The Ramsey Show - App - Separate Your Wants and Needs If You Want to Win (Hour 3)

Episode Date: September 13, 2019

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Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Dollar Car Rental Studios, it's the Dave Ramsey Show, where debt is dumb, cash is king, and the paid-off home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice. I am Dave Ramsey. Thank you for joining us. Open phones this hour at 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225. Roger is in Anderson, Indiana. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show, Roger.

Thank you, Dave. It's an honor to speak to you. You too. What's up? Well, I'm looking for a health check. 61 years old. My wife is also. She's been retired for three years.

I'm looking to retire in about six months, right after turning 62. We have no debt. House is paid for. Great. We've got roughly 700 or so in our main retirement accounts. I've got a 401K that's got $155. Our property's worth about $2.25 on the high side, maybe. $700 plus $155 or $700 including $155?

No, plus the 155. Okay. All right. So 855. So you got a net worth of over a million. Congratulations. Thank you. We've worked hard at it.

We actually lived this way before I ever found you on the radio. Sure. Sure. Yeah, it was before you got into a local radio station. I bought an O2 vehicle that bought on time, 0% financing, and it was still $500 a month, and I said, never again. Yeah, I hear you. And paid it off in three years. It was a five-year note.

And then soon after that. Do you have any other pension coming in? I do. I will have a pension from my job besides the 401K. How much? It's roughly $62,000. Okay. What do you make now? Right now, I'm about $33,000 an hour.

Probably about $70,000 with my overtime. Okay. At our high, we were making around $125,000. Then my wife retired, like I said, three years ago after 38 years of her job. Yeah. She was due. Right. Does she have a pension as well?

Yes. It comes in on a monthly stipend. How much is that? That's just under $800. Okay. All right. please stipend uh-huh how much is that no uh that's uh just under eight hundred dollars okay yeah all right and then i've got another pension that uh um if i wait until i'm 65 to start calling it it will be roughly in the 450 450 range a month okay and uh are any of any of these pensions have the ability to do a lump sum rollover. Yes. At my employer now, I do.

I haven't checked the other one out. We worked at an automaker spinoff, and when they closed us, they took over our pension. Okay. And so I'm set up for their pension. Here's what I heard you tell me, okay? You're making it now with your income at 70-something as the household sits. Yeah, and I still have at least $30,000 liquid in cash. Yeah, if you take the pension, if you take the pension, your income would drop from 70 to 62.

Right. You easily, it's kind of a no-brainer, you know, can supplement that other $10,000 out of the investment income off of $850,000. Yeah. So you're in great shape. You've got no issues at all, none whatsoever. My wife's a little bit nervous about it. And also we have an unknown fixed retirement from her folks when the time comes. But here's the point.

Okay, you need to just do some simple math with her, okay? We have $800,000. If we take 5% off of that, and it's earning a lot more than that because we're in mutual funds. Yes. And it's earning a lot more than that because we're in mutual funds. But if we take 5% off of that, that's $40,000 a year. That gives us a $30,000 a year raise, you know, 40 plus 60, your pension, over what you make now. Yeah, yeah. So my 60 would be a lump sum. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh. Yeah, that's a lump sum.

Oh, I thought you said they were paying you $60,000 a year pension. No, no, I'm sorry. That's a lump sum. Oh, I'm sorry. Yeah. Okay, then we roll that over. So now we're not at $855,000. Now we're at $900,000.

And so $900,000 at 10% is $90,000 a year. At 8% is $81,000 a year, and so on, right? Right. And so you just show her those numbers, sit down with a SmartVestor Pro, and lay out a game plan to draw enough off the income only of the $900,000 to live well. Okay. And you won't even have to touch your nest egg. This is basically what our financial advisor has told us.

We haven't sat down and specifically gone over numbers with him yet. I have found in these situations that even though I'm the expert, it helps my wife to hear someone else say it. Yeah. I understand. I don't know what that is. It's wrong, but it is that way. So, Roger, thank you for calling in, man.

