The Ramsey Show - App - Reverse Mortgages Are From the Pit of Hell (Hour 3)

Episode Date: April 19, 2023

Dave Ramsey & Jade Warshaw answer your questions and discuss: "Should I pay off a reverse mortgage for my father-in-law using 401(k) money?" "Should I buy a second home to be near my boyfriend?" Pulling from a brokerage account to pay off debt, "How do I stop living below the poverty line?" Have a question for the show? Call 888-825-5225 Weekdays from 2-5pm ET Want a plan for your money? Find out where to start: https://bit.ly/3cEP4n6 Listen to all The Ramsey Network podcasts: https://bit.ly/3GxiXm6 Learn more about your ad choices. https://www.megaphone.fm/adchoices Ramsey Solutions Privacy Policy

Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the pods moving and storage studios, it's The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create actual amazing relationships. Jade Warshaw, Ramsey personality, is my co-host today. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Starting off this hour is Jill in Dallas. Hi, Jill. Welcome to The Ramsey Show.

Good afternoon, sir. I am so grateful that I have been able to get through the lines. Thank you so much for your time. We're honored. How can we help? I have been able to get through the lines. Thank you so much for your time. We're honored. How can we help? I have an investment question, please. I value your opinion very much. We have a question about paying off a reverse mortgage for my father-in-law.

My husband and I make between $180,000 and $200,000 a year. We have no debt. We have about $1.2 in our retirement accounts. We own our house and we also own two other houses. Wow. Very good. So your net worth is north of $4 million? Probably between $2 and $3. One of the houses is pretty small. That's a story in itself. But anyway, my husband's father has a reverse mortgage, and we would like to pay it off.

The interest rate seems to be quite exorbitant. Yes, and in another six or seven years, the interest will have eaten up the complete value of the home um we would i just want to know from your perspective we were considering taking out the money they there's 160 owed on the house we were considering withdrawing it my husband is uh 59 and a half we were considering withdrawing it and making it like an investment since real estate does appreciate. I realized that it would, his father is 89. And so this could be tied up for 10 plus years, but long-term investments usually are just that long

term. So I just, from your perspective would really really value your opinion in what do you think of this? What pitfalls do you see? Very sad that your father-in-law is 89 and he's got himself in a position where these rip-off reverse mortgages to be in a pinch. I'm so sorry. The great news is you guys are in great shape and you're able to do this. So does your husband have siblings um he does um we our thought was at the end that if we took out what we spent on the house plus the same gain that we had made on our 401k and let that be ours because you can't take the money out and not

make something on it because what is the house currently worth? The house is worth about $330,000. Okay. And none of the other siblings are in a position to help? No, sir. We bought one of the siblings a house so that he could live in the county and get county health care. That's one of the houses we own.

So he is very ill and needed to be inside our county line so that the county could cover his health care okay so uh no one's going to object to anything here then i don't think so his dad would like to keep it a secret until after he's gone and let it be a surprise i think that's a bad idea that's everybody gets, that's how people spend the rest of their lives, pissed off. Nope, we're going to tell everybody in the family what's going on, and here's what we're going to do. Yes, sir. We're going to deed the house to you guys.

Yes, sir. And you all just pay it off, and it's your house. And then you pay for the insurance, and you pay for the taxes, you pay for the maintenance, and dad gets to live there for life. Yes, sir. Or as long as he can stay in the house, dad gets to live there for life. Yes, sir. Or as long as he can stay in the house, that is. Anyway, not life. Yes.

If he has to be cared for in some other way, then that would be different. But, yeah, just, you know, we'll get you out, dad, but go ahead and just deed it to us now, and that's our return, and we're also going to have to invest more because we're going to have to cover the maintenance and we're going to have the taxes and insurance for you live there for free as long as you're able to live in the house yes sir and that's a fair that's a fair deal financially it's also a very kind thing for you all to do and you're in a position to do it and you'll you'll be okay financially you're not stupid but i'm not doing this and keep it a secret. Secrets are ugly and stuff like this. Okay.

