? Oh your youngest sisters? Last time I checked

Terrible keep track of 18 and 22. I think okay. So they're everybody's old enough to work then Yes, yes, okay. They've been working part-time Yes, yes. They've been working part time. Tell them to pack their clothes and come to Texas now. Yeah, get out of that mess. Right now. That's what I've been telling them to do, yes. Right now. My husband as well. Yeah, and if you gotta put them in a hotel for a week while you get a rental house lined up, that's fine. They need to leave the abuser now. Let me tell you, in a domestic violence situation, in an abuse situation, the victim will hang on and hang on and hang on and hang on and have every

excuse in the world to hang on because they have this ridiculous idea that the moron who's using them as a punching bag is going to change. They need to leave now. Okay? Yes sir, we've been trying. Yes. Now? I'm serious. I'm gonna get up in their face because they are in danger. They need to leave now. I'm fully aware. What? Yes, we've been trying to get them to leave immediately. Yeah. But they keep coming up. Lamiscus, why is the 18 and 22 year old staying there? They're emancipated. They can go. Why are they choosing to stay in that mess too? They're there to stay with my mom as well. So they don't leave her behind.

If we're really honest, is your mom going to leave or no? Yes, yes. She will? She's going to leave. Then why hasn't she? I grew up financially, no. No, no, right now. You've told her you would take care of the hotel. Move. Go right now. Load your stuff in the car and come now. Why hasn't she done that?

My mom and my sisters are not liking the fact that they have to leave. They don't... are not liking the fact that they have to leave. They don't... it's a whole stand your ground. They... how do they put it? They shouldn't be the ones to leave. I got it, I got it. They shouldn't be. They shouldn't be. It's not fair, but it's also not going to change. Yes, yes. Yeah, we're preaching to the choir here, we know. Yeah, okay. This is your only option. And no, you don't need... Yes, yes. Yeah, we're preaching to the choir here, we know. Yeah, okay.

This is your only option. And no, you don't need, it's not good for them to be in the same property with you. It is not good for them at all. They need the emotional healing and the dignity of creating a sustainable life without the abuser and without sister being a crutch and so you can support them and help them to get started like John said let help them get get moved but man this is this is bad and let me

tell you it stands your ground usually means something violent in reverse and you don't need to be doing that that's not a good phrase to use that's a phrase used in the law about protecting your home and shooting someone that's not a phrase phrase to use that's a phrase used in the law about protecting your home and shooting someone That's not a phrase you should be hearing coming out of their mouth right now They need to get out of there and even though it's not right not fair whatever

Divorce will take care of taking and taking the house away from him. You don't worry about that and Wow, it's probably been going on for years Michael is in Atlanta. Hey Michael, what's up? Hey, it's great to speak with you today. You too. Back in 2008, my wife and I, we pretty much lost everything when all the mortgage crisis went down our house and everything. And I was the worst thing that happened to us. Why? We had a lot of people, um file bankruptcy. We owned several businesses.

They filed bankruptcy against us. Oh, actually. We lost a lot of money. And one day we got $62,000 worth of bankruptcy notices. Wow. Okay. So we had to start over. And you know, like I said, at the time, it was the worst thing that ever happened. Now looking back, it's the best thing that ever happened to me.

Because I refuse to let it happen again. And we've rebuilt everything. We now own another house. It's valued at $680,000. We owe $270,000 at $2.875. I am currently investing $5,000 per month I am currently investing $5,000 per month into our retirement. My wife is putting in another $1,200 through her work. We're working on baby step number six. My question is, we're planning on selling the house in four years due to, I've got some health conditions. I've got something called DISH and OPLL. Basically my spine's fusing itself together and we're one of the downsides. And knowing that,

should we continue putting that 5,000 into our retirement and savings and bonds? 5,000 a year or a month? A month. What's your household income? About 120,000 a year or a month? A month. What's your household income? About $120,000. No, you should only be putting 15% of your household income into retirement at this stage. That was my curiosity. 15% is nowhere near $70,000. You're putting $70,000 away? Yes, sir. Jesus, man. You're way too much going in there. Yeah, you need to be lowering that to only fifteen percent of your household