Congratulations. You're another everyday millionaire. Very well done. Portia's with us in Dallas, Texas. Hi, Portia. How are you? Hi. How are you?

Better than I deserve. What's up? Okay, Dave. I have an issue. I am a single mother of five. I did buy your book and I love the book, Total Money Makeover. I have student loans totaling in about $68,000. I have credit card debt in about $5,450. Cars that I pay for about $523 a month and I owe about $20,000 on it. I am needing to find out how I can actually start this process.

I do have the $1,000 saved up. Good. But I don't know if I should be saving money when I still have debt. No. Right now we've got to work on the debt. That's the first thing you do. What we teach folks to do is baby step one is $1,000, and then baby step two is we list all our debts, smallest to largest.

We stop saving and we stop investing, and we pile up and we tear into that smallest debt and get rid of it. You need to cut up your credit cards tonight, all of them. Okay. What is your income? As of right now, my income is about $47,000 a year. I had a job making more, but I was recently laid off for about two months, so I picked up the nearest job that I could get, the quickest job that I could get. And how much child support do you have coming in?

Total, it's about $14,000. A year? A year, yes, sir. All right. So we're dealing with a $60,000 household income. That car is a very expensive car. It's not where you have to sell it, but it's where you need to think about possibly selling it and moving down in car. Okay. A $500 car payment in your situation is a huge ouchie. Ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch.

It's going to hold you back. I mean, so it sounds like you got a high interest rate on it too. I do. Unfortunately, it was my first car and I didn't know anything about buying a car on my own. I'd love for you to get about a $5,000 car for a little while while you get this mess cleaned up and get no payments. Just for a little while while you get this mess cleaned up and get no payments. Just for a little while. But you're going to have to pull back on some stuff and lay into this,

and then you can get this moving. It'll work for you, though. Hold on. I'm going to send you a copy of the book, The Total Money Makeover, to show you exactly how to do what and when to do it. This is The Dave Ramsey Show. Are high health care costs getting you down? Are you confused trying to navigate your options? Do you wish you could find an affordable, biblical solution to your health care costs? Based on New Testament principles, Christian Health Care Ministries, or CHM,

helps Christian families, churches, and ministries join together as the body of Christ to share their major health care costs. Christian Health Care Ministries is the original health cost-sharing ministry. A Better Business Bureau-accredited organization, CHM members share to pay each other's medical bills. It's not insurance. It's Christians financially and spiritually supporting each other. It's what Christian Healthcare Ministries has done for over 35 years, and our members have shared over $2.5 billion in medical bills. To learn more, visit chministries.org. That's chministries.org. Christian Healthcare Ministries is a proud sponsor of Dave Ramsey Live Events. chministries.org. Audrey is with us in Atlanta, Georgia.

Hey, Audrey, how are you? I'm doing good. Thanks, Dave, for taking my call. Sure. What's up? So my husband and I own a small business that's considered a high-risk industry. And we recently got our workman's comp audit back, and the bill was a lot higher, around $28,000, a lot more than what it has been in the past.

What was it in the past? Well, last year it was around 16 000 and what's happened is they won't allow us to break down the class codes for the ground workers and versus you know the tree climbers or whatnot yeah we've run into that too you'll have to change companies because the people you're dealing with are morons okay yeah yeah i had these idiots come in here and start classifying our people as all kinds of high-risk things, and they're sitting at a freaking desk. I mean, they're just absolute morons sometimes. And so, yeah, we had to break our stuff down by class and had to break it down by some of the executive classes

because our highly compensated people have workers' comp on them, too. And it's just, it's, all of our guys fly a desk, for God's sakes, you know? It's ridiculous. Well, you're in the broadcast industry. Yeah, sitting at a desk, you know. So it just, but they just, they're really a bunch of bureaucrats, is what it amounts to. And so, yeah, get your, do you have an independent agent that is your agent? We do. They've been going up to bat for us we've been disputing it but my question is as far as the the funds go to

pay it so we had about 10 000 saved well you needed 16 yep yeah so you weren't even ready for that yeah well right now we have 14 in our business account, and then we have 16 in our personal savings. So should we take what's in our emergency fund? You know, we're on baby step six now. We're working to pay off the house. Should we just stop that, take it from our emergency fund, pay it off one lump sum, and then start back?

