The Ramsey Show - App - Should I Use My Savings To Pay Off My Wife's Student Loans? (Hour 1)

Episode Date: April 22, 2021

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Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Dollar Car Rental Studios, it's the 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. Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey personality and host of the vastly popular Dr. John Deloney Podcast, is my co-host. Today, we'll be taking your calls and your questions about your life, because he's here and he can help you with your life. And I've always got an opinion about it, because I'm an expert on my opinion.

And we'll talk about your money, too, if you want. The phone number's free, and some say the advice is worth what you pay for it. The phone number, 888-825-5225. Joe's going to start off this hour in Boston. Hey, Joe, what's up? Hey, Dave, how are you? Better than I deserve. How can I help?

So I'm 22 years old and graduating college in a couple weeks. I'll be getting married in the fall. My fiance will also be graduating. We're really excited for that. Both of us are. Congratulations. That's awesome, man. Thank you.

Thank you. So excited. We're both debt-free. I'm going to be making about $45,000 after graduation. She's probably going to be in a similar ballpark, maybe a little less, but not very much. We currently have about $20,000, $25,000 in savings, which a good chunk actually comes from the unemployment assistance. And we're just, you know, a little concerned about that, you know, with some of the new legislation going forward is, you know, if we might have to pay it back. So we're trying to figure out the

best way to just make smart decisions with, you know, an apartment or probably not buying a house, but, you know, a living situation and just how to be, you know, financially responsible to live well going forward. Way to go. What's your degree in? What's her degree in? Mine's in theology. Hers is in psychology and elementary education. Okay. So are you going to become a pastor, or what are you going to do? I'm going to be a youth minister at a Catholic church nearby in the area.

Wonderful. Good for you. Okay, cool. Thank you. Very fun. All right. Well, you know, it sounds like you've got a lot on your plate. It's going to be an exciting 12 months.

Agreed? Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. We're very excited. So why Boston, man? I just grew up here. You know, big Red Sox fan, big Boston sports fan, and, you know, we're both from the area and love it, you know, plan to stay around here.

Okay. Well, buying a home is a good thing as a part of the scope of your life. It's a complicated thing. It's a big decision. There's a lot of moving parts to it. Obviously, it requires money. It's one of the largest purchases you'll ever make in most cases. And so I recommend something that's highly uncomfortable because everybody's running

around going, get a house, get a house, get a house, get a house, because all renters go to hell. Get a house, get a house, get a house, get a house, right? You know, it's like renting is evil or something. You know what I'm saying? And I don't want you to be a renter when you're 32. You're 22, okay? But I don't want you to add a house purchase to the busiest year of your life ever you're graduating getting new jobs getting married i mean my god the last thing you want to do is hang curtain rods yeah okay i mean

really it causes divorces but um yeah so we always joke and say you'll make a the serious thing is you'll make a better decision one year after marriage about which house to purchase because you'll know each other better. You've got all of this busyness and craziness in your rearview mirror, and it'll be a calm, steady, wise decision. You're out of debt. You have your emergency fund. You have a good down payment. That's a good decision. I've got to get a house because I'm getting married! It's about the way you make a stupid mistake.

And, by the way, it takes about a year of being married to know how close to your mother-in-law to buy. I was going to say two or three years, but one's a minimum. And maybe, yeah, I'd get the smallest place y'all can afford to live in. Like, you're not trying to prove anything to anybody. You're getting to know each other. That was a mistake I made coming out of college. I rented this big, freaking nice place that was like three times more expensive than I should just because I could afford it.

And it was all rented money. It was wasted money. Right. And I stayed there six months, and then we moved in this stinky little apartment and started saving money. And we had bugs in our first apartment, man. It was awful. I don't want you to do that. That's gross.

I'm not saying it was great. I'm just saying we survived. Sign up for bugs. We survived. We lived. Well, yeah, but we're not. Yeah. And we learned to have'm just saying we survived. We lived. Well, yeah, but we're not. And we learned to have some conversations that we wouldn't have had. Yeah, it's okay to go small and clean.