All right. Well, I don't want to cause a problem. You will. Okay. Well, then we won't keep it a secret. It's just fair. Okay. And if anybody has a better plan, y'all can do it.

But if you don't have a better plan, you don't have the money, we're standing here with the money, we can do this. But I don't want some character plan, you don't have the money, we're standing here with the money, we can do this. But I don't want some character in the family to be yelling later, oh, Jill took advantage of Grandpa. Yeah. You know? And it has to be the deed. The house has to be deeded up front.

It can't be, hey, we'll give him the money to pay the house off, and then he wills us the house. Like, it can't be that. No, no. You get the house in your name now. Now. Okay. and we were taking the money out of our 401k to pay it off but yeah i mean we've got plenty in there and we've still got another many years to still you don't you don't have enough in a side investment account

that's not 401k to do it do you uh no we've only got about 50 in another account we don't have enough to pay it off yeah you're gonna pay taxes taxes, so it's going to cost you $200,000 to get this out. Okay. To clear $160,000. And so, yeah, I'm still doing it, though. It's why you work. You're able to take care of Dad. But I'm not going to have anybody objecting to this,

and we're going to control the variables. Because he obviously has – we know that he doesn't always make good decisions because he made the decision to put a reverse mortgage on there and so i can't leave the house in his name hoping he's going to make good decisions no we're going to take care of this so that we can take care of him okay all right i just want to do the right thing that's all i don't know what i hurt no one's anyone's feelings. You have such a good heart. You do. And hopefully everyone will see the good in this,

and there won't be a relative that objects. But if there is, at least they'll know it on the front end, and we can just go, this is what we're doing. And unless you've got a better plan to take care of him, he's otherwise going to end up losing his house. So what do you people want to do here? Yeah. These reverse mortgages are from the pit of hell they're horrible absolutely horrible high interest rates high fees and what's weird is of course the reverse is they pay for you those of you don't know how it works they're paying the old man payments until it gets to 65 percent

loan to value when it gets to 65 percent loan-to-value. When it gets to 65% loan-to-value, they stop the payments, and now they just add interest to the 65% until it eats up the entire value, and then they foreclose. That's so sad. Or if he doesn't keep up the taxes and insurance, even after they stop the payments, that throws it into fault, and they foreclose. So regular home mortgages have about a 2% to a 3% foreclosure rate.

Reverse mortgages have a 15% foreclosure rate. So I'm not kidding when I say this is a ripoff. Yeah, that's true. And they're sold on television on ads by washed-up actors between the walk-in bathtubs and the commercial i saw joe joe namath montel jordan yeah yeah yeah my greatest fear in life is i live long enough to do one of those ads oh no dave you would never you would never. You would never. You're right. I would never.

I'm not that desperate to be in front of a camera. This is The Ramsey Show. Hey, you guys. Health insurance costs are only moving one way, and that way isn't down. And if higher costs aren't enough, the wait times to see your doctor are longer, and it's harder than ever to get anything approved through the bureaucracy. So if you feel like the system is working against you, try a biblically-based alternative to health insurance, Christian Healthcare Ministries. CHM is a health cost-sharing ministry that's helped hundreds of thousands of families like yours take care of over $11 billion in medical bills since 1981. And CHM has also helped them stay true to their values

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slash budget. That's chministries.org slash budgets at chministries.org slash budgets. Jade Warshaw, Ramsey Personality is my co-host today. Thank you for joining us, America. The phone number here is 888-825-5225. A whole bunch of you are brand new. We appreciate that. We appreciate that. We're glad you're here. You can help us out if you would, whether you're old timer or whether you're brand new. We need the help. You can do three things to help us move this show out and help America and serve America by telling them the truth because we love them.

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at all just move along and now we're i think we're number 11 podcast on apple's ranking it comes and goes uh in the entire world of podcasts which is some two or three million podcasts that are out there that's not a nuanced uh category that's of all of them and so thank you guys we appreciate that we have not spent 300300 million on marketing this year. Instead, you guys are just telling us you like it by telling each other about it. So thank you, thank you, thank you. Katrina is in Chicago. Hi, Katrina.