They'll put us on a payment plan. Yeah, I mean, you can put it on a monthly plan. There's nothing wrong with that. And just keep up with it. But I'm not accepting the $28,000. Okay. If you change agents, change agents. But let's get somebody to grow a brain here.

Okay. They almost doubled it. Yep. Based on reclassification alone. Yes. Not based on experience rating, right? You didn't have a bunch of claims? No, not one at all, never.

Yeah, no experience rating whatsoever here. They just came in and some idiot in a cubicle 500 miles away decided to reclassify your workers. Okay. That's exactly what happened, isn't it? Yeah, pretty much, yes. Yeah, same thing. I mean, we ran into that about five years ago, and I just ripped everybody a new butt. I mean, I'm not, you know, that's just these people that don't think don't get to charge me money.

Okay. It just pisses me off, man. Business is too hard without stupid people getting involved. You know what I'm saying? Yes, sir. Yeah. So, yeah, get you – tell your agent to grow a backbone and straighten this out, get you a new provider, or get you a new agent, one of the two.

Okay. And then let's put the thing on a monthly. And then you've got to start to assess, are you charging enough for your product line, your service, to cover the cost of labor, which includes, in your case, high workers' comp? That's right. Because whether it's 16 or whether it's 18 or whether it's 14, it's still high workers' comp is what you're saying. Because you've got guys out there swinging sharp objects around, right? That's correct.

Yeah, so you're going to have a charge, a per head charge that's going to be high, because there is a legitimate risk there. But there's no justification for that shift. That's just somebody that got out of control. And so time to smack a bureaucrat. It's smack a bureauc got out of control. And so time to smack a bureaucrat. It's Smack a Bureaucrat Day. Unbelievable. Bruce is with us at Fort Walton Beach.

Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Bruce, what's up? Yes, thank you, Dave. I'm in baby step seven. My wife and I, we have a net worth of $1.1 million. Wow. Investing at, well, I'm 54, so I've had time. Investing is not my forte.

Savings is. So this is kind of the area I've been almost dreading. But here I am. So you're $1.4 million. What's it invested in? It's $1.1 million. I'm sorry, $1.1. Well.

How much of that's in your 401K? $340,000. Okay. We have $368,000 in cash in the bank, which my wife's about to shoot me over because she wants me to invest in something. Good for her. Yeah, $225,000. Our home's worth $250,000. We can sell it for $225,000 or get net for that.

And then we bought a piece of property in a resort area worth $132,000, and it's about $175,000 now after a couple of years. Good. So you have done some real estate investing, your home and that property. Yes. And you've done some investing in your 401K. Yes, everything's paid for. You're more of an investor than you think you are, except for that $ that needs to be moved okay how can i help uh yeah um yeah we make uh

about 175 a year and what we're looking at now is we would like to build a home in a resort area but it's going to cost uh by the time we're done we we'd have about $600,000 in a home, which is half of our net worth. We would have to sell our current home and use a large portion of that cash, and then we would be in an area where we wanted to live. And I just don't know if that's a smart thing to do, to have so much in one house, or should we just stay where we're at or buy another home for about the same in a different area and then just keep buying houses or invest in other areas?

