The Ramsey Show - App - Stop Obsessing Over Pennies While Ignoring the Plan

Episode Date: May 22, 2025

📈 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Are you on track with the Baby Steps? Get a Free Personalized Plan⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ George Kamel and Jade Warshaw answer your questions and discuss: "Should we go through with a lawsuit to sue my brother?" "How do I pay off debt and spend time with my daughter after my wife left us?" "Should we take out a loan to build a mother-in-law suite?" "Are mortgage companies that offer 1% down a legitimate way to get a house?" "Should I continue paying my car off or have it voluntarily repossessed?" "How can we work out way out of debt that we're underwater on?" "Should I move in with my mom in order to pay off debt?" "I feel bad spending money on a pool even though I'm on Baby Step 7" Next Steps: ✅ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Help us make the show better by taking this short survey!⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 📞 Have a question for the show? Call 888-825-5225 weekdays from 2–5 p.m. ET or ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠send us an email.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💵 ⁠Start your free budget today. Download the EveryDollar app!⁠ 📈 ⁠For help with investing, get connected with a SmartVestor Pro.⁠ ❤️‍🩹 ⁠⁠Get trusted insurance coverage that fits your budget.⁠ Connect with our Sponsors: 🛒 Stop paying more and start shopping smarter at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Aldi⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🌱 Get 10% off your first month of⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ BetterHelp⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 📱Go to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Boost Mobile⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to switch today! 🏥 Learn more about⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Christian Healthcare Ministries⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🏡 Get started today with⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Churchill Mortgage⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🔒 Get 20% off when you join ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠DeleteMe⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🏦 Go to⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ FAIRWINDS Credit Union⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ for an exclusive account bundle! 🥗 Save 15% on your first ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Field of Greens⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ order with code RAMSEY ⛨ Find top Health Insurance Plans at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Health Trust Financial⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💸 To find out more about student loan refinancing, check out⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Laurel Road⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💻 Visit⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ NetSuite⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ today to learn more 🗂️ Use promo code RAMSEY for 18% off at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The Nokbox⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💵 Learn more about ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Timothy Plan⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🏛 Get started with ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠YRefy⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ or call 844-2-RAMSEY 🔐 Visit⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Zander Insurance⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ for your free instant quote today! Explore more from Ramsey Network: 💸 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The Ramsey Show Highlights⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🧠 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The Dr. John Delony Show⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🍸 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Smart Money Happy Hour⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💡 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The Rachel Cruze Show⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💰 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠George Kamel⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🪑 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Front Row Seat with Ken Coleman⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 📈 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠EntreLeadership⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Ramsey Solutions is a paid, non-client promoter of SmartVestor Pros. ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Ramsey Solutions Privacy Policy⁠⁠⁠⁠

Live from Ramsey Network, this is the Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create amazing relationships. I'm George Campbell, joined by bestselling author, Jade Warshaw, and we are here to take your calls and help you take the right next step with your money and your life. Give us a call at triple 8, 825-5225. Carrie is our first victim here in Bend, Oregon.

What's going on Carrie? Hi you guys. How can we help? So I have, it's kind of an emotional question, but basically our brother-in-law has not done what he was expected to do as the executor of a will that we would be involved in. And it's got to the point where we would need a lawyer. So that is my question. Should we pursue a lawsuit even if we don't have the money for a lawyer? But we would probably have the money once the

lawsuit was settled. Well, you got to tell us more. Make your case for us here. Okay. So my father in law passed away in 2018 and left everything to his wife, which is my stepmother-in-law. She passed away in 2020, leaving everything to her son, which is a stepbrother, and then two other brothers. The stepbrother that's the executor of the will Went and sold everything in the house Sold the house the land all of it. Okay behind our back behind our back That was not the stated wishes of the will

No, what were their wishes? That that the three beneficiaries were her son Mm-hmm, and then the other two brothers. And is one of those your husband? Yes. Okay. How big was this estate? Do you have any idea? The house sold for about, it was listed at 795,000.

