The Ramsey Show - App - Should We Buy a New Car?

Episode Date: April 27, 2022

Dave Ramsey & George Kamel discuss: Should you buy a new car? How to handle a debt in collections, Reducing your tax burden. Want a plan for your money? Find out where to start: https://bit.ly/3nInETX Listen to all The Ramsey Network podcasts: https://bit.ly/3GxiXm6

Live from the headquarters of Ramsey,, it's the Ramsey Show. When 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. This is the Ramsey Show. We help people build wealth, do work that they love and has meaning. We help them create and have actual real relationships. George Campbell, Ramsey personality and host of the Fine Print podcast and the Entree Leadership podcast is my co-host today as we answer your questions about your life and your money. It's a free call at 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225. Shannon starts off this hour in Carlsbad, New Mexico. Hi, Shannon. How are you?

Good. How are you, Dave? Better than I deserve. What's up? Good. So I'm calling because I have a 2019 Suburban that literally broke down on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere about two months ago. I finally found out that it needs a new engine. It's under warranty. And basically, we are getting nowhere with GM and finding out an answer on when we will get a new engine. I have a friend that owns a body shop where we live and I kind of said, hey, can you give us some advice? When do you think we would possibly get a new engine? Because we're getting nowhere with GM. He said, let me make a

few phone calls and get back to you and basically said, I would start shopping for new vehicles. So here we are unplanned trying to figure out should we wait you know possibly the three four however many months to get my vehicle back since it is under warranty. It's completely paid for you know we have the cash to pay for the difference for a new vehicle but it's just not the ideal time. We weren't planning on getting a new vehicle at all. Now in a crummy time to buy a car right now. It's terrible. I'm sorry. What a mess.

So when you talk to the General Motors folks, what are they telling you? So it's basically a back and forth of, of you know my husband's at this point trying to see where we are in line you know we could be 30 in line we could be 900 in line and so they told us last week you know we'll get back to you we still haven't heard back um it's basically going nowhere well it's going somewhere based on the size of the foot you put on their butt true that's true they said they would try to escalate it but that you know that they actually might actually escalate for them so you know i call the general manager of the dealership and explain to him you're getting

ready to hire an attorney okay because they're not they're not honoring their warranty and you being without a car is not okay and you know let's jack them up because this i'm guessing this is a supply chain problem because it's not general motors dna to be this uh uncooperative usually they're very good about stuff yes and they basically are blaming everything on covid and yeah supply chain they can't get an engine out of the dead gum factory well i'm going to be calling them Yes. And they basically are blaming everything on COVID. Yeah. Supply chain. They can't get an engine out of the dadgum factory. Well, I'm going to be calling them every day for updates. You're the squeaky wheel who gets the grease.

And on top of that, I'm going to go to the dealership and say, you're going to let me use a car until this is fixed, and you're going to do it for free. There's a good idea. We've tried getting a loaner. They don't have any cars. Again, yeah, they said they don't have any loaners because of COVID. And the hard part about it is, too, is that we live in the middle of nowhere, and our car is in El Paso, Texas, two hours away.

So it's not a thing, you know, where we can go in there every day. We have been on the phone with, you know, the person in the shop every day, but basically that's where they escalated it to GM corporate, and my husband's been in communication with them. Yeah, I think I'm going to be in touch with the regional corporate guy, and so you guys need to get me a loaner. I'm with George on that. That's a brilliant idea.

And, guys, we understand that you've got supply chain problems, but you need to understand I also don't have a car. Yes. And so that's a bigger deal for me than your supply chain problems. So get me a car. Get me a car. I'll be real understanding if you get me a car. Bring me a car.

Okay. Now. Like, bring me a car now. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, that's what we've been trying to do. Yeah, I know, but I think you're being, what we're saying is we think you're being too nice.

Yeah. Channel your inner Dave Ramsey when you show up. I know. Well, and that's why we're going back and forth, and, you know, we've been saying, you know, should we just go get a different car because this is the second major issue that we've had with this car. Well, if you want to sell it, that's fine. Sell it after it's fixed. But in the meantime, they should provide you a car.