The data that we have found on the millionaires that are between one and four million, most of them have about a third in their house, between one and four million and so if you go to 600 and you're at half which is about where you'll be i agree with you um you make really good money you've still got a lot of years to earn that and so um you know you uh you're gonna have to the if i did that i think you're kind of on the bubble i don't think it's if you told me it's eight eight hundred i'd say no okay that's too much if you told me it was 400 i'd say it's a no-brainer do it okay so you're kind of on the bubble uh you know you're right there where i'm it's good to be a little nervous but not anything to freak out about i would probably do it but the

way sharon and i would do it would be we would then in turn say, okay, now we've got to really plow into some good mutual fund investing or some real estate of some kind to where our net worth shoots on up past this, and quickly this becomes a third of our net worth. Okay. Well, that's good. That's good to know. Yeah, because we have no debt, so that's not really an issue.

Yeah, it's just a matter of diversification. You're going to have a large chunk of who you are money-wise in one thing. Yes. So resort area makes me a little nervous because that's volatile real estate. What kind of resort area? Well, it's near the beach. Okay. Well, again.

About half a mile from the beach. Okay. Well, again... About half a mile from the beach. Okay. Beach property, if the value is based on the beach, resort property is the first thing to go up when the economy is good and the first thing to go down when the economy is bad. Exactly. Beach front condos, mountain houses for skiing, beach front condos, lake houses skiing beachfront condos lake houses i got a lake house my lake house went in half in value when the market went down and my house in town dropped

hardly at all uh now my lake house is almost tripled since then because the economy came back right it always is it's always making you know not that i'm going to sell it, I'm going to keep it, but, you know, anything around water, it seems, or a mountain is going to give you a fit. So that makes me a little more nervous here. But I still think you're paying cash, you make good money, you don't have any issue here, but you might have to hold your breath if the economy shot down. You might see your value drop where if you had a $600,000 house in town, it might not drop at all. And you might just have to kind of emotionally ride that thing down and ride it back up. I don't think it'll kill you. It's not going to cause you to go broke. It's

not going to cause you to not be wealthy. It's not going to cause you any of those things. It just might take your breath away. And you just kind of need to be ready for that and brace yourself if the economy shifts but it's a temporary thing it'll come back just like my lake house did this is the dave ramsey show Hey, guys. At the Dave Ramsey Show, we really value your input. It helps us to know what's important to you so we can deliver relevant content to help you crush your money goals. We just launched a brand new survey, and we'd love your feedback.

It only takes a few minutes, and you'll be entered to win a $100 Amazon gift card. No purchase necessary. Take the survey at DaveRamsey.com slash survey or text survey to 33789. John and Wendy are in Athens, Georgia. Hey, guys, how are you? Good, Dave. How are you? Better than I deserve. I see on my screen you're debt-free. Congratulations. Thank you. How much have you paid off?

$91,032.19. Love it! And how long did this take you? Twelve months. Whoa. And your range of income during that time? $130,000 to $140,000. Okay. And what kind of debt was the $91,000? Everything except us being smart enough to have student loans. We had a lawnmower for about $600,000, furniture for $600,000, credit cards about $4,500,000, all our cell phones another 1,400 the Harley Davidson that I had to have was 10 grand a Cadillac for 34,000 and a truck for 41,000 whoa you were vehicle

poor I love vehicles I can tell me too but they were killing you, weren't they? So how many of those things did you sell? The Cadillac and the Harley. Okay. All right. And we cash flowed out of the rest? We did. Okay.

Wow. How long have you two been married? Next month will be 25 years. Wow. So a quarter of a century, and yet 12 months ago, something big happened. What happened? Well, for me, I was actually driving up to Fayetteville, North Carolina, for work, listening to one of your shows.

And I'm listening to these people who have good income and have no money at the end of the month. And I thought, man, that's us. You know, we're really good at finding an extra three hundred dollars and then finding something we can pay three hundred dollars a month for that we had to have there's living paycheck to payment paycheck to payment that was exactly it wow okay so wendy uh john comes home and he spent too much time in the car apparently because he has these crazy ideas right exactly so what did you say i was kind of hesitant at first but once we got into the whole thing i

got kind of excited it was nice being able to instead of stressing about money being able to use it freely yeah but he sold your car, right? He did sell my car. He sold my car. He called me at work and told me to come pick him up because he had just sold my car. Oh, no. That's when I knew he was serious. Oh, my gosh.