income, which is a lot less than this, and throwing the difference at the mortgage. I wouldn't stop retirement, but I would lower it to fifteen percent. That's baby step four. Five is skits college, six is pay off the house early. Hang on, I'm going to send you a copy of the book The Total Money Makeover to help you walk through this. In the lobby of Ramsey Solutions on the debt-free stage, Ben and Sarah are with us. Hey guys how are you? Doing well. Welcome. Where do you guys live? Well I guess Paducah Kentucky is our closest big city. Okay, well welcome to Nashville. Good to have you. And how much debt have you paid off?

We paid off $42,000. Alright, and how long did that take? 11 months. Good for you. And your range of income during that time? At that time it was about $70,000 during that period. Okay, cool. What do y'all do for a living? I'm a Senior Project Manager of Residential Products for Roof and Exterior Company. Mm-hmm. And I'm a stay-at- residential projects for roof and exterior company.

And I'm a stay at home mom. Okay, very cool, good. What kind of debt was the 42,000? There was medical. Yep. And then there was- Credit cards. Yep, consumer and then stuff at our house improvements. It was our HELOC, which was, we didn't have a mortgage.

The HELOC is the only thing against our house. So when we paid it off, we paid off so your house is debt-free we are we are completely clean we don't own nobody a dime in the whole world. I love it! What's the house worth? I would guess probably somewhere 250, 260. Wow good for you. How's that feel? Great. Feels good. No payments in the world. Way to go you guys. Excellent job. Very cool. All right, so what started this journey here 11 months ago?

Well, we were in Florida. We had a house and we bought it the wrong way and we had AirBeebies. It was just, the anxiety level's just huge. And so we wanted a place where we could live and actually afford to live, afford to have all of our kids and be able to just do all the things. And so we moved to Kentucky and then we started to go backwards and it was like our dream of moving from Florida

to Kentucky and then having a home outright and all those sort of stuff. It just kind of, things just would come up and it just sort of was fading farther and farther and farther away. And I remember one point I looked at it, I was like, man, it's gonna be like four or five years now. We thought we were so close and it was just, it just kept getting farther and farther away. Before we'd be homeowners outright. Yeah. Yeah. It was. And so then we found your YouTube videos and just were watching along and it was a couple of months. We got the books from the library and then we got the EveryDollar app.

Got the EveryDollar app and we were getting like, we were like really close to that tipping point and it was a day after our son was born. No, the day of. The day of like hours after. It was like an hour after she gave birth to our fifth son. And he's like, I think we should stop using credit cards. And at first I said no. And he's like, I think we should stop using credit cards.

And I said, OK, well, if we're going to do it, we're going to do it all the way. And so then I can feel the intensity. She's like, if we're going to go through this, it is. It is. It is. We're not having it. The real deal, not halfway is nothing.

And so then my response was, well, then I'm not gonna buy any cigars, no bourbon, no guns, no ammunition until all this is cleaned up. And then her response was pretty much like- Guess we won't have to make downloads anymore. Doubled down and, you know, I mean, we just did our normal working stuff.

We had $17,000 in a independent brokerage account that cleaned it down to 25. And then we just didn't buy anything for 11 months. And Sarah just managed our home so well. And just nothing that we bought at the grocery store went to waste. And she just made everything just as it could be so that we could just get it all behind us

in our rear view mirror. Did they let you stay in Kentucky if you don't drink bourbon or buy ammunition? It was really hard. It was really hard. It was against the law there. They kick you out. They'll revoke your passport, man.

Way to go, y'all. That's amazing, guys. I mean, you know when people are gonna do it is when they start going, okay, the things that matter to me, I'm gonna set them on the shelf because now getting out of debt matters more and this is not forever. We're gonna live like no one else

so that by God we can live like no one else and give like no one else. And, you know, like you said, no McDonald's. No eating out. We're not, the kids are, you know. And 11 months after a new baby, you're done, house and everything. Everything. Yep.