No bugs. Yeah. Yeah. No rats. You don't need any pets in there. Just you two. Yeah, just spend the year enjoying your first year of marriage and your first year of starting off at adult life with all these jobs and graduations and all this stuff. And, you know, and you will make a much better decision a year later and be out of debt,

have your emergency fund, and have your down payment. But everybody's going to put pressure on you because everybody's a freaking genius. You're 22, you're going to die if you don't buy a house. Horse crap. You're not going to die. I've never considered hitting you up, Dave, to create a Dave Ramsey t-shirt, but a t-shirt that said, all runners go to hell with Selwyn really well. That's a fantastic day.

But isn't it the way people talk about it? They talk about it as if it's a salvation issue. The number of people, when we just got an apartment, I didn't know what we were doing with our lives. They sound like a beagle chasing a rabbit. If you want, I'll just go flush your money for you. I mean, it was over and over and over. And they're all broke.

But they all got expert advice on me buying a house. Yes, that's right. You know? It's just, and they do. They drive people. You people, you broke people don't need to be giving financial advice. It makes you look dumb. And God help you, somebody will follow it. people you broke people don't need to be giving financial advice it makes you look dumb and god

help you somebody will follow it and just set a young couple up to be stable and you said it best the last thing a young couple needs taking two new jobs in a new town in a new marriage is to also be worrying about can we make this rent payment or this this mortgage payment this month or what's our house worth or the plumbing broke or or whatever happens with new houses which it always happens you know in in ancient times in second kings in the bible even when a young couple got married it's very clear that the brand new husband did not go out to war in the first year stayed home to make a home with his wife they didn't put brand new married soldiers on the front lines in ancient Israel. Because he knows if he goes out there and, you know.

He's not going to make good decisions. He's not going to make good decisions. And it's very interesting. There's something about that. First year of marriage, I mean, you probably know some research on the statistics of, you know, what you invest in each other in the first year of marriage sets a pattern for the rest of your life. That's the key is these patterns that you adopt really quick and can take years to unwind, and they happen overnight, right? Yeah.

And you're both bringing your old patterns into this one pattern, and you set it real fast. It takes a while to undo those things you say or those things you do or those annoying things. Man, you've got to really unlearn all that. Spend your time getting to know each other. But here's the other thing. When you do've got to really unlearn all that. Spend your time getting to know each other. Here's the other thing. When you do give somebody good advice, they remember it. I remember, Sharon and I have been married almost 40 years. We got married, and we moved into this too expensive a house,

and it was four bedrooms. There was two of us and two dogs. It was ridiculous, but it was nice. We thought we were pretty cool. I stopped by and saw my old elementary school principal, Evelyn Hyde. And she's like, where are you living? And I told her, and I was all proud. And she's like, that's dumb.

She was the best. That's the best, isn't it? The world needs more Evelyns. Yes, they do. To look at genius 22-year-olds and say, that's dumb. That was dumb. This is The Ramsey Show. Ever wonder how to save more money or pay off debt fast? What about the right way to invest?

Listen, I've been there, asking the same questions with no idea where to turn for answers. But here's the good news. You don't have to keep searching for answers. Ramsey Plus will guide you every step of the way so you always know what to do next with money. Ramsey Plus is our step-by-step plan that shows you how to get consistent small wins with money and even some big ones so you can see exactly how you're making progress. Then we help you turn all those wins into better habits that last. You can be confident that you're doing the right thing with money, and that means no debt payments, cash in the bank for emergencies,

and a plan for your future. Get started today with a free trial of Ramsey Plus at RamseySolutions.com slash Ramsey Plus. That's RamseySolutions.com, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. Austin is with us in Fort Myers, Florida. Hey, Austin, how are you? Pretty great. How about you? Better than I deserve, sir. How can we help? So, I recently just got married about a year ago.

Congratulations. Me and my wife are trying to purchase a house, so I'm just trying to get some good advice as well. Okay. What's your question? She also has some student loan debt, and we're trying to figure out if this is a good time to buy a home or pay off her student loan. Pay off the student loan debt, and we're trying to figure out if this is a good time to buy a home or pay off her student loan. Pay off the student loan.