If you jack everybody up, you still don't get a car, and you still don't get an engine, and you've got the money, I guess you're going to have to go buy a car, aren't you? I know. And then sell that one when it gets fixed, right? Yes, and that's another thing, because they're low-balling us because we've tried to say hey what would you give us for this and they're low-balling us and we do have the money to go we are in a very blessed situation where just go buy a car and get that car fixed and get it sold if you can't get a loaner and i

really am going to be talking to the regional guys. I've actually had two people work for me over the years that used to be General Motors regional customer service reps. And so they had regional guys. And I don't know if they still do or not, but that was a few years back. But and honestly, they are trained like no other to make customers happy. Now, I understand they can't make cars or engines appear out of thin air, but they can if you make it a big enough deal and go, listen, I really don't want to go legal on you guys,

but I'm getting ready to hire an attorney, and we're going to make you guys wish you would loan me a car. Yeah, I agree because I'm at the point where I almost don't even want to buy want to buy another gm vehicle ever yeah well i mean you can tell them that too i mean that that's understandable and the sad thing is they make great cars i've owned them all my life but um yeah you know it it is what it is but here's the thing companies there listening, you have legitimate supply chain issues, but your customer has legitimate problems, and your job as the company to solve the customer problem, they don't really care about your problem.

They don't really care. Yeah, and a big part of this is to realize you have options. It's when you realize, well, we've got to go get a new car. I'm going to be beating down their door until we have a solution here, and the worst, worst case is we get a temporary car we resell it and hopefully we don't lose any money drive the car that or buy the car you want to replace it with and direct and then sell the suburban when you get it fixed that's fine that's a fine answer you got the money to do that it's just inconvenient and you shouldn't have to you shouldn't have to they should they should take

care of you so and i got a feeling if you lean in hard enough and often enough that probably you're going to get that result. That was a good fix, George. That's a good fix for the problem. I always start with kindness, and then I get a little more firm when things aren't going the way they should. And it's a hard thing to do with customer service. A lot of people have a hard time, you know, being the bad cop. Yeah. Well, I don't want to just start in chewing somebody out yeah but we do need to you know click up click up click up the heat as we

go along and um i mean you know if the food's not coming from the kitchen it's like hello been an hour we need some food you know and we've talked about this a couple times now do i need to talk to a manager how How can I help you? Do you need me to go back there and help you cook? I mean, what's the deal? I would love to see you back there in the kitchen, Dave. Food needs to come out of the kitchen, baby. You can grill. I've seen you grill.

This happened the other day, I'm just saying. This is the Ramsey Show. Homeowners, listen up. Your house is the biggest purchase you'll ever make. That's why home insurance is such an important part of your money plan. It protects the place where you live and your family's financial future. Now, you probably have home insurance, but does your current policy really cover everything you own? If you're not sure, that's something you need to know. A good independent insurance agent will help you find the exact policy you need to protect your biggest asset.

If you don't have an agent you can trust, check out our network of endorsed local providers, or ELPs. They'll shop around to find you the best value on the coverage for your home at no extra cost to you. And they'll make sure you understand your policy so you can feel confident knowing your home is actually covered. These agents will put you first. That's why they're Ramsey Trusted.

To check your home insurance with a trusted ELP, text HOME to 33-789. We've taught gods and grandmas ways of handling money for 30 years here at Ramsey. And now my good friend and expert, Dr. John Deloney, is paving the way for how we talk about relationships and mental health. His brand new book, Own Your Past, Change Your Future, has been on sale now for eight days. It's available for purchase, and it's a book everyone needs to read. It has personally changed the language I use with others. It's changed me. It changed George.

Who knew? There we go. This book is not just for people who are healing from some terrible traumatic experience. The practical steps packed in here apply to everyone in every walk of life. The single 30-year-old looking to sharpen their mind, the 25-year-old who's out of college and looking to make friends, the mom and dad who want to connect with their grown kids better or their young kids better, people coming out of abusive relationships, everyone,

every one of you listening right now has a story. John took his two PhDs, his 20 years of counseling experience, and packed it into an easy-to-understand book. Pick up your copy of Own Your Past, Change Your Future today for only $20 at RamseySolutions.com. Don't miss this. Lori is in Chicago. Hi, Lori. Welcome to the is in Chicago. Hi, Lori.

Welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hi, Dave. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? I am going to court tomorrow for a credit card debt. The credit card original company sold it to a debt buyer, and now the lawyer is suing me and I tried settling two times and they really wouldn't go down very much. It's the original debt is $8,500 and they went down as far as $5,985.

I was just wondering if you had any ideas of what I could do as far as facing a lawyer tomorrow or if I should still try to call this company that's not working with me. They wanted me to make payments, and I know you're not for that. Yeah, I wouldn't do that. It doesn't work out well for you. The lump sum settlement is the only way to go. Have you got the money to settle tomorrow?

No, I don't have that much. I tried settling. I can give them $2, 2300 how much do you have 2300 okay what was the original debt uh 85 50 that was the original debt not what they say you owe i'm i'm not sure how how that exactly works. How much did you borrow? How much was owed when you quit paying it? Well, it went to another collection agency. It was sold again. No, no, no.

That's not what I'm asking. I'm asking when you quit paying the credit card, how much was owed? Sorry. Years ago. I believe it was $9 seven hundred and sixty six dollars no i was making no it wouldn't have gone down well i made i was making payments to the original oh okay all right well they probably as you've heard on this show probably paid a nickel on the dollar for it right so they probably they probably got $500, $600 in this debt.

Right. Can you get any more together than $2,500? Well, I have some saved for my taxes on my house. I mean, I'm very limited. Maybe $3,000. Okay. All right. Or maybe if you used a little bit of that tax money.

If you get rid of this, it's worth it, okay? If you go to $3,500 or $4,000 and you get rid of an $8,000 or $10,000 debt, it's going to be worth it. So here's what's going to happen. All right. When you go into court on a debt this size you it's um very similar this is not high drama with matlock or some big high-powered whatever you think of attorney on some television show okay this is more like going to traffic court when you got a ticket that time you ever done that not that but i've done something okay you went you're going to court when it was like a big yawn

and it was all like a conveyor belt and it was automatic and nobody cared and there was no drama and there was no shaming and there was nothing legal it was just boom clip clip clip you're out of there that's what this is going to be i had heard you once say to um try to find the lawyer ahead of time yes and she can make a deal then in the hall yeah otherwise walk up in front of the judge and tell the judge you've tried to make a deal and you know that this is a debt buyer and you know that they paid a nickel on the dollar for it approximately because that's industry industry standard and i'm standing here offering this guy three thousand dollars and we can't get him to take it your honor and he's going to shame the attorney then because you're going to be the only human that showed up on this whole thing this guy's got 200 cases all of them are on automatic

slip mac down and no humans show up except old laurie and there she stands so you're going to be like the entertainment for the morning right do they care about any of my history regarding nothing so they don't care about your story they don't think they don't care if you're pitiful right they don't care yeah that's fine it's just money okay it's just very very agnostic there's no spirit to it there's no morals to it it's just i want some money and if you give me some money oh and i don't like the money and then the you tell the judge and here's the money and the judge goes oh come on it's going to sound like that it's going to be like judge judy or something in here right okay you don't think that the lawyer will or i mean the judge will say that make payments he might

he might he might slap you with a garnishment. I don't know. It's possible. But you don't have a lot of options here. Your only option is settle it. If you can't settle it, ask the judge to settle it. Otherwise, he's going to make you do something. Because he's going to do that anyway. Right. If you don't show up, they're going to get a judgment, and they're going to begin to garnish you. Yeah, I'll show up.

Okay. But I'm just saying, if you don't show, you automatically lose. But by the way, you're in the wrong, so you're automatically going to lose anyway. I know. The only question is, can you just, you know, by being a human and being there, do you influence the process and get a settlement? But you got really no defense. You owe the debt.

You didn't pay it. There's no defense. Lori, how old is this debt? It was from, well, these guys purchased it in 2020. When did you? Oh, okay. The last time I paid. So that's a few years old.

Probably 18, 2018. Okay. And what was it originally? What kind of credit card? The name of the credit card was Capital One. Okay. All right. Yeah, they'll sue you on $10,000.