Okay. Anything else? Everything that was in the house, tractors, cars, everything. I mean, he had two acres. What do you think it was all worth? Speaking to a lawyer, they said it would probably be about 100,000 for everything in the house because we don't have any documentation for it.

So we're talking about almost 900,000. 900's plus 3,000. Yes. So you'd be owed about 300,000 at the end of this, if all things had gone to plan. Yes, minus the back taxes that were paid when the house sold. How much was that?

And not very much, less than 50,000. Okay. But he also did a complete remodel to the house that we didn't know about either. I don't know if that is in the consideration or not. So let me just make sure I understand this. The will said everything was supposed to be split three ways amongst the brothers. One brother said, forget that.

I'm going to sell all of this myself. Yep. And then where is that money? Like he, so he sold the estate, he sold the property. Where is the money? Do you know? He's got it. And how long over what period of time did all of this happen? Um, well, I accidentally came upon the house being listed on Zillow when I was looking at land prices in that area. I saw the house that my father-in-law built on Zillow. When?

This has been going on a little bit before, the house sold in October, so a couple months before that. October of last year, 2024. Yes, yes. So when that happened, did you guys go to him and say, oh, so you just sold everything, like, okay, so you're gonna divvy it up three ways. And then he said what? Well, he is not talking to us. He won't answer calls. He won't return anything from his lawyer. And we found out that the only thing that

his lawyer has for us is a cashier's check for $5,000. And you said, what's this for? And he said what? They didn't, they didn't say. And so then did you then go to whoever the lawyer was who first, you know, read the will and said, this is the executor, you went to him and what did he say? He, the, my brother-in-law won't return any phone calls to the lawyer. Got it. Okay. So now you guys. Basically on the run. So you guys return any phone calls to the lawyer. Got it. Okay, so now you guys.

I think he's basically on the run. So you guys then need to go to a judge and say, hey, the executor of the will is not carrying out the wishes of the will, and he is keeping all the money for himself when the will clearly states. I feel like, yeah. He essentially committed fraud.

So what you'd have to do is petition in probate court to force the accounting of this, force him to show up, force him to deal with this. I don't know, he may have spent all this money. Exactly. So we just, I don't know that you're gonna get what you're hoping to get out of it. I mean, it sucks that this happened. Yeah, over five, I'm just trying to understand

the five-year play here because, and I don't say this to sound any type of way, but if I know I have an inheritance from grandpa and grandpa died, you know, last year, I feel like I would have already known, forget five years, I would be wondering, okay, when are we selling the estate? When are we getting the money?

So I wanna know more about that, I'm not trying to say anything negative. We're not defending him, but there's a lot of other pieces here that we're confused about. Like was the estate officially closed in probate court? What happened with probate? Well, the house was my father-in-law's that he built this house on two acres. And it was just an agreement between all of us that we weren't going to do anything right

away because- A written agreement or just a phone call? No, no, just talking. Okay. That we didn't want to sell anything because we would like one of the three of us to buy the other two out and keep the property. Got you. Okay. But he went behind our back and we knew nothing about the remodel, anything.

He was still talking to us about how it would be awesome that we moved there and things like that. Completely lying to us. Okay. Okay. And what was your timeline for moving into the house? Because again, we're talking five years. Was this like on, like what was the timeline in you all's mind

for saying, here's when we're gonna buy you out. Here's when that's gonna take place. When I was looking on Zillow, we were getting prices for the land to find out how much the land was going for. So we knew how much we would be paying him for us to move back there. Here's the reason I'm asking these questions.

I'm trying to get inside of the brain of the son-in-law here. No kidding. The only thought, because you're the only caller on the line, right? So the only thought that I could pull up in my brain is maybe this guy was thinking, hey, they said they're going to buy me out. They haven't bought me out yet. Who knows what's on fire in his life? Maybe he thought, whatever, they're not going to buy me out. I'm going to force the sale of this by just selling it myself. I don't know. I'm just trying to think what could be going on here because this is a extent like five years is a big timeline here. So I'm trying to figure out what, what could have gotten lost in translation.