Okay. So you have the money to pay off the student loan? I have money saved before I got married to her, and I mean, I know when we got married, it's all equal as one, but it's money that I had saved before we got married. Correct. But now it's hers. Okay. It's not I have money. It's we have money now.

You're now a we. When you get married, you're French. Oui, oui. Sounds good. Okay. So here's the thing. The old-fashioned marriage vows in the Book of Common Prayer say, in sickness and health, for richer, for poorer, unto thee all my worldly goods I pledge. You don't hear that in wedding vows much anymore.

It's kind of anti-prenuptial. It's quite the opposite. If we're going to share life, we are going to share the money and the problems and the good things. Because you're going to end up sharing them all anyway. You might as well just admit it. So this is a good time to admit it, and it's a good exercise for her to accept that her student loans are paid off, that she got before marriage, with money that you got before marriage,

and that's a very real sign in your relationship spiritually and financially that you have combined your households. And then you build your emergency fund, and then you save up for a good down payment yeah don't go into a house without an emergency fund man because a hundred percent chance something's going to break when you buy it and you don't want to walk into that house with student loan debt and suddenly you're swimming upstream trying to fix stuff and make that mortgage payment. Let that house be a blessing, man. And there's something that snaps in the psyche, Dr. John, that when you force yourself to do an action that reveals that there's a new reality. Yes.

It's a winnowing, right? It's a test moment to where you can talk about it all day long. I know this is going to be ours. That's going to be ours. You can hear that here. I know this is ours, but I saved it. Right? Yeah.

Okay, well, cool. Pay it off, right? Yeah. And it's like, it's this shaky hand signing it off. When I really do it now is when it's a real thing. Yeah. And I don't want to hate on anybody. I get that that's weird and hard.

He wasn't doing anything wrong. That's a normal process whether you've been married a year or whether you've been married 10 years. There's people married 10 years still talking like that. Oh. Most of them. 30 years, 40 years with separate checking accounts. You take care of these bills. I'll take care of these bills.

It's like roommates. That's exactly where they are. They're roommates. They've never fully come together on this deal. But anything where you're changing your life, you're changing a behavior pattern, and then you have to actually do the action. Yes. Not just discuss the theory of the action. There's something that snaps in the old psyche.

You have to step into it. It calls your bluff, and it begins to change you physically and neurologically. It changes you from the inside out. And all of that, Austin, in your situation means that your marriage is already awesome, and it's about to get a little better. Yes. That's what we're saying. And it's going to be real uncomfortable. For a minute.

Right before it gets better. Right, there you go. As you write that check, your hand may shake a little bit, and then six months later you're going to be going, yeah, but this is the woman I love. We're debt free. This is the woman I love. That's beautiful.

Daniel's in New York City. Hey, Daniel, how are you? Daniel? Hey, hello. Hi, Daniel. Hey, Dave and John. How are you? Better than we deserve, sir.

How can we help? Thank God. So I've been a listener for a couple years already. You know, I listen daily. It really keeps you motivated and moving in the right direction. Thank you. But, yeah, of course. So I set myself up.

I think I'm in a good spot. I have some money saved up in the past couple years of working. And I wanted to know what I can do to really be setting myself up for success. Okay. Are you working? You're in college? How old are you? What's your story?

I'm in college. I have about a year left. Okay. What are you studying? Business management. Good for you. Okay. What's it going to cost to finish?

I have a college fund that's taking care of that, and I have some scholarships as well. Great. What's it going to cost to finish? Not sure exactly, but probably another two semesters. You don't know what a semester costs? Maybe like another $25,000 to $50,000. I think it's $25,000 each semester. Where the crap are you going to school? Yeah, on Mars. Say again?

It's a private university. Yeah, I guessed that. Where are you going to school? In the city. Is it a secret? It's a secret. Is it a secret school? What's the name of your school? What? Say it again. It's not such a large school, so I'd rather not say. Okay. All right.