They usually won't screw with it on under five because it's not worth their legal hassle. But the debt buyers sometimes will screw with it if they buy it under five. And so, yeah, this is a pretty substantial account. Most debt is under $5,000 per card. But good old Capital One. What's in your wallet? Lawsuits. Apparently.

Man. I haven't heard a lot of situations where people are going to court over the credit card debt. It doesn't happen very often. It's usually they just deal with the debt settlement companies and they try to negotiate it down. The debt buyer will usually settle. And again, folks, they're buying these things at a nickel on the dollar.

And we did this. Oh, yeah. Christmas before last. We paid off a bunch of debt we bought 10 million dollars worth of debt from um from a lot of us medical debt and uh we we bought 10 million dollars for a quarter on our for two and a half percent paid 250 000 for it and we call we had all of our employees, we gave them eight each. There was like 10,000 accounts, roughly. And they each called and told people for Christmas that their debt was forgiven. So we bought $10 million worth and forgave it. And it was our Christmas.

It's what we did for Christmas. Yeah. That was our favorite gift. And it was a blast. But we bought that for $250,000. It was $10 million. A little north of $10 million. So that's $0.25 on the dollar.

Yeah, we bought the whole book of debt. So there's the proof. Now, that was old medical debt, which, by the way, is usually cheaper to buy than old credit card debt. There was some car loans in there, too. I remember calling someone and saying we paid off their car. Yeah, we got a few credit cards in there. I think we probably got, I don't know, a couple of hundred credit cards in there. But most of it was medical.

So you can buy debt for a nickel on the dollar and then go try to collect it. Anything they make over that is profit. Yeah, we didn't collect it. We just sent them all letters. And a lot of them thought we were scamming them. Oh, yeah. No one believed me when I called. They said, what?

I didn't ask you to do that. So fun. We got some great videos. There were some inspiring ones, too. A lot of tears. Some of them just broke down and cried. Yeah, it was sweet. But some people were just angry with me.

Yeah. Why are you calling me? I'm busy. Okay. Sorry, sir. Have a good day. Just calling to tell you you don't owe the debt anymore. What?

I didn't ask you to do that. Who are you? I didn't tell you to do that. Who are you? What are you, the Grinch? It's Christmas. Oh, my gosh. Too funny.

It's a blast. So, yeah, that's the truth. And so you can buy debt like that if you want to write big checks anyway. And so that's kind of proof that what we're saying is true, that you can buy it for a nickel. Which is why they're willing to negotiate. They probably got about a nickel on the dollar on it. And this is a good old Citibank at your service. Just think of that next time you see one of those stupid buck commercials of theirs.

This is the Ramsey Personality, is my co-host in the lobby of Ramsey Solutions on the debt-free stage, Courtney is with us. Hi, Courtney. How are you? I'm doing great, Dave. How are you? I am better than I deserve. It's so good to have you. Oh, I'd love to hear that. Where do you live? I live in Houston, Texas. Good. Fine. Welcome to Nashville.

Yes. All right. How much debt have you paid off? I paid off $113,874. I love it. And how long did that take? It took me 30 months. Good. And your range of income during that time? Between $74,000 to $90,000.

Cool. What do you do for a living? I am a director of marketing. I work in real estate. Good, good. And what kind of debt was your $114,000? So most of it, about $94,000 of it was from student loan debt, and the rest was from my car loan. Okay, cool.

What did you get your degree in i got my degree in health science and biology it was totally different from what my career is that's okay yeah now you're making money life's good yes and you paid it off that's the other thing that's good so good for you so how long you been out of school i've been out of school oh my god i graduated in 2012 so it's been a really long time so like eight eight nine years yeah all right but but two and a half years ago bing bing what happened okay so it's been a really long time since I've been out of school. So like eight, nine years. Yeah. All right. But two and a half years ago, bing, bing, what happened? Okay, so I've been getting these mails from my, you know, from FedLoans saying, you owe

money, you owe money. And I was talking to my friend and she's like, Courtney, just look at it as a debt you'll pay for the rest of your life. Oh, that's so hopeful. What good friends. And I was like, yeah, I want better than that. So I came across your YouTube channel and I've been hooked ever since. I purchased the Total Money Makeover.