Wow, that was very intense. Oh yes, yep. But I hear people say, it's a year of saying no, but it was really, I think it was a year of saying yes. Like we did things like going to parks, having fires in our backyard, things that didn't cost money. And we were saying yes the entire year to what starts now and moves forward.

It's just, you know, we just, the whole year it's like no, we're not saying no to doing these things. We're saying yes, yes to the future. Yeah, yes we're gonna have a great future. Yes, we can live like no one else later because now we're paying a price. That's a good way of looking at it. I like that framing.

Very, very good, very cool. And how many kids do you have? Five. Five, you know you have a bunch of kids when you're having finance discussions an hour after one of them's born, right? Yeah, we're like, all right, well, we got the fifth one done, now let's see.

Let's open the spreadsheets and look at the budgets. That's right. Well, and the medical bills were from the fourth son. Oh yeah we're like okay well you know we had another son here and this one over here is not even paid off yet. Gotta make sure this one doesn't get repo'd we got to clean this up. Well done you guys very well done. Hey the good news is is that um the switch flipped for both of you at about the same time. Yeah. I mean you both something about that birth and that new baby coming uh said okay we really got to do this and you're just you you within hours are looking at each other going we got to do this. Yep. And that that's pretty impressive. Um that's

the good news because we run into so many couples, it's six months or a year later before the spouse gets on board, whichever spouse it is, right? And that kind of thing. But you guys are just, you're messing with it, you already had made a sacrifice,

you'd already moved and everything else to try to get there, but then it wasn't a magic pill, you still had to deal with the stuff. All right. Yep. Yeah, wow, that's good deal with the stuff. All right. Yep. Yeah, wow, that's good, I like that. Very good.

What do you tell people the key to getting out of debt is? Find things in the event, whether it's a playground, whether it's an event at the library, go and find the free things in the area. Yeah, make free fun. One of the biggest things for me was listening to you guys on my way to work, you know, back and forth because, you know, it's like for those times as difficult as certain things were,

it was like these are the clear voices, these are the voices that tell me I'm not crazy. Listening to people do this debt-free scream, I remember sometimes I'd just be like crying in the car going, that's going to be me, that's going to be me. And just, you know, surrounding yourself with the positive good voices that are saying this is where you wanna go so that you just don't get lost and wander around in the middle of that journey. Very good.

You guys are heroes, I'm so proud of you. Who was cheering you along? Lots of coworkers, different friends. So you were talking about this Ramsey stuff all the time then? He was. You're sharing it. You're one of those guys huh? I'm a salesman. Whatever I like, whatever I think is just great. I'm trying to win everybody over to doing that. So it's just yeah. So we just and you know I'm I'm hoping that there's a lot of other people that we know that'll you know Come along with us so that you know, it's kind of one of those things you think you jump in the water is great

Come on in and just breathe the air. Yeah, amen. Amen So, um, how old is your oldest? He'll be 10 in September 10 in September. So he's nine right now. So he's old enough to know what happened. Oh yeah. Now the kids were watching. Our oldest two for sure. So I get paid for every Friday and so every Friday we would pop it up and looking at the debt snowball and getting it closer and closer and closer and so you know we didn't tell them. They're have a very clear memory of the time that the old man the old lady changed their whole lives. The dead gun family tree's completely changed because of you two heroes.

Oh, and I remember Wilbur, he's five. One time we were riding in the car and we were playing it and from the back seat, he goes, "'Dad, am I debt free?' And I said, "'Yes, buddy, you're debt free.' And he goes, "'Yes!' And I'm like, you know, and so it's just, and then, you know, we get the little credit cards

in the mail, those offers, and every time we get them, the kids are like, can I cut it up, can I cut it up? And we're just, it's just, it's just fun, because we've just, we created a culture where we just, yeah, we live in freedom. Well, and now the, but the kids have watched this, and so it's seared into their memory. It's foundational for them. Well done. Y'all. All right there there are they here? Yeah They're here. Get them up there. Yeah, we gotta do the free scream with you. I'm sorry. They're off camera

I didn't see them. Okay. All right, my guys Come on, come on. Let's run run run run. All right $42,000 paid off in 11 months, making $70,000 a year. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Three, two, one, we're debt-free! Yeah! Yeah!