It's a very small, very expensive school in New York City. It's a spy school, Dave. Yes. Okay. Well, it's a secret school. Secret. All right. So you think you have enough money in the college fund and in scholarships to finish.

How much money do you have saved that you're worried about investing? Like $250,000. $250,000? Yeah. Spy school's paying pretty good. This is pretty neat. I'm way in the wrong job. I should have been a spy.

What in the world are you doing? Where did you get $250,000? I mean, I've been working all throughout high school since I'm like 14. Doing what? I worked really hard in high school, and I had like $250. Exactly. $11. What did you do?

I just never. Is it a secret what you did? You were a spy in high school, weren't you? And now you're in spy school, and now you're rich. Dude, I'm so impressed. We're picking on you. These numbers are bizarre. Way to go.

Well, here's the thing. The standard answer here is this, and I'll stick with the standard answer, although these numbers are not standard. Congratulations. You're obviously a young stud. All kidding aside, you got scholarships. You made a lot of money already i never saw 250 good lord that's amazing good for you so proud for you so your first goal is graduate you are the secret sauce to success graduate with no debt you think you've got that figured out you

probably do have that figured out you probably have enough money in your account with your scholarships and your college fund to do that. I really don't care if you invest $250,000 for the next one year. That is not going to change your life. Finishing this school with zero debt and launching yourself with zero debt into the marketplace is going to change your life. And understanding that you are the secret sauce here, not the interest on $250,000 for one year. Dave, would you recommend a 23-year-old with that kind of money to launch in and buy a house? Or would you even recommend to this guy to chill? Not until he gets out of school.

He'll get out of school. Because when you graduate from school, you have a high rate of transition. Correct. You often change cities. You obviously start a new job, a real job. And the chances of changing another. He probably ought to keep doing the one he's doing. And it's not unusual to get married.

Right. Within 18 months of that. Right. So, statistically. Not everybody... You don't have to. It's not like a rule. You're not doing something wrong if you don't.

There's some research that says men especially do everything all at once. Right. That one year following school. They do it every once. And that takes some money. And you probably aren't going to end up in the same city you were in. A high statistical average, you're going to end up in her city. Or is there any data on you take a job right out of college, what's the chances you're still in that job?

Five years later. Very low. Okay, that's what I would think. These days. In the old days, it was. But these days, the average person has 17 jobs in their working lifetime. So you've got the turnover. But, dude, you've done so well, Daniel.

You're going to be all right. I think you're going to struggle through with your quarter million dollars. Yeah. We're going to figure it out. And if you all need any extra spies, Daniel, you know a guy. You always wanted to be a spy. I always wanted to be a spy. Well, when it pays like that.

I'm telling you. Bond. In high school, man. I had no idea James Bond was so loaded. He drank well, but man, I didn't know it was a good high school. He always had a good car, but we thought it was a government car. I thought I was killing it making 20 bucks a lawn in high school. Daniel just embarrassed me, man.

Well, he said 250. I didn't know what he meant. That's incredible. Way to go, Daniel. Good for you, Daniel. We're having some fun, buddy, but my God. Only because I'm jealous. Yeah, exactly. And we're just freaked out. But yeah, you did really good, Daniel. Good for you, Daniel. We're having some fun, buddy, but my God. Only because I'm jealous. Yeah, exactly. And we're just freaked out. But yeah, you did really good, man. So graduate,

graduate, graduate, graduate, graduate debt-free, then become an investor, then start your life. Don't get into a bigger hurry. You're not missing out on compound interest by being out of the market for one year, making sure you graduate. Graduate, graduate, graduate debt-free. You are the secret sauce. You are the best investment you can make. This is The Ramsey Show. Thank you. Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey Personalities, my co-host today in the lobby of Ramsey Solutions on the Death Free Stage. Baby Mike and Lacey are here. Hey, guys, how are you?

Good. How are you? Good. How are you, Dave? Welcome. How are you, John? Good. Where do you are you? Good, how are you, Dave? Welcome. How are you, John? Good. Where do you all live?