I listened to podcasts. I mean, I was hooked on you. And I got debt-free because of you, and I said thank you for that. Well, thank you. Way to go. You did the work. Yeah. You're impressive.

We're about the same age. I graduated the same year with a lot less debt than you. But was that a slog to get through? It was. It was a slog. I had to really use that debt snowball method to really take it piece by piece because looking at it full on, I was terrified. I was like, I'll never get it done. But doing it smaller by smaller, it helped me really accomplish that goal. Yeah. When you look at that debt and you're like, I don't even make that much. How am I ever going to make these payments? And you started doing the debt snowball. Was there a moment where you were like, oh,

this is working. I see the progress. Yeah. I think my third or fourth loan I paid off. I was like, okay, I can do this trucking along. And I had my mini victories for those ones that I did pay off. So it made it much better getting to the final destination. That's fun. What was those mini victories? Did you celebrate in some way? I did celebrate. I might've bought a pair of shoes or something small. Sorry, Dave. You know, I wasn't on rice and beans the whole time but i just had to you know give myself a little treat yourself moment yeah yeah so i had to do that for myself well you were very reasonable yeah i might celebrate but it wouldn't be shoes not shoes but that's you know ken coleman he would buy shoes yeah definitely would definitely for sure

oh that's awesome congratulations thank you thank you. Thank you. So proud of you. Thank you. Who was your biggest cheerleaders? My biggest was my parents were really good, my family. My boyfriend, Terrence, he was great, helped me out a lot in a little way. So, yeah. Cool. And you clearly had some detractors there.

Does your friend now go, wait, you did it? It didn't take you your whole life? Yeah. Yeah. And they're like, well, Courtney, can you tell me more about this debt snowball method? Who is this Dave Ramsey person? So, I'm just putting them all drinking the Kool-Aid of Dave Ramsey so you just put debt free in the search bar on YouTube and there we were there you were that's how you were

that's how I found you yeah oh my god so I mean literally even like my passwords on my computer was like debt free 2021 I really wrote a vision and made it plain and I stuck to that Habakkuk 3-3 I love it yeah well done yeah write the vision and make it plain. And I stuck to that. Habakkuk 3.3. I love it. Yeah. Well done. Yeah. Write the vision and make it plain. I got it. That's good. Hey, when you do that, something snaps when you write it down and you put it right in

front of you and you go, okay, I got to do this. And there's an accountability that starts to work in your brain that's really powerful. And then you tell people you're doing it and they're like cheering you on. You're like, I can't let them down. Yeah. I mean, even on my vision board, I wrote like a blank check into my fed loan with the amount to pay off and it's crazy that now it's finally done so george she has a vision board yes you're incredible she has a vision board that's like a life hack that's amazing yeah yeah you need it really good

you don't need to manifest it when you just write it down and go, I'm going to write this check one day and it's going to feel so good to have no payments in the world. Yeah. Love it. How does it feel? It feels great. It feels great to be finally free to have no one calling me. I mean, I did work another, I worked two jobs. I had my full-time job and I worked part-time at Amazon as a personal shopper.

I remember listening to your show during COVID. You're like, hey, get a part-time job while you can. So I did that and it helped me a lot. How much did they pay you for that? They were paying me about, I think, $15 an hour. Wow, that's rowdy. Yeah, and you made your own hours. And it was all remote, and you just check in, check out?

No, so I worked in the store. Oh, literally in the store? Literally in the store. Oh, wow. Yeah. So I did that. Oh, my gosh, so physically. Amazon did something physical.

It's amazing. Except deliver, yeah. Was physically. Amazon did something physical. It's amazing. Except deliver. Was this an Amazon store? No, so it was Amazon with Whole Foods. So I would clock in at four in the morning, and I would pick up groceries for people, and they would deliver it. I've been known to do that, the Amazon Whole Foods delivery, Dave. You have?