Welcome to the Ramsey Show. Thanks. How are you guys? Better than we deserve. What's up? So I own a condo in Chicago, and I am looking to buy a second home in Nashville, Tennessee. Why? And what I'm wondering is why? Because my boyfriend got transferred to Nashville, and then I've been doing long distance, and so now we want to live in the same city

to figure out if we're going to marriage. So you're going to move from Chicago to Nashville? Well, I'm not planning to. So I'm trying to work it out with my job so that I could be fully remote, but in the meantime, I have to come in. I'm supposed to be around 60%. So I'm still doing that by going to Nashville, but it's a little painful. So you want a second home in Tennessee. Is your current home in Chicago paid for? It is. Wow, okay.

So I don't have any debt currently. And I really don't want to get any because you know how this works. Yeah, I do know how it works. Well, my question is, why do you feel that you would have to, just hypothetically, why do you feel that you would have to buy a home? Well, she just rented an apartment for six months. The rent is so expensive. But even if this wasn't,

even if there was no boyfriend or anything like that, we would never say to just walk in and up and buy a house. You would just want to get a feel of the area, figure out what life is.

I have been getting a feel of the area in the last, I've been doing this for a year and a half, like going back and forth. How old are you? I'm 46. What do are you? I'm 46.

What do you make? I make $183 and then a bonus that's about $100. How long have you been dating a boyfriend? Since more pandemic love. Pandemic love. Only good thing that came out of it. That's much better than puppy love i'm just saying but here's the thing i'm slightly well no i'm robbing the cradle a bit he's much younger i didn't know that but it is what it is doesn't matter so that's another reason why i like i have

that's just another reason that's just another reason we think you're awesome right there. So, okay. So the, but here's the deal. You're making a permanent real estate decision in a temporary situation. That's a bad move. This is a situation where you rent until the permanent shakes out. There's two issues on the permanent. When the relationship goes from boyfriend to husband and when the job allows you to move, now we have permanent.

Then we buy. As a matter of fact, then we buy, you and him, because you're married. Until then, you're doing this gypsy thing back and forth, corporate gypsy thing and remote semi and long distance love affair and all this. And all of that just screams rent. And not to mention, if we're really playing this out long term, okay, you got the paid for house in Chicago. Let's say you come to Tennessee, you rent for a while, your work thing works out, you

get engaged, you decide to get married, you know, your work thing works out. You get engaged. You decide to get married. You can sell the Chicago house and you can probably end up buying whatever house you get here in Tennessee in cash as opposed to trying to, do you see what I'm saying? This just screams rent for six months. Yeah. Long-term, it's better to do it this way. Okay.

But then I hear what you're saying, but then can i ask yeah my question was going to be when i buy that place i have cash in three different places pay cash and i'm wondering okay yeah but you're going to sell the place in chicago yeah you got to sell the place in chicago the end of the story if it goes like you think unless i'm missing something is you're married and live in nashville right yeah yeah that's the end of the story so you're going to sell the place in chicago and you've got cash and you've got him hopefully he's worth something we didn't even ask about that please please tell us it's good katrina yeah no it's good he's just far, you know, he's more puffy in his, you know.

How young is this guy? He's 32. I don't mean that, but, like, compared to, like, there's a lot of earning potential between 32 and 46. Okay, okay. All right. I see you, Katrina. I see you out here.

All right. Hey, yeah, just what's happening here is this is an exciting adventure in your life, and don't confuse that with real estate. Real estate's when things are stable and boring and you pay cash. So I would not buy right now because if you buy, you're going to end up selling what you buy and doing something different when this all settles. You're going to end up saying,

we want to set up our lives and it's not in this house or not in this condo. And so it just bothers you because you're going to end up saying, we want to set up our lives, and it's not in this house or not in this condo. And so it just bothers you because you're cheap to rent because you feel like you're wasting money. But rent, when it's in a proper scenario, and this is a proper scenario, is called paying for patience. And look, if you move all the way down to Tennessee, your boy better put a ring on it. That's all I'm saying.