We live in northern New York. All right, very cool. Welcome all the way to Nashville to do a debt-free scream. We can see Canada from our backyard. Ah! Literally. That's how far away we are. Well, at least it's not Russia.

All right, so. I was going to say, you're not a Palin, are you? But go ahead. No. So, how much say, you're not a Palin, are you? But go ahead. No. So how much debt have you paid off? $104,000. All right.

How long did this take? One day more than two years. We had to wait for payday. I'll take it. I'm going to round that down to two years. We were very patient. And your range of income during that time? We started out at $90,000, and we went up to $172,000. And then we went down to $163,000 because of the pandemic.

Oh, yeah. Good gracious, you doubled your income. So what kind of debt was this? We had five of the 0% promotions because we thought we were really smart. You showed them, right? Yeah. We had my car, we had a camper, and then we each had student loans. Y'all were like normal.

Yeah. We were paying on a deck for a house that we didn't even live in anymore. Oh, that hurts. Yeah. I was like, it has to go. I don't think it really helped us out. And they get real mad if you go sit on it after you don't live there anymore. They don't like that.

Or if you park your camper that you're paying on in the driveway, right? Yeah, in the wintertime. Oh, man. That hurts looking out at it with snow on top. What do you guys do for a living? I'm a certified professional boudoir photographer. Okay. And I'm a director of case management.

I'm a nurse. Oh, very cool. Good for you guys. So how did you double your incomes? I cranked up the work. I just took on more work and invested in my education and just kind of took off. Wow. What about you? Well, I've kind of scaled the entire time in my career. So you got the opportunity to take on overtime like crazy, right? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Especially in 2020. Yeah. Actually,

during the pandemic, my business was shut down and he had to take a 20% pay cut because the hospital wasn't, you know, having all the elective surgeries and whatnot. Plus, I'm salary, so there's no such thing as overtime for salary. Oh, I'm sorry. Oh, my gosh. Okay. Wow. All right.

So what started this journey two years ago? What got you guys so fired up? Well, I actually had heard about you from an educator that I followed, and I saw your book in the thrift store, and I was like, why not? I've spent more. It's a dollar. It's a dollar. It was two, but that's okay.

The cover was flashy. It caught our eye. Yeah, good looking guy on the cover. When people think Dave Ramsey, they think flashy. Yeah, that's what comes to mind. Exactly. I think I was going to say that we've kind of had this concept in our head the entire time that we've been together,

but we call it, we did like Dave Ramsey light. We didn't really know where we were going or what we were doing, but we knew that not being in debt was kind of where we needed to be. So although we've, over time, we've had cards and things like that, we never carried a balance. We knew at different times that when we had debt, we had to pay it down. So we've tried over the years. We just never had a clear path. How long have you all been married? 17 years. So what actually in your brain, what do you think, was there an event or a certain thing that happened that caused you to just flip the switch and go, I'm all in, let's do this? Yeah, no, it just was like I picked the book up and I was like, okay, this sounds like a good idea.

You know, like he had said, we had the idea in our head and we just didn't know where we were going. So once I read the book, I was like, oh yeah, we just made a couple little tweaks and that's what we needed to do. She read it, then I read it, and we were sold and we were like, let's do this. So just the total money makeover and game on. Yeah. Wow. And then I listened to your podcast every day. We were believers anyways prior to that. We just needed that path.

We needed those stories. We needed that guidance to be able to be on the right trajectory. So there was no big drum roll moment where one of you presented this to the other. It was just, hey, I'm in, you're in, let's get out to the races. Well, she did it first. She really absorbed it. She's the reader, she's the studier, and she kind of planned this out and then kind of brought me on board. And that's where we bought into, you know, the whole concept that, you know, this is a plan we need to be on. Love it. I'm definitely the nerd.

So I found a calculator online and I was like, we could pay off our debt really quick. Let's do this. Yeah. And so it was really easy to get them on board. Wow. Congratulations. I'm so proud of y'all. You're impressive.