Either way, I think the first advice we gave stands, which is you go in front of the probate judge and say, hey, here's what's going on. And do you know if you have to pay an attorney to do that for you? Because that's, that's my main question. If we should pay attorney fees for such. Well, I would have gone through the attorney who was dealing with the executor, but it sounds like you can't find him and he's not talking. So now, yeah, I'd be calling up that circuit court or whoever, whoever you've been in contact with and saying, what do I have to do to get in front of a judge? I'm not a lawyer, so I don't know.

And I've never had to deal with this. I say, what do I have to do to get in front of a judge because the executor of the will is not doing what the will says. And then go from there. I'm guessing, yeah, it's gonna cost you a little bit. And it's gonna cost you your peace, it's gonna cost you your time,

and it's gonna cost you your money bit. And it's gonna cost you your peace, it's gonna cost you your time, and it's gonna cost you your money. And so I would just tread lightly before you pursue this for the next five years, all to find out there's nothing there. And that's gonna really add insult to injury here. So I would try to get all the evidence you can, do all the homework you can, get all the family members you can involve,

get a copy of the will, get documentation of everything you can, all the communication with him or lack thereof, and then see what happens. But it might be worth at least reaching out to an attorney to see what the next step would be. Nathan is up next in Bozeman, Montana. What's going on, Nathan? How can we help today?

Hi, I was calling in because I'm trying to figure out my next steps on trying to build wealth and spend time with my daughter after my wife has left. Oh my goodness. I'm so sorry. When did she leave? About six weeks ago. Is this a very sudden thing or were there marital issues beforehand when you saw this coming? There were a few marital issues

but I feel like she left very prematurely. We hadn't even been married a year yet when she had left. Wow, so you have a young daughter? How young is the daughter? I actually have a daughter from a previous relationship. She's 12 almost 13. Okay so married less than a year, wife takes off. Is the daughter living with you full-time? Yeah I have full custody of her. Okay. So are you filing divorce? Because I wouldn't touch much of this until a divorce because some of it, I'm guessing

some of it's in her name talking about the debt. Most of it, a lot of debts in my name, but there is like a car that she took out dead on before we got married. Is that in her name alone or are you on it too? It's just on my name, but I did co-sign for a truck for her brother. Oh my goodness. Yeah.

Yeah. You're on the hook for that one. If he doesn't pay, is he making payments? He's making payments, yes. I've also talked to him about him refinancing into his name. So I'm hoping that he can go through with that. Yeah. Good luck. I mean, he couldn't get the loan without you before. So that's scary. Chances of that happening. It might be slim unless something's changed for him recently. Yeah. I think the first step is if this marriage is over, like ended officially and figure out, is she going to,

is this gonna be a situation where you guys can sit down together and figure out how to just divide this right down the middle? Are you gonna have to get lawyers involved? But I would not start on this until you know how it's gonna land because I wouldn't want you to end up paying

something you didn't need to pay or think that something wasn't gonna go on you that does end up going on you, that sort of thing. Yeah. Do you have contact with her? No, she left the phone and hasn't talked to me since. She left her phone. She left.

Are you sure that she left and somebody didn't, something foul play didn't go on? That sounds kind of odd. Well, I do have contact with her sister and her mother because they're not happy with her choices and so I do have contact there so I know that she's alive. She just moved to like a town 30 minutes away. Got it. Okay. Okay. Well, there's going to have to be some level of communication. I don't know if that's going to have to be through a lawyer, if you can't get in touch with her, but we've got to get this thing settled because there's no legal separation right now even. You guys are still totally

legally married? We are totally legally married and I'm trying to do things the biblical way. I hope that there's reconciliation, but there was quite a few problems with parenting and whatnot and she's with another guy right now. So that's not looking too good. now, so. That's not looking too good. What's your total debt? I would say the debt that I have for my car and credit cards is about $4,500 and the truck is $28,000. Okay, that you co-signed for.