If you're making this type of transition, he needs to come through, and I hope that he does for you. Mama Jade with relationship advice. There we go right there. Ding, ding. I love it. Good stuff. Stacey's in Bakersfield, California.

Hi, Stacey. Welcome to the Ramsey Show. Oh, thank you for having me. Sure. What's up? Well, I listened to your podcast on the way home from a trip and I was really, you pulled me in. I'm very newly divorced. I've never operated on a budget at all. I have some debt in this new single life of mine and I have a little bit of money in a brokerage account. How much debt and

how much in the brokerage account? Only $22,000. I have about $38,000 in debt. Half of it is a medical bill and the other half is credit cards. And I really need some direction and help. What do you make? I make, um, I gross about 107. Um, this year I'm going to get a 5% though, but 113 a year. All right. I pay into a pension. I have a pension. No kids, right? Right. All right. You know, if I were you, I would probably do that. I, you know, if I were you, I would probably do that. You know, if I had money set aside that was not retirement, I'd probably pull some from it to pay debt, especially if it's single stocks. Yeah, I'm going to cash it all in and clear the debt because we're going to get you on

the debt snowball. We're going to put you on a budget. And a budget's not a beans and rice thing. It may be for a little while until you get some of these bills cleaned up. up. But then after that, it's just you telling your money what to do and giving you confidence in this new stage of life for handling your own money. And I also want you to download EveryDollar. That's the budgeting app that we use here. And it's great. It's going to help anybody who's never budgeted before learn how to do it because it's not just an app where you put the numbers in. It's teaching you and there's teachings that are built into the app that help you throughout this. So that's what

I would do. And I'm excited that you're on this journey. I think that it's exciting that you're finally getting in control of your money. And that starts with you budgeting, it starts with you getting out of debt. And make sure you before you do all of this that you put aside $1,000 for emergencies because you need that first things first. For your starter, beginner emergency fund. So every dollar will do that. And I'll tell you what, let's just go ahead. Since you're starting a new phase of life, put you into Financial Peace University. That's a nine-week class, a nine-lesson class on how to handle money.

Give you your confidence in this area and we'll help you do it. We're going to do it all for free. It's just our gift to you to help you start fresh. Jade Walshaw, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Nicole in Syracuse, New York. Hi, Nicole.

How are you? Hi, Dave and Jade. How are you guys doing? Great. What's up? So, my husband and I are on Baby Step 2. We just paid off one of our cars, well, our only car, with a huge $9,000 payment to eliminate that debt.

It took a lot of strong-arming my husband to let go of that money to pay it off, but we did. So, last year we sold his car to get out of that money to pay it off, but we did. So last year we sold his car to get out of that debt and save money since he's able to walk to both his jobs. It's worked for us for almost a year. My husband has a full-time job for 22 an hour and part-time with 17 an hour, and I get 16 an hour for my part-time job. We take home about $4,530 a month. So my husband is looking for a better job that would pay him about $25,000 to $28,000 an hour. If he gets this job, we would have to come up with at least $7,000 quick to get a new car or a used car.

Where did $7,000 come from? So we've been working with a car broker, auto broker, and that's like around the number that we have been looking for. But, yeah, if he gets that, then, you know, we can get down to one job and I won't be going crazy with the kids at home all day alone. So my question is, is it worth it for him to go for that job that cost a little, I mean, pays him a little bit more? Or should we just continue what we're doing? So let me get this straight. I want to make sure I'm tracking with you.

You're saying that if your husband gets this other job, it's going to require you to get another vehicle. And you want to know, is his pay increase worth that cost? Yeah, because he works a job and a half. And if he gets this other job, he could eliminate the other two jobs. Okay. Yeah, and then we would actually see each other once in a while how would you pay for it how would you how would you pay for that the new car um that's the thing like we don't know how we would come up with since we just did that big payment on the that car and i took a lot of convincing

to get him to do that um and do you have to pay i mean you don't have to pay seven thousand having to convince him doesn't enter into this discussion. The only thing that enters into the discussion is what makes sense for your family. He shouldn't need convincing on that. He should just want to do it. You should just want to do it. What's best for your family? Very cautious. You don't have $7,000, right?