Thank you. Very, very well done. Very well done. Thank you. Very, very well done. Very well done. Thank you. Now that you're professionals, you paid off $104,000 in two years. What's the secret to getting out of debt? America wants to know. I think it was really automating. So every time we got paid, I just automatically put the money right into a debt account, and we just clicked the button.

We actually didn't do the budget for a long time until this last April when I was like, I'm bored. Let's do something. And so then once we started doing that, I was like, wow, we have a lot more money now. Wow. It's amazing. You don't realize what's there until you start, like what you say, crunching the numbers. And you realize it's almost like money begets money. Yeah.

It's there. But when you start managing your money and you start accounting for every penny, it seems like there just is more and more and more. It feels like you got a raise. Absolutely. And it's an amazing feeling, really, for that to happen like that. Congratulations, you guys. Who were your biggest cheerleaders?

Probably my parents. And I have a couple friends that were kind of cheering me on. Every time I would make a big sale or something, we'd get a cash fan. And we'd be like, yes, we are that much closer to paying off our student loans or whatever we were on. We'd make, you know, every time I would make a big sale or something, we'd get like a cash fan and be like, yes, we are, you know, that much closer to paying off our student loans or whatever we were on. So it was, it was, we did have a lot of people around us that were really supportive. And she's an entrepreneur. She, you know, didn't really start off by herself, you know, knowing what she wanted to do, but I was kind of the cheerleader behind her to say, you can do this. So I was living vicariously through her in terms of her, her entrepreneurial spirit. And it was

really nice to watch that and, you know, encouraging her along the way. You know, and that's why obviously our income increased a lot. I think we wouldn't be where we are right now if it wasn't for the work that she did in her business, the blood, sweat, and tears, you know, building it from the ground up, you know, reading the business books late at night and just trying to figure out how to make things work. How far are you in now? Five or six years? Yes, I've been a photographer for 13 years, but I've been doing

my business for six now. Congratulations, you guys. Few things in the world make me happier than listening to a husband describe how proud he is of his wife. That's beautiful, man. That's awesome. Well done. I'm very proud of her. So how did this help your marriage? Yeah, we definitely had to

be on the same page and I think we were just competing to see who could make more money. I would do well and then he'd get a raise and it was great. I think it was very exciting, actually. I think it helped our marriage in terms of that because for us to do this journey and then, of course, we've been trying to inspire people along the way and describing

what this is all about we've handed out books you know we're we're always thinking one step ahead you know to how to how to be forward thinking you know getting on to those next steps um and so that's that's how we got us very cool and you brought the kiddos to do the debt-free screen what are their names and ages uh We have Andrew. He's eight. And we have Evelyn. She is six. All right. Very cool.

Well, we've got a copy of The Legacy Journey, which is my last book I did, on what happens now. How are you going to leave a legacy now? Change the family tree. So, give you a copy of that and take care of you. So, thank you guys for making the trip all the way from New York. We're so proud of you. You're incredible people. Very, very well done.

All right. Mike and Lacey, Andrew and Evelyn from New York, 104,000 paid off in two years, making 90 to 172 to 163. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Three, two, one. We're debt-free. I love it. Two, one. We're debt free!

I love it! Love it, I love it, I love it. Well done. That's the first Macklemore thrift store debt free scream I've heard of, man. That's incredible. What a fortuitous walk through a thrift store, man. Two dollar book. Yeah, that's a good ROI on that purchase.

Yeah, that old total money makeover for $2, slightly used. Slightly used. It was shiny because somebody spilled something on it. So...

Hey, but then they turned into proselytizers and they've been buying books and handing them out, man. That's right. I made out on that. So I think what we should do

is start just putting some copies in thrift stores. We ought to plant a few books in the thrift stores. Yes, I like it. Because it leads to more book sales. This is a new marketing plan.

Yes, James is going to be right on that. Yeah, get on that, James. Make that happen. Send Kelly out to the thrift stores right now. That's perfect. Well done, you guys. Very, very proud of you. You guys are incredible.