Correct. And what's your question specifically today that we can help with? Well, I'm emotionally, I'm trying to move on and I have a job that's about 40 hours a week. And I also do like Instacart and Spark, which is like delivering groceries to people. And I don't want to spend all my time working because I want to spend time with my daughter, but I'm trying to also find that, that good, uh, comparison. Cause I know that she's going through a hard time. Well, I think, um, I think that, you know, we, we hear this question a lot,

which is, you know, I think I think that you know, we we hear this question a lot which is you know, I prioritize my family Am I is it bad to work more? Is this a negative thing? But I do think that when we think about the priority of our family There's kind of like subcategories underneath that like what does that mean to prioritize and take care of my family? Part of that is I go to work and I make sure that I have financial stability so I can provide stability and peace in our life.

That's part of taking time and that's part of prioritizing your family. You could say that also spending time with them falls into that priority, right? But it's not the only thing. Time is not the only way that we prioritize our family It is one of the many ways. So I think if you can view it like that It'll kind of free you up to realize okay the time I do spend with her

I'm gonna make that very quality But it's also so important for me to go out make sure I have the stable job make sure I'm working paying off this debt Able to stay in whatever living situation you have, all of that sort of thing. Yeah, I'm in a public housing right now, like state funded housing. And see, that's proven my point, like we got to get out of that because that there's no, you know, that doesn't feel stable at all. What's your income? It's about $33,000 with my full-time job. What's your full-time job?

It's working as a mental health technician in a child's hospital. Okay, what's the upward mobility look like in that field? Because that feels awfully low for a full-time job at a reputable facility. Right. I think there's potential to move up, but I'm not sure what the pay scale looks like. Okay, that's for the long-term.

I think there's sort of some, you know, stages here we need to work through. One is the current urgent putting food, you know, on the table, making sure the light bills are paid. Can you cover all of your bills right now with your monthly take home pay? Yes. And cover all the minimums on your debt payments? I can, yeah.

And then how much is left over after all of that? I haven't created a budget, and that's the first thing that I need to do. I'm taking the financial peace university class through my church right now. We just did the first lesson. Good. Awesome. And does your daughter know about your financial journey? Obviously she knows about mom, what's going on there. How is she doing? What are her urgent needs? I think that it's...

That it's to be there for her kind of... that's what I feel, but I'm not sure... You know, I know that I want to build wealth and I'm trying to figure out a way to do that. But right now we're trying to survive. Yeah. Building wealth is great for the next 10 to 20 years but right now she's got an absent dad who's just in frozen in grief right now. Yeah I think you gotta silo this a little bit into the different buckets of what's going on because right now it feels jumbled up and I understand that because you're going through a lot financially, you're going through a lot emotionally, you're going through a lot career wise, like there's a lot here. So there's the housing situation like that's a line item like of thought. Then there's the fractured marriage. That's a line item of thought. Then there's the financial struggle That's a line item of thought and then there's making sure my 12 year old daughter is okay, right? So there's all these different things that are going on

Are you speaking with anybody to help you sort through all this other than us a professional? I Am yeah, I'm meeting with a therapist. Good. It's Christian therapist. So, okay. I think I think you need that. I think you need somebody who's gonna help you give you some actionable steps for everything. Money does touch all of these areas, but there's a lot deeper issues that are going on that I think you need to figure out what's the priority because it's gonna be very hard to tackle all of these things at once I think you need to figure out what's the priority because it's going

to be very hard to tackle all of these things at once. So you need to figure out what is the top priority for me today to work on and what's my goal and at what point do I move on to the next thing. Getting off this call George, I'd say the first thing is to start putting a clear end to this marriage and that looks like filing for divorce so you can start building some closure there. We love an excuse to give you guys a deal. And so good news for you, the Memorial Day sale is here four days only.

You can get our most popular hardcover books for 12 bucks, select questions for humans decks for 11 bucks and more books include building an on anxious life, breaking free from broke. That's mine. Baby steps, millionaires, plus lots of other products like Ramsey, Merch questions for humans decks, a lot of stuff on there. This is the stuff that helps you take action with your money, your work and your relationships. You can make some real progress on what matters to you.