Two-hour delivery. You can't beat that. You have? And it was free at the time. George. You know, we're a generation of convenience, Dave. George. That's such a millennial thing to do. Dave went uphill both ways. He doesn't understand. the time george you know we're a generation of convenience dave george that's i know you went

up such a millennial they went uphill both ways i not only shopped at whole foods but i had them deliver it george it's even more that doesn't even compute to a dinosaur i'm sure rachel would do that i'm sure rachel has done that like today yeah for sure there's no question well that's awesome you were willing to do whatever it took to get this thing out of your life. Well done. Well done. Proud of you. Thank you. What do you tell people the key to getting out of debt is? Consistency and having that discipline. And the key is, like I said, writing a vision, making it plain.

Work at Whole Foods instead of buy at Whole Foods. There you go. That'd be a hint. That'd be a life hack. She got paid to be inside of a Whole Foods. Yes. That's historic. Yeah, and walk out without buying anything.

Hello, yeah. Whole Paycheck. That's the place, yeah. Okay, wow. That's historic. Yeah, and walk out without buying anything. Hello, yeah. Whole Paycheck, that's the place, yeah. Okay, wow, good for you. I'm so proud of you. All right, we got a copy of Baby Steps Millionaires for you. That's the next chapter in your story for sure. You are definitely on your way. That's the next thing for the vision board.

Yes. Right? Millionaires. On your way. Gang on. Game on. Game on. Game on.

I love it. Very cool. Also, a copy of Total Money Makeover for you to give to your friend who doesn't think she can do it so maybe we can gang up on her and help her do it in a good way so good stuff very very cool courtney you're a rock star you're amazing we're so proud of you thank you very well done all right courtney from houston texas 114 000 paid off in two and a half years. 30 long, short months. Making $74,000 to $90,000 with the extra job. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream.

Three, two, one. I'm debt-free. Yeah. Wow. Reminds me of that Henry Ford quote. If you think you can, you think you can you think you can't you're right you're right and she thought she could and she was right i don't know what happens in the human spirit or in the human brain when you write something down that means a lot to you not just

generally writing something down you go okay i am going to lose 30 pounds in 90 days. And you write it out. As soon as you write it down, something snaps. I'm going to increase my income to $100,000 this year. As soon as you write it out and you actually believe it, what you can conceive and believe you can achieve, Earl Nightingale used to say, something happens. It's not something happens it's not magic and it's not it's not just the power of positive thinking but there's something about

when you when your brain the neural pathways when you get really precise and concise and say this is my desired future and then you your brain automatically kicks into gear okay what have i got to do to make that happen that's a mix of science and spirit you have a little bit of both a little psychology a little brain magic but then also it changes your spirit and you go okay i'm going to do this it's for real this time i'm not playing around and that's exactly what courtney did yeah she's she's powerful and you know she's quoting a scripture from the old testament habakkuk there back at three three i believe it is it says write the vision and make it plain

and so take your vision write it out and this is not again not hocus pocus and it's not just goal setting is magical it's not it's not magical unless you go do the work to cause the thing to happen i mean if you write down i'm gonna lose 30 pounds then you eat a bag of cookies 20 minutes later probably not on track right so well before i get started no no so um it's a cat i don't know anybody's done that but um i could probably do it yeah so uh you gotta write this out and something happens or something your brain just goes and it starts focusing and all the distractions out here the things that were causing you to to bounce off the walls and not hit your goals they start to be minimized and the things that cause you to hit your goals start to be maximized.

There's something about it. And really, you know what a budget is? It's written goals. Written goals for the month. That's all it is. If you think you're going to pay off Sally Mae for the rest of your life, you're probably right. And if you think you're going to pay her off in two years,

you're probably right. It's amazing how that works. Yep. Because you will find your way at 4 a.m. into a Whole Foods to buy groceries. That's right. This is The Ramsey Show. Thank you. So if you want to come on the Ramsey Show in person here in the lobby, if you want to visit the lobby, come visit any time, by the way. It's here in Nashville. Our If you want to visit the lobby, come visit anytime, by the way. Sidebar.