Well, that's how you do it. You work together. And they kept saying over and over, they really didn't do anything different except start paying attention and make every dollar behave. And then every time they dialed in that much more and made every dollar behave, they got that much more mileage out of it and it accelerated the process. This is The Ramsey Show. We'll be right back. Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Mark is with us in Boston. Hey, Mark, welcome to The Ramsey Show.

Thanks, Dave. Really appreciate it. How are you doing? Better than I deserve. How can we help? Yeah, so I'll throw you a little back story here. I'm currently an undergraduate student, full-time enrolled. I have a full tuition scholarship.

I'm also a resident advisor, so I don't pay room and board either. So I actually, I net nothing at the end of each semester. Recently, I just bought a car. I have about $10,000 in debt on that. There's obviously a large push from the left, pushing for student loan forgiveness. So I was wondering what your thoughts would be on pulling out student loans again and transferring, paying off my car with those loans, with student loans, and possibly getting the chance to have my car loan that is now student loan forgiven. So I'm a taxpayer, and I'm supposed to pay off your car with your student loan forgiveness. Don't you think that's immoral?

Yeah, a little bit, but at the same time, it's... Yeah, a little bit. If the opportunity is there, if the government's going to be deciding to start handing out money left and right, why not take the opportunity? So let me tell you, there was a book out several years ago called Millionaire Next Door by a man named Tom Stanley who passed away. It came out in 1992. He did a book later called The Millionaire Mind. The Millionaire Next Door, he studied millionaires. The Millionaire Mind, he studied people that had $10 million, decamillionaires. And he looked for the character.

He looked for the correlating statistical points. He was a researcher in people that had $10 million or more. And he found demographic similarities. He found career similarities. And he found 38 statistical points of reference that indicated that they were causal that indicated that if you had a large number of these you would have a high indicator that you were heading towards 10 million dollars or more and he listed them in order of the of you know the first one in other words number one was the most often occurring 38 was the least

often occurring out of the 38 points. You understand what I'm saying? And let me tell you what number one was. Fanatical levels of integrity. You need to visit that and sit on that. Because when you do not have fanatical levels of integrity, you are missing the number one correlating data point towards become building wealth versus how much can i scam the american taxpayer out of and get me a free car dude that's just wrong yeah it's just wrong so no you should not do that a a really important mentor of mine posed an important question back in my 20s and the question was this is integrity something you can sort of have you can mostly have and that is

just sad and sad inside me for a long long time because i've lived some of my life thinking yeah i mean mostly you know and here's the thing d that bill's going to come due for all of us. It's going to come due for all of us. It's just, you don't, nobody gets rich scamming the government and the taxpayers. No. It's just, you don't get wealthy that way. You know, you don't get wealthy trying to, you know, run a welfare scam. You don't get wealthy running an unemployment scam. You don't get wealthy hiding your grandpa's assets so you can get a government-funded Medicaid nursing home,

which is illegal as crud. It's called welfare fraud, but people do it every day. And so stealing is not a part of integrity. Why do you think decamillionaires, what's the correlation there? I don't know a lot of deca-millionaires uh the ones that i know anecdotally align up with that i mean everybody knows some you know any group of people you can put them in a room and there's idiots in every group that's right there's a jerk right there's somebody that doesn't have integrity so not all deca-millionaires do but

there's a high correlation to that that when they interviewed their wife when they interviewed their kids when they interviewed their employees when they interviewed their wife, when they interviewed their kids, when they interviewed their employees, when they interviewed their competitors in the marketplace, they said, you know, I don't always agree with that guy, but one thing about it, if he says it's raining, you better get you an umbrella. You know, if he says he's going to unleash hell on you, you better get ready because hell's coming. You know, whatever he says he's going to do, he's going to do. And so there's fanatical levels of integrity. And I think it's because most things in this world move on the speed of trust i was going to say i think you could probably stumble and grit and grind and

cut and cheat your way to three million dollars but to get 10 you got to have other people walking alongside you got to have somebody else lifting with you and they don't live with you if they don't trust you yeah and trust is just a it's a mammoth thing uh and yeah how you get trust well you're unbelievably consistent and you know the word integrity comes uh from the same root word that we get the word integer from or integral okay and so the word integer if you're a math nerd you know that an integer is a whole number it has no fraction fraction to it. It's not 1.5. It's not 1.25. It's a whole.