So go check out everything we've got going on, ramsysolutions.com slash store, or if you're watching on YouTube or podcast, click the link in the description. Sale ends on Monday, so jump on it. Jade wanted to sing Jump On It so badly there. I did. I felt it. The last time I tried that though, I got called out. They're like, Jade, this song is no longer

like politically correct. Oh, wow. I thought it was like an FCC violation. They just were like, Jade, this song is no longer like politically correct. Oh wow. I thought it was like an FCC violation. They just were like, we can't do this anymore. No, it's just think about it. And then I thought back on it and I was like, yeah, this song is a little sketchy. Wow. Okay. Good to know. I'll stay away. AJ's in Orlando up next. What's going on AJ? Hey, how's it going? Great. How are you? So, I'm great. Me and my husband are both currently out of debt except for our mortgage which we bought a house recently. Cool. But, and I know that the

Ramsey program doesn't endorse ever going back into debt after you're out of debt, but we are considering taking out a loan to build a mother-in-law's seat in my backyard for my 82-year-old grandmother. Look at you trying to throw that guilt on us by saying it's a mother-in-law's seat for my 82-year-old grandmother. Oh.

Okay, is she in very poor health? What's the reason for her moving in with you guys? So she's slowing down for sure. But you don't want her in the house. You want to build her a dog house in the back. We both have very strong personalities and we both agreed that that probably wouldn't work. Okay, what's the in-law suite gonna cost?

So we think we can build something pretty nice for around $50,000 to $60,000 in our backyard. But she's gonna have to come into your house for like everything, right? Or will she have her own entrance? So it would be her own entrance and her own kitchenette and her own kind of little garden area in the back. And like a shower and all of that?

Yep. For $50,000. Yep. I've got a bridge to sell you. Are you guys doing this yourself? Are you going to just go to Home Depot and try to like hammer it together? No. So we're looking at a couple of like the kits that you can get. And so some of the work we might do ourselves after we have the kit to save on costs What do you mean by kit? So they have like, you know, like modular home kits So like Deltec or like, you know, like there's there's like it comes up a little bit cheaper because then they're not having to put The house together on site. They put the house together before and they either bring it to you or

Essentially grandma's living in a souped up shipping container. Okay, and this. Well, it would be nicer than a shipping container. Souped up, that helps. This is so that as she ages, if you need to care for her, she's on site. Is that why? That is the goal.

So she also has, oh my gosh, I can't remember what it's called, but she gets very dizzy sometimes. And so my fear is that she falls. And she, vertigo, that is it. And she, if she falls, she's in Texas. And you know, we, we, we talk every couple of days on the phone, but you know, nobody checks on her that often.

So she's in Texas, you're in Orlando. No, you're in, okay. So is there, I'm just thinking through this. Here's where I'm thinking A, it's debt. We're never gonna say to do that. B, I'm wondering what this does to the value of your home because a kit doesn't sound like a great thing if I'm looking to buy somebody else's house.

And then the third thing I'm wondering is if the goal is to be able to take care of her, what would it look like to just put her in an apartment that's near you? So Orlando rent is very expensive. She also currently lives on, so it's a family ranch property that just she lives on down in Texas because nobody else lives in Texas. So I just think that like her going from

living with all of this open land to putting her in an apartment would be a rough transition for her. You're squeezing her into the little kit as it is. But we are on an acre property. So at least we have outdoors available that she could sit outside and feel fresh air and she's not super close with her. Like you're not up against your neighbor. What would happen with her property there?

So it's currently in an undivided interest between my uncle, me, my brother, and my grandmother. Wow, that sounds super simple and not complicated at all. So what would happen? You can't sell it then? Cause there's too many people involved? Yeah, there's too many people involved that it would make sense to sell.

Would they buy her share out then? We have talked about trying to buy her share out. Wouldn't that be you buying her share out? It would. It's not something that we can do right now because we just purchased our home. We're not looking to try and purchase that other part of the property. What about the other family members? So, okay, you guys are taking on this burden of taking care of a person who is a family member to many. Is there anybody else who's willing to kick in and say, hey, if you take grandma,

that's, you know, you're paying a financial cost and a just lifestyle, physical cost. You know, amongst the brothers and sisters, if it were my mom, there's four of us, we'd all be thinking, okay, what are we all chipping in to make sure mom's okay? So is that a conversation that you can have with siblings to figure out like, what's the budget here

to make sure somebody's here to take care of her and she's got a living situation that works? Right. So my brother is not financially responsible in a way that he could support that. And then she has two sons, one that lives in Tennessee and another that does live in a different part of Florida, that they would never take on the cost of having her come live with them or near them.