It's here in Nashville. Our visitor center is pretty stinking incredible. All kinds of timelines and wonderful things. You can enjoy the whole Ramsey experience here. Free homemade cookies. Oh, my gosh! And coffee and all kinds of stuff in our snack bar. We've got a big bookstore area.

And you can sit and watch the show if you'd like. It's taped in the afternoons. Not taped, it's live in the afternoons, and it's also taped while we're doing it live from 1 to 4 Central Time. So if you're in the Nashville area, put us on your stop. We're a little bit south of Nashville in a wonderful town called Franklin, Tennessee. Now, if you want to do your debt-free scream on the phone, you can do that. A lot of people do, but these days, a lot of people go, oh, the way I'm going to celebrate debt freedom

is I'm going to make a trip to Nashville because it's a cool city, and I want to see the city, and I'm going to use this Dave thing, this Ramsey thing as an excuse for doing that. So if you want to do that, you go, George, you need to go to the website and fill out what's going on. So what do you do? Yes, ramsaysolutions.com slash debtfreescream will take you straight to the form to apply. Okay. Now, the idea of the debt-free scream is two things. One is it is a chance for you to celebrate the transformation that has occurred in your life and in the life of your family. And we want to celebrate that milestone with you.

Also, the benefit of that is there's probably 1,000 or more now posted on our YouTube channel. We put all the debt-free screams on the YouTube channel, and so you can just sit and watch them for days. But your debt-free scream is to motivate others, to tell other people that this can be done. Now, this, when we say this, George, that's an important qualification. What is this? This is to become debt-free and stay debt-free.

Yes. And so you've got to follow the plan to a T. And still be following it. To this day. Which means maybe you're not using a credit card anymore. Not maybe. It means you're not using a credit card anymore. Not maybe. It means you're not using a credit card anymore. And so let me help you with this.

Kelly just told us at the break, and we were just flabbergasted, that like one out of three or so of you that apply to do your debt-free screen are still using credit cards. Let me tell you what happens. We throw you in the trash bin. In the digital trash bin. We don't want to motivate other people to be like you. We want to motivate people to be not like you.

And so that's the whole thing. Get out of debt. Stay out of debt. You're not using your stinking credit cards anymore. And you're not violating six other things we teach around here, you know, every day. Because that's not consistent with we're trying to create a transformed around here, you know, every day, because that's not consistent with, we're trying to create a transformed life here, not just a simple number that you paid off the debt, and then you're, you know, you're going to go back in.

Yeah, the debt-free screams are not for those that are Dave-ish. It's fine if you did that. Or Ramsey-ish. Yeah, it's fine if you did that, but we want to celebrate. Or just ish at all. We want to celebrate the people who really made the sacrifices, who had that full 180 life transformation. So there's a series of questions when you go fill out the form at RamseySolutions.com slash debtfreescream.

And some of those questions involve your financial habits. And so make sure that you answer those honestly. First of all, don't skirt around the process. Kelly will sniff you out. But we get thousands of applications every year. You have to get quite a line to do your debt-free stream. Yeah, and people think I can apply today. There are a lot of people wanting to do it that are actually doing this stuff.

So we tell people to apply months ahead of their debt-free date because there's such a long line ahead of you. But you're going to get thrown out if you don't do it the right way. And like Kelly mentioned, 40% of you said, I'm using a credit card still. Which means, hey, more room for the other 60 percent yeah follow the plan and here's the thing it'll save you a lot of time to just not even fill out the application because you're not going to be on okay and well dave i don't like that well then get your own radio show this is mine so um and i get to do what i want it says ramsey on it isn't that magic so um it's not fair dave yeah that's it so you can do your own debt-free scream on your own youtube

channel yeah that works make it up just just jump own debt-free scream on your own YouTube channel. Yeah. That works, too. Make it up. Just jump out there and all six of your followers, and they can see you do it. But if you want to do it here, we're going to celebrate the proper kind of life transformation that sticks and that is generational, and everything's going through, so no credit card use, and don't be ishing the stuff we talk about. Don't borrow from your 401k. We don't want tohing the stuff we talk about don't because we don't

want to lift that up that's not what we want to encourage people to be it's not that we're mad at you well you're just being snobbish no we have a very dialed in purpose for this it's to motivate people to do things that we teach and have taught for 30 years because they work because they're good for you um it's you know and it's kind of unsatisfying for us to sit and watch you half do stuff so we don't want to do that but dave we're missing out on the debt-free screams where they go dave the way i got debt free was my credit card points yeah that's how i did it missed that i borrowed from the 401k dave that's how i got debt free yeah i borrowed my way out of debt that's how how I got debt free. All these things come up, believe it or not.