No. Right. You can't buy a $7,000 car then. How much could you scrape together to make this happen? I think if he got hired after the hiring process, if he got hired within two months, we might be able to get $5,000 scraped together. But you're starting now.

You're starting to put aside now because you know that this is on the horizon. So we wouldn't wait until, you know, don't wait until the cards are on the table. Start putting aside now so that he has it. Okay, let's just be real clear. Your household income, if I understood you correctly, if he takes this job, does not go up. He just is going to be working less because he's making more at the new job. Your quality of life goes up. So the numbers don't change at your house when he gets the new job.

Am I right? Correct. Okay. That's what I thought I understood. So Jade is exactly right then. You can save up starting right now and buy a $2,000 car or a $4,000 car or a $3,000 car, whatever cash you can scrape together. There's no magic to seven.

The only magic to seven is you don't have it, so you can't do it. Right, right. Because you're not going to, listen, if you continually figure out a way to rationalize borrowing money, you're going to borrow money the rest of your life and just be normal broke people. You've got to stop that. You have to draw a line in the sand. Debt is not an option now what do we do we want a better life he wants this better job i'm with you on both of those things got no issue with that now how do we get started

over there or how do we scrape up some money when do you think he's going to hear on this job uh he's got an interview on Thursday. Is it a one-and-done interview, or is it a six-week interview process? Well, he's had an interview for this job before, and then he applied. He keeps applying to the same job over and over again. Same company, I mean. So why is he going to get it this time? I don't know.

Hey, what kind of job? What is it? What is it that he's interviewing for? grocery store manager for aldi is there any other chains that he can be interviewing for the same position why has it got to be the same aldi can he look at publics can he look at kroger whatever it is by you hyvee whatever the grocery store chains are is he just putting all his chips in one bag or can he, you know, I'm just trying to get a beat on what's really going on. Right.

Yeah, I guess we were just kind of, like I think he's putting out a lot of feelers for different jobs, but that's the one that he wanted. I want to be serious again. I'm not trying to be sarcastic or mean. He's applied for this job multiple times and has not gotten it. Why is it now you're more sure what evidence do you have um i don't okay so let's stop then you're tired of him working all the time and so you're trying

to wish this into existence and somehow figure out a way to buy a car that you don't need to be buying until this all goes down. Right. You're just tired. You've been fighting this baby step two stuff and your tank is starting to get empty. Am I wrong? Correct. I hope your wish comes true. I hope he gets this and you all get a better quality of life making the same amount of dollars.

How much debt do you all have left? We have a home equity loan for about $10,000, and then he has his student loans, which are on pause, for $39,000, and then our house, we have $61,000. So baby step two is the home equity loan and the student loan so you got 49 000 left and your household income total in a year is what round um before taxes about 55 to 60 yeah okay i have a question for you and i don't want to dig the hole deeper are you guys working towards your long-term play for careers? I'm kind of just like working part-time jobs. I don't, yeah.

Because it kind of sounds like... I don't really have a long-time play. Okay. His jobs are like grocery store managers. He doesn't really have a long-time play either. I want you guys, okay, in the break, let's pick up and let's get you guys paycheck to purpose let's do the career assessment all that stuff because i feel like the ken colman materials you guys need to get the career thing yeah yeah because that's what's going to give you

grabbing it little things and you got this one thing this one aldi store this one managership what jade was telling you earlier we want to um we want to help we want you to earn more for your sake and that's going to make this whole thing get better and go faster. I hope he gets this one, but if he doesn't, we need a better plan. Because you've still got, at your current income, you've still got two years to go, maybe step two, and you're at snowball. You're tired, and you're already tired. So I do think you all need to get a car.

I think the one car is adding to the family stress, even not counting this job stuff. Is that right? Correct. Yeah. So, yeah, we need to do that. And I want him not to have to be coerced into these things. I want him to be leading into these things with you, the two of you holding hands and walking towards the light, right, and doing this together.