You didn't even talk about it, John? You just sold her car? We had a brief conversation. After or before wow amazing so the radio show got you started did you do anything else or just listen to the radio show and go do the stuff no we uh i listened to the show and listened to the podcasting while I was traveling. I got the Total Money Makeover on audio version because I'm just not a big reader. And then probably two or three months in, we went through FDU with the church. Oh, okay.

So your local church was doing it. Good. Good. Very cool. Well, fun, guys. Way to go. So 25 years, have you ever been debt free in 25 years of marriage until now absolutely not never even considered it a possibility wow

and you did it in one year boom just like that but you you went all in i mean you got real serious and you went wide open most definitely so what do you tell people the key to getting out of debt is? This is a very impressive story. For me, I mean, and we've talked about it, I think it was, you know, the budget, I think, is one we have never done a budget in our lives. And I think it was looking at your money and, you know, giving each dollar a job to do. I had no idea how much money we brought in and just went away and had no idea where it went or nothing to show for it so wendy uh on our

youtube channel they're showing the chart with the dollar amounts and how you guys paid off everything did uh who did the chart um we all did the chart every time we paid something off our son colored it in and I wrote it was paid off. So we all kind of chipped in on making that chart work. So this was a family affair? Yes, sir. And that's got to be part of the way you get out of debt is everybody's in. Oh, yeah, we were all in.

Yeah, we're joking around about him selling your car, but it was a game changer, and you all made the decision, and then he executed it at rapid speed. Rapidly, yes. Instantaneously. Anytime we wanted anything, our son would tell us. He was like, what would Dave say about that? Oh, whoa, he got hardcore, didn't he? Yeah, he did.

So 25 years in, how does it feel now to have no payments? It feels great. It is amazing. And we are able to, after 25 years, have a nice anniversary trip that we paid for in cash. Where are you going? Aruba. Oh, nice! Ding, ding!

Good anniversary. Yeah, well, you've lived like no one else, and now it's time to live and give like no one else. That's exactly what you should do. You ought to celebrate this. So very, very well done, you guys. Very fun. We're very proud of you. What do you tell Pete?

What was the hardest part of this for you guys? For me, I think it was, you know, looking at the money we make and going, why can't I have this or that or whatever? I mean, obviously, I love vehicles, you know, woodworking, so I want tools all the time, guns, all the stuff that I need and thought that I've got to have it. Why can't I have it right now? Yeah. So your natural wants aren't necessarily your needs?

Yeah. Yeah. Like hardly ever. And there's nothing wrong with buying some wants but when you buy them to the point that you can't breathe then it's uh it's no fun you're making 140 grand and you're broke so but not anymore not anymore you went through financial peace university listen the podcast way to go you guys we got a copy of chris hogan's book for you uh retire inspired number one best-selling book and of course that's the next chapter in your story we want you to be millionaires now

you are on your way and be outrageously generous as you go along very very well done proud of you guys thank you john and wendy athens georgia 91 000 paid off in 12 months, making $130,000 to $140,000. Count them down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Three, two, one. We're debt-free. That's how it's done, baby. That's how it's done.

Changes everything. Now, what about their young son? He colors in the blocks. He challenges them. What would Dave Ramsey do? Do you think he has changed? See, there's several elements to changing your family tree. Some people think that if you just get enough money that it changes your family tree. It won't, because

idiots can lose it in one generation. And it'll ruin their life if they're idiots, because they're just well-financed idiots then. So you have to, in order to change your generation, to change your family tree, in order to change the next generation, you have to not only leave them money, but also leave them the wisdom on where money comes from and how you control it and where it goes from here and making good decisions with money and placing a value on a dollar.