So there's some clarification for you. And Kelly is world-renowned for being able to figure out if you're lying or not. It's like scary. She's got a pretty good BS meter. She's looking at me right now. I think I failed. RamseySolutions.com. You're a little intimidated, are you? Okay, good. That's good. All right. Chris is with us, Cleveland, Ohio. Hi, Chris. What's up? Hi, Dave. Thanks for taking my call. I'll try to be as brief as possible.

My question is, my wife and I, over the last two and a half years, have really focused in on the steps and have been in the situation where now we financially were able to pay off the house last fall. We have no credit card debt. And it seems to me at this point where our income levels are, she had recently gotten promoted about two years ago, that now we're getting just absolutely at the end of the year crushed and having to write big checks for taxes. And I guess my question is, I mean, is potentially looking into an LLC with some rental properties, even something that should be on the table to even look at?

Well, an LLC doesn't change the taxes at all. You can own the rental property in your personal name. Well, protection-wise. Tax-wise, it doesn't change the taxes one bit. Protection-wise, it's good to the rental property in your personal name you can own it in protection wise yeah tax wise it doesn't change the taxes one bit protection wise it's good to put rental property in there from a risk management standpoint somebody falls and breaks her face on that property then they can sue only the owner of that property which happens to not be you happens to be an llc so they don't come take your personal vehicle so from a risk management standpoint i no longer own anything. I'm completely poor.

A company that I own owns everything. So I've got this stack of LLCs. It's ridiculous. My cars are even owned by LLCs now. But that's just because now I'm at a point that I'm a target for lawsuits because it's like, oh, Dave Ramsey bumped into my car. Woo-hoo! You know, so it's like – Easier than winning the lottery.

Yeah! Who needed a job? So anyway, but you're not going to quite be that way with one rental property. Of course, we're going to tell you to pay cash for the rental property or not buy it. And don't do things that don't make economic sense only for tax reasons. Okay. economic sense only for tax reasons okay and if you get tired of paying taxes and mad about paying taxes like i have and like you are you can go that way and i have found myself tempted to enter into things that really don't make any sense except the fact that they are a huge tax write-off and so i i don't do i would rather just give it to charity,

and then you can write it off, you know, than I would go lose it and do something bogus that gets me in a bind later in order to get a write-off. So as long as you're paying cash for the rental, yeah, throw it in an LLC for risk management. Doesn't change the taxes. Same depreciation schedule either way. It's all passed through on an LLC. It still lands on your personal return.

Doesn't change a stinking thing as far as that goes. But yeah, it's okay to start talking about doing that. And it is one of the benefits of owning some real estate. And I'd talk with a tax pro. If you don't have one already, you can jump on to RamseySolutions.com. But working with one of those ELPs, they can look at your whole situation and go, oh, here's a spot you missed. Here's a spot we can save you on taxes. Here's how to lower your taxable income. So that could help if you're not already working with a pro. Yeah. And this idea that the rich don't pay taxes is 98% hogwash. I pay so much in taxes, I can't breathe. I pay more in taxes in a year than I made in the first 10 years of my working life wow i mean so the idea

that rich don't pay taxes absolutely and i'm really good at this stuff so it's just asinine that you know well warren buffett's secretary pays at a higher rate than he does yeah he lives off capital gains which is a 15 rate but it's 15 of a billion and he's not And the only thing he has are investments. He has no earned income. Only investments. So at a higher rate, yes. But his secretary doesn't have a billion dollars that she's living off of. And so she's paying ordinary income.

So that's just a bogus argument, too. Well, that's not fair. That's absolutely fair. It's the tax code. Sorry, boys and girls. It's the law. This is The Ramsey Show. Do you love a good day, Brandt?

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