That's going to lower the stress for both of you as well because he's not giving up his life. He's living his life. It's through and with his family. That's what he chose, and that's what he's doing because he's a good man. But it's not like you're mommy and telling a little boy he can't have candy. That's right. That's not what's going on.

So this is a man who's leaning in, good for him, and he's working with his wife and we're fighting for a better future. Together as two grownups, and that's how it should be. So you've got a good guy there. He's a good guy. You guys probably do need to budget in a car into your debt snowball. And let's start working on the career stuff, too. So, but hang on.

We'll have Austin pick up. We'll get you a paycheck to purpose book for him and for you by Ken Coleman and the Get Clear Assessment to help you figure out what kind of careers to aim at where there's serious money that can be taken off the table. I'd love to see y'all double your income in the next five years. This is The Ramsey Show. Our scripture of the day, Proverbs 14, 23, there is profit in hard work but mere talk leads to poverty stephen king says talent is cheaper than table salt what separates the talented individual from the successful one is a lot of hard work jade warshaw ramsey personality is my co-host today open phones at 888-825-5225 Stephen is up next in Cookville Tennessee hi Stephen welcome to the Ramsey show

hi thanks for having me on sure how can we help well uh essentially uh all my life I've really been earning below the poverty line um you, living in a low-income area. It kind of goes with the lifestyle, I guess. But with recent years of people not wanting to work and that tailored with a lot of houses and mortgages going up and everything, I simultaneously see an opportunity to make a lot more money, which I don't really know how to do, as well as having the dread of not being able to afford a home within the next 10 years. So it's kind of like a duality sort of thing.

And I'm wondering, what would your advice be for trying to jump on the opportunity to earn as much income as possible for somebody who's in my situation? What do you want to do? Well, I've always been enamored with with film and and the art of it uh i i did go to film school about 10 years ago didn't get to finish it because of uh how much i didn't make enough money um i'm currently in a uh an acting class right now um but i've always wanted to know i've always wanted

to be able to have something to fall back on but uh yeah the thing the thing with the arts is the thing with the arts is you've got to make money until you make money basically is the way that works um right you know when whenever i hear people talk like this or it's like i've been i'm below the poverty line i'm kind of caught up into this i think you've got to drill down and instead of looking at all those outward reasons, why? Just look at your specific situation. Why are you not getting up and finding work that's paying more? What is it that's keeping you from that? Is it that you don't know what you want to do? Is it that you don't know what the actual next step is? You need to start asking yourself those questions because that's what's going to give you the next step is. Like what are, you need to start asking yourself those questions because that's what's going

to give you the next step forward. So you said you went to school for acting. You tried the acting thing. I mean, I would want to drill down more on that and find out what happened. But in the meantime, what kept you from doing other work? Well,

I, I'm currently in an acting class. It's thankfully, it's pretty cheap. I can, I can at least afford that. And I get, get that done acting class. Thankfully, it's pretty cheap. I can at least afford that. And I get that done in August. But from what I can tell, it's because I've done a lot of job hunting,

and it seems to be an educational boundary that I've not been able to crack. What do you do now? Currently, I'm in security for a a uh entertainment venue i've got about three three years worth of uh experience in security and what are you earning um after taxes uh a little over 30k a year and it's full-time yes ma'am okay that's not the poverty level you know that well yeah it's lower it's lower income but it's not the poverty level, you know that. Well, yeah. It's lower income, but it's not the poverty level. Oh, okay. I mean, poverty level for a single guy in Cookville would be $15,000.

Well, I commute to Nashville, too. Do you have any debt? Why do you commute to Nashville for a $30,000 job? It's just, I've not been able to find much in Cookville. So move. In terms of debt, yeah. That's a two hour drive each way. Yeah, where I live, I'm kind of I kind of have the ability to afford

rent. Okay, let's stop. My friend Henry Cloud says that what we need to do is lay in front of ourselves when we're setting goals, when we want to move, when we want to level up. We say, okay, here's what I want to be doing, and that's our desired future. And then once we have the desired future figured out, then we have to say, okay, what must be true about me, about my life, about my education, about my location that is not true now in order for me to have my desired future? Now, you ask us about a desired future that makes more money than you make today. We've had an exploratory conversation around that. All right.