And you can do that if you're wealthy. You don't have to spoil your children when you're wealthy. I can promise you the Ramsey kids were not spoiled. They were not lacking, but they were not spoiled. You can ask them about the work ethic that was drilled into them. Their old man is a task master because we're not going to raise kids who don't know how to work because you know what all else fails as long as you know how to work you can work your way through a whole lot of stuff that's the one skill you gotta have

you gotta have and you can do it i know you can do it way to know you can do it. Way to go, you guys. Proud of you, John and Wendy. Well done, well done. This is The Dave Ramsey Show. Thank you. Our scripture of the day, Romans 12, 12. Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. Richard Branson said, treat failure as a lesson on how not to approach achieving a goal, and then use that learning to improve your chances of success when you try again. Failure is only the end if you decide to stop.

Josh is with us in Roanoke, Virginia. Hi, Josh. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hi, Dave. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? Hey, Dave. I just wanted to let you know that I've been following your program now for the past two months and just wanted to say that I'm on a solid two-and-a-half-year plan to get me out of debt and be debt-free, and I'm very excited about it. Good for you. Basically, my question is today, I've been trying to follow more principles of the Bible, not only just about life, but also about money as well, and also what have you been teaching? And basically, my question is, how can I work on getting out of debt and also be generous and give back to others at the same time well it obviously they obviously both pull at the same

checkbook without a doubt and uh scripture breaks giving in for for those of us that are Christians into two categories, tithing, which is a tenth of your income, and offering, tithes and offerings. There is not an instance that I've been able to find in Scripture that an offering was given except from surplus, meaning extra money after you've gotten yourself out of debt and you're building some wealth. And that even includes the example of the widow's mite. We can discuss that another time. If you go through Legacy Journey, you'll see some different renderings on that scripture and look at it.

But anyway, even if you set that in there, if you said the widow's mite is one time, then that's the only time in scripture that anybody gave from anything except surplus other than the tithe. Now, every time the tithe is mentioned, a tenth of your income, it's called first fruits, which means off the top. The first fruits that come out of the harvest go to the Lord's house before you do anything else. And so the baseline that I've used is this. First and foremost, God's not mad at you either way.

He's your dad. He's your heavenly father. He loves you. He thinks you're awesome. He thinks you're smart. He's not going to be mad at you. He's not going to wait to give you good things until you do it exactly perfect according to him. It's not all that freaked out, okay?

So let's not get legalistic about performance-based Christianity. Okay, we're not going to do that. So we're going to walk in grace and in the light and with a lot of love, and everything's going to be okay. And we're going to say, so the tithe is a principle. It is not a sin issue. Okay, and people get them confused. They make them very, very legalistic.

I don't. I'm very diligent about it, but I'm not legalistic about it. Because I'm very sure that my dad, who loves me, put his arm around me and says, Son, the best way to live is with your money. The first thing you do is you give 10% to your local church. Then here's some other stuff you do with you give 10 to your local church then here's some other stuff you do with money if you want to win with money but he's going to love me whether i do it or not you follow me yeah absolutely okay so the tithe is your baseline you start there

no matter how broke you are 10 but i wouldn't give a dime more than that, and I didn't. I tithed, though, all the way into bankruptcy court and all the way out. And so, I mean, I've tithed my whole Christian life ever since I got saved and met God. And so I believe you give a tenth of your income, and evangelicals have taught that for hundreds and hundreds of years, that our grasp of the Scripture is that we give a tenth of our income to our local church because it's a New Testament representation of the Old Testament storehouse. The storehouse took care of the widows and the orphans and fed the priests, the Levites. So the local church's job is to take care of the widows and orphans and pay the pastor.