There we go. But you can't do this stuff with a large family. Absolutely you can. Those guys are heroes! Our scripture of the day, Job 3432, the Lord detests dishonest scales, but accurate weights find favor with him. Earl Wilson said to sell something, tell a woman it's a bargain and tell a man it's deductible. That'll work.

Lindsay's in Shreveport, Louisiana. Hi Lindsay, how are you? Hi, good. How are you? Good. How can I help? So, um, me and my husband, well, actually it's my husband, my husband's father passed away and they did a lawsuit against him in that lawsuit. Um, my husband wasn't even born yet. So they put his money aside into a trust or a settlement of some sort. Um, with the receiving of the full one sum on his 30th birthday, which is just shy of a million dollars.

Who fast forward to today, his 30th birthday is in about two months, and we're not really sure what to do with the million dollars. Wow. Wow. So I'm gonna give you my Venmo, okay? I'm just kidding. Yeah, send it to Dave's Bahama Fund.

Right. Alright, so what is your financial condition today? We make roughly $50,000 a year before taxes. We're about $27,000 in debt. Twenty of it being our house payment. Or not our house payment, but our house, we still have about $20,000 towards our mortgage and then we have $7,000 left on my student loan. Okay, good. And so you've been living on $50,000?

Yes, sir. Okay, good, good. All right. Well, there's three things you can do with money and you should always practice doing all three. You can give it for generosity, you can invest it for the future, and you can enjoy it. And I would urge you to do all three things with some of this money, okay? And I want you to develop a plan for that and I want you to develop a written contract with yourselves that that's what you're going to do. Okay? That whatever it is you're going to do. So my personal recommendation would be obviously I'd write a check the first day and pay off

the debt. Okay? That's a very small amount out of a million. Okay. The second small check I would write is I'd put $20,000 in a high yield savings account for your emergency fund. That's all I would do there. Okay. And then with the rest of it, we've got to decide what we're going to do. Now, what do y'all do for a living? My husband's a police officer and I am stay at home. Okay, alright. And is your plan to continue all of that? My plan is to stay at home, yes. No, is it, is your, the two of you, is your plan to just continue life like it is? Yeah, we want to for the

majority of the, most part we would like to put our kids I have two kids that we would like to get in a bigger and better school district currently Okay, so we might move we might move we we would like okay But he's gonna he's gonna continue to be a police officer and you're gonna continue to stay at home. That's the plan And he is gonna continue to work. He's actually in school to be a cyber security specialist. Great, I like that. Okay, good plan. Let's just continue on all that plan. And so what's your current home worth? Our current home is worth about 120. Okay. And what would the move up home cost?

Anywhere from 375 to 450. Okay, let's call it 420. Let's call it 420, which means you need 300. Right, yes. We're relocating to the DFW area and that seems to be the average. Okay, how are you relocating to the DFW area and he's continuing to be a police officer in Shreveport? He's leaving that to go to do cybersecurity. He should graduate at the end of this year in December. Okay, okay. Alright, so you, but you would have a job lined up before you made this move?

Yes, obviously. Well, I'm not obvious to everyone, but it is to me, yeah. Yeah. Fair enough. Yeah, well, I'm not obvious to everyone but it is to me. Yeah, and so Talk to several people today that it wasn't obvious to Yeah, that's yeah that that's what we're gonna do, okay, so we're gonna have a job we're gonna spend 300,000 upgrade We're gonna sell the houseless report but 300 with it buy something in the 400 to 450 range we're gonna have an up zero debt we're gonna have an emergency fund and range. We're going to have a zero debt, we're going to have an emergency fund, and then we also probably need to upgrade some cars, and we probably need to go on a vacation,