And so, number one, there's not going to be acting jobs in Cookville, Tennessee. Done. You have to move if you're going to do that. You got to at least get to Nashville. You got to at least be in a metropolitan area, minimum Nashville, but obviously new york or la even atlanta yeah and and nashville's got a lot of film work going on a lot of stuff happening but it's not exactly nirvana for actors right right either so uh it might be for music people sorta but the uh anyway so you got a location issue if you're gonna be be there. That must be true. You can't live in Cookville and do your dream.

That's one of the – so you have to start saying, okay, what are my barriers? What are my blockers? And I'm going to knock those down. And I think the next thing you've got to do, too, is what Jade was indicating, is you need to find something making $50,000 to $60,000 a year, working 40 to 80 hours a week to start piling up some money so that you can afford to work on entering into the entertainment business which you have to have the side hustle

the side gig and it may last a decade until you break into those businesses that's right whether it's music business acting business or whatever the joke in nashville is how do you get the next country music stars attention uh waiter and I know it's possible like I think sometimes people in the arts they kind of have that well it's be I'm broke because I'm in the arts no man like you're broke because you ain't working yeah man Sam and I went to dinner the other night and the valet was parking the car and I went to tip him and I said you know do you have the QR code so I can tip you he said yeah he gives me his card with the QR code on it he's a guitar player yeah and he's a musician but he's working as a valet at night and I'm guessing he probably has a day job in a high-end restaurant he's making

bank he was at a high-end restaurant so don't talk yourself out of the fact that you can't make money until you become a successful actor that's a lie two blockers i see immediately is location for your long-term dream and willingness to do a whole bunch of side hustle big time fast you know why you took the security job at the venue because you wanted to be around entertainment not because it was a good job yeah you're still you just want to be around it because you love it you love the stage you love watching those people on the stage dreaming you're going to be that guy someday and you might be i hope you are but the security gig is not i mean obviously he's not making a lot of money and commuting from cookful to do it is just plain mathematically ridiculous yeah just does not work so you know you're you're

working all the time there's plenty of work And it's not education-based at all. There's plenty of work from retail to restaurants to Uber to cutting grass to construction. Man, there's construction jobs on Nashville. There's more cranes in Nashville and the skyline right now than there are buildings. So it's just, you know, there is all kinds of work you can do at 20 to 40 bucks an hour in a town like Nashville if you can't find that in Cookville. Now, Cookville is not a small town anymore. Right.

And everybody in Cookville is not at the poverty line. I can promise you that. That's true. And I know several multimillionaires there personally. You know, I've said it before and I'll say it again when it comes to this stuff. You've got to, until you write it down on paper, step by step, what your steps in this process are going to be. It's floating around in your head and it's causing chaos

and it's causing you to either paralyze you and not do anything at all or it's just causing you to go in a million directions. You got to get this on paper and write down, all right, step one. My desired future, and I'm Stephen, is to be in the acting world, in the film world.

I've got two things I immediately see already in a five-minute conversation yeah we move and we work side hustles more to eat really really well while we're pursuing this dream then there's probably more blockers that have to do with actually entering into that industry you need to get an agent there you go i don't know anything about industry. You need to get an agent. I don't know anything. There you go. I don't know anything about that stuff. You do. You need to get an agent because your agent's going to give you feedback onto what you need to do next to actually be able to land work. So make sure you're sending your things out to people who will give you accurate feedback.

So hang on, Steve. We're going to send you Proximity Principle by Ken Coleman and From Paycheck to Purpose by Ken Coleman, which both deal with these issues. You're a good man. I'm honored to talk to you. Thank you for calling. That puts this hour 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. Hey, what's up, guys? It's Jade. Look, if you like what you heard in this episode and want to know more about getting started on the Ramsey Baby Steps, go to RamseySolutions.com and click the Get Started button. We'll help you figure out the best next step for you based on your specific situation. That's RamseySolutions.com and click Get Started.