That's their primary job so be it being active in the community taking care of single moms loving on widows and and children and you know that kind of stuff and being if your church is doing that you're attending that church you trust that church then and that you shouldn't attend there if you don't trust them and you get and you give them a tenth and then other giving i I would wait to do until I got myself out of debt, got my emergency fund in place, and at that point when I'm doing baby steps four, five, and six, I would increase some of my generosity at that point.

And, of course, you're going to really increase it when you get to baby step seven, above 10%. But I kind of break them into those two buckets. Not kind of, I do. Now, again, you can do whatever you want, but that's how I have interpreted Scripture. Okay, absolutely. That helps out tremendously. That was really pardoning to me, and I really appreciate the insight on that.

Cool. Thank you for calling in, man. I appreciate you listening. Open phones at 888-825-5225. By the way, a lot of you that are listening are not people of faith i understand that that guy was asking me from that perspective so i'm answering from that perspective if you're not you still ought to apply the principle because the principle will still work for you the principle is give something 10 it's not a bad guideline. And, you know, give 10% and then do your budget with the other 90%.

You'll make it. You'll make it. And something is activated in you when you're giving that says, okay, it's not all about me. I'm not going to try to squeeze every penny until it screams. I'm going to hold this with an open hand. This is not all about some weirdness. But you can't grit your teeth enough. And there's something that happens when you learn to give

that it moves you along the selfishness spectrum from selfish to less selfish. And for those of us that are believers, that's why God tells you to do that. He's trying to teach you a lesson, not because he needs your money. He didn't need your money. If he wanted your money, he'd take it and there'll be a greasy spot where you were sitting. He didn't need your money. He's got money. He's God. Okay. So, and if his church needed the money, he'd get it from somebody other than you. Don't worry about it. That's not the problem. The problem is he's trying to teach you how to win and how to be a better person and how to grow. And in our case, again, people of faith be more like Christ, more Christ-like, more like God.

And so become better, grow in your spiritual walk. And that's where giving comes in. And that's why we say live like no one else so later you can live and give like no one else because giving is the most fun you will ever have with money by far nothing comes close now you can go out and have a 300 dinner at a fine dining establishment with some of the world's best food and wine, and you should. I want you to get to the point that you can do that. But you can also have more fun than that with that $300 giving it away.

Finding someone that you learn a little bit about their situation so you're not giving a drunk a drink. We're not going to be an enabler. But we find a situation, and you know,ler but we find a situation and you know three you ever been in a situation where three hundred dollars will change your life i have i've been that broke i've been that scared and you just catch somebody just as they're leaning over just as they're about to fall over and you hand them 300 bucks it it changes everything. They stand straight back up. It's amazing. And it's, my friend Chris Brown says that generosity works like this. If you do not position yourself for your intentions, you cannot do your intentions.

You can intend to be helpful. You can intend to be giving. But when you get yourself in good shape financially, then you are positioned for your intentions. You can intend to be helpful. You can intend to be giving. But when you get yourself in good shape financially, then you are positioned for your intentions. And you can be generous then. And that's a beautiful thing. Intending. A lot of people intend to do stuff. But if you intend to send your wife flowers on your anniversary but you don't, you don't get points for your intention. You only get points if you sent the freaking flowers okay i don't care what you intend to do or what your heart says or how you feel

about something what you actually do is what you get points for right she she's not keeping score oh i know you meant to do that it's okay okay. No, that isn't how that works, darling. The flowers actually need to hit the table, baby. They got to show up at the front door with the little man from the florist. That's how that works. Intention doesn't matter. You got to do it. I intended.

I don't care what you intended to do. I care what you did. That's how you measure that. So put yourself in a position to be outrageously generous and quit talking about it. And quit talking about everybody else being generous when you're not. Man, there's some people doing that, isn't there? That puts this hour of The Dave 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. This is James Childs, producer of The Dave Ramsey Show. Did you know you can now listen to The Dave Ramsey Show on Pandora and Spotify? For all the ways to watch and listen, check out our show page at DaveRamsey.com slash show.