It's 2, 1, 3. It's whole. And integrity is whole. The whole person. And it's not like, well, I don't cheat on my wife, but I do cheat on my taxes. You know, you're just a freaking cheat. It's just a matter of time before it's revealed somewhere else. It's because it's that hole. And the interesting thing about this is

the reason I'm wearing this young man out is directly and indirectly and people in our audience simultaneously is that it's a choice. You can grow up being a cheat and just decide. I'm done. Yeah. Characters in the Bible, Jacob. I'm done. Jacob did it. Yeah. He was known as the deceiver in the bible and then he became a man of integrity you can just say as of today i have integrity you can just decide yeah you can't decide i'm beautiful you can't decide to grow hair i've tried but you can just decide i'm gonna have integrity i'm gonna tell the truth i'm gonna be a man i'm gonna be a

woman that can be counted on and so i you know i you know once i got all that dialed into my head you know what i pay all my taxes every stinking dime i owe exactly we don't have a side set of books like we don't count the cash we count the cash the cash is part of the profit it's taxable income in america when you make a cash profit on something you can hide it but i but the but the law says and my integrity says when i sign that tax return that it's real now i hate taxes and i don't pay a dime more than i have to and i spend money with accountants trying to legally use everything in the law to not pay it right but once i know what's owed i it's every if if i ever

get audited come on over a hot knife through butter because it's all right there, baby. I've got nothing to hide. And my guess is your heart rate runs a little lower. You sleep a little better. You sleep at night. The old thing, I don't have to try to remember what I said because whatever I said was what I said. Right. Huh.

It's like we were digging around in the warehouse. We closed up a warehouse this week, and they brought some of the old files over, and I found a file in there. I was going through them this morning with my assistant trying to figure out what to throw away, and there's a file from 1999 with hate mail. I can't wait to read that. She gets all my hate mail anyway because the mail comes here. She's like, this is the same thing they say right now.

They hate you for exactly the same reason that they did in 1999 i think we need to we need to read it on the show oh i do need to do i'll bring the file down next week we'll do that yeah that's a good idea but you know i'm unbelievably consistent i'm even hated for the same reason next week we're going to do an episode on my show james of just that 40 minutes of reading letters it's going to be fantastic we're all going to feel better about ourselves well we used to do read mean tweets but now that's all there are so it will be all you have to do is open up nice tweets that's right because they're the rare ones there's three of them that's right three of them twitter is troll land but you know

the the thing is that that once as a young guy i figured out reading these people and understanding these people and it became a part of my faith walk too to tell the truth to be the truth to to be consistent it it does get easier it's hard in the moment i mean he's got ten thousand dollars in debt now yeah that might have might have gone away if biden makes it go make student loans go away. But that's like fraud. Yeah. It, you know, if you hide assets so that you can get government money, that's illegal. And my challenge with the bailout, besides the fact that we don't have the money,

is, Dave, I didn't understand what I was signing. My wife and I signed for a lot, but at the end of the day, I signed my name on a piece of paper that said, I'll pay you back. You know what I mean pay you back. Yeah. You know what I mean? That's old school.

That's wrestled in my, that's just been in me. It's old school. I told you I'd pay you back. I will. Yeah. My challenge with it is, it doesn't bother me much. It's just quit making the stinking loans if you're going to forgive them. It's intellectually dishonest.

Plug the hole first, right? Yeah. That's just, why are you making them if they're so that gun bad? Stop making them and then we'll talk about the rest of them. This is The Ramsey Show. Have a friend or family member that needs a daily dose of Ramsey advice in their life? Let them know about the Ramsey Call of the Day podcast. It's a quick hit of advice about life and money in under 10 minutes.

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