and so let's spend another $100,000 on that. So that's $300,000, $400,000, $450,000, $500,000 we'll call it. So you've got $500,000 left to invest and do some generosity with. We're going to upgrade your cars, we're going to go on a nice trip. We're not going to hog wild, we're not losing our mind, but we are going to enjoy some of this and then we're going to invest 500,000. Okay? Now let me help you with how important that is. You need to lay every one of those things that we just talked about out. Just write them down, down a sheet sheet just make you a little one-page game plan strategy this is where the money's going I'm spending the million okay I'm spending 300 on a house

upgrade I'm spending a trip I'm upgrading the cars I'm paying off the debts I'm putting in a $20,000 side of an emergency fund you with me on all this yes you line item it right down a yellow pad if you want to and write it out and then y'all initial it because you got to get a freaking stick to this because when in the middle of the night when your brain starts spending this money you have to tell your brain to shut up. I was in on shopping sprees darn it. Yeah yeah those things because what you can do is if you have if you know a million dollars is coming in you can spend Three million in your head

Right, yeah, and that's what I'm trying to avoid. I'm laying out a game plan here So and then you stick to your this is your million dollar budget. What are we gonna do with this million dollars? We're gonna have a budget We're gonna give every one of these dollars a name before they get here and you guys got to do that this weekend Two months before the money comes you got to lay it out. Just like we laid out. Go back and play this call back, okay? Okay. And the two of you write it all down. Now if you will put a half a million dollars with a SmartVestor Pro, go to RamseySolutions.com, sit down with an investment professional, and if you will put a half a million dollars, five hundred thousand dollars in there, how

old are y'all? I'm 29 and he's going to be 30. He's going to be 30, okay. So if you will put it in good mutual funds like we're going to talk about, it will double about every seven years. Wow. Okay, so when you're 37 that 500 is going to be a million. When you're 44 it's going to be 2 million. When you're 51 it's going to be 4 million if you keep

your stinking hands off of it yes okay because you had a game plan and you stick to the game plan and then you guys go be cybersecurity build your own wealth in DFW restart your lives there debt-free stay debt-free stay on a budget stay on a plan live on less than you make, and leave this money alone and let it double every seven years. So when you're like 70 years old, this is going to be $10 million. You follow me? I'm following you, but that sounds like a lot. This is an important assignment.

This is an important assignment. You are going to be one of the few people that actually becomes a millionaire because of inherited money. Very few actually do. But you're going to do it because you're going to do this right and you're going to be smart about it. So hang on, I'm going to send you a copy of the book The Total Money Makeover and Baby Steps Millionaires, which is the largest study a millionaire has ever done. You guys need to study

what millionaires do because you are getting ready to be one and then you need to do it the way they do it so that you stay one. That's the point here. And we're also going to put you into every dollar premium with Financial Peace University, the whole shebang. Give them everything, Christian. And everybody that thinks they need some of your money, let me teach you a word. No.

I was going to say, Dave, tell me if I'm wrong. I wouldn't tell anybody. I wouldn't tell the real estate agent We just had a million bucks. I wouldn't tell the story. I wouldn't tell the story I would just between you know there's no reason to tell it. It doesn't do anything You can tell it later someday But in the re in the near future until you emotionally learn to handle all of this money and the responsibility that's coming with it future until you emotionally learn to handle all of this money and the responsibility that's coming with it The last thing you need to do is have to run off a bunch of crazy friends and relatives by saying no no no no no Well in the difference between spending four hundred thousand dollars on a house and six hundred and fifty in Dallas, Texas is two blocks and That money can just evaporate on you if you're not careful. Yeah. Yeah, that's a good

That's a good budget by the way because median household, median house price in America is $431,000 right now. But that means there will be a whole bunch of other nicer houses in Dallas you're going to have to say no to. Yeah, no. Stick to the plan. Stick to the plan. You got a good plan.

I like your plan. Now stick to it and go be a multi-millionaire. I love it. That puts us out of the Ramsey Show in the books. We'll be back with you before you know it. In the meantime, remember there's ultimately only one way to financial peace and that's to walk daily with the Prince of Peace, Christ Jesus.