So this is all on you for the rest of her life. Well, and it's not something that I really regret. Like this woman has poured into me my entire life. Oh, sure. This is family. Yeah, yeah. It's something that I really regret. Like this woman has poured into me my entire life. Oh, sure. And this is family. Yeah, yeah. It's something that I'm very happy to do. I'm just making sure you guys are good to take on that for the rest of her life, which could be 20 years.

I mean, let's go back to the apartment thing, because I wanna clarify, I'm not saying that's it forever, but it is it until you guys can save up the 50 or 60,000 and get this kit. What's wrong with that? I'm just trying to keep you free. That's my goal here. You guys worked really, really hard to get free. And and I'm wondering, why does she have no money?

So it's not that she says she is she is very small expenses since the house is paid off and it's on the ranch. So it's not that she doesn't have any money. What is her income? So she has social security and I'm not sure what social security pays her a month. And then she had some savings that she got from my grandfather. So I'm wondering, can we use her money to fund this or cover her apartment versus you guys taking it on? Yeah, cuz you're gonna be paying for everything from here on out

Why not use her Social Security to pay for an apartment for her or even like a assisted living community? so it's Possible and we haven't gotten in depth into finances with each other yet She would she would contribute some of it. So like, but if we paid $60,000 for a kid, she probably wouldn't be able to afford the full $60,000. Well, how much was it? Did she get from, how much is in her savings from her husband?

That I don't know. So we need to find that out. I just know that she's very frugal. Yeah, she might have a million sitting in there and she's just very frugal. Yeah, I think- She might have a million sitting in there and she's just very frugal. Yeah. She might have a dollar sitting in there. We don't know.

She's too generous to be a millionaire. Well, that doesn't make sense. Hold on. Let's say this. Let's say this. If you're going to do the very generous thing that I think that you're wanting to do, which is say, hey, we wanna take care of you.

You've got this health issue. We wanna make sure nothing happens to you. You've got this health issue. We want to make sure nothing happens to you. You've poured into us, like you said. Then I don't think it's unfair to say, what can you contribute? Because the truth is as we age, it is our job to make sure that somebody can take care of us with our own money.

It's not supposed to be, the burden is not supposed to be passed to somebody else. Even if you don't feel that it's a burden, you going into debt is, and it's not a bad or wrong thing to say, grandma, what can you contribute for your own care as you age because we wanna make sure, we wanna know what's there to take care of you.

I would not go into debt for this, AJ. I think you wanna go into debt for this. And I think you're thinking of all the reasons why you need to instead of why you don't. My fear is you're paying for this thing long after she's gone. You still have a payment on this kit. I wouldn't do it.

The Ramsey Show question of the day is sponsored by Yreify. If you're buried in defaulted private student loans, you're not alone. Reach out to Yreify to see if they can build a custom plan to help you dig out. Visit wirify.com slash Ramsey. That's the letter Y, R-E-F-Y dot com slash Ramsey. May not be available in all states.

Alright, today's question comes from Toby in Pennsylvania. They say I'm seeing some mortgages advertised with only 1% down required. Is this a feasible way to get a house if we don't have enough for a 5% or 10% down required? Is this a feasible way to get a house if we don't have enough for a five percent or ten percent down payment? Ay, yi, yi. You owe me a Coke. Wow. These just break my heart. It's just these too good to be true advertisements where they go, hey.

And they're everywhere. It's like bad credit, no problem. Come take out a loan at 98 percent interest. It's fine. Yeah. That's kind of the vibe with these. Yeah, it is. And think about it. You know, you wanna make, when you buy a house, you wanna make money at the table immediately, right?

It makes you feel good, all of it's good. And any money that you're putting down, that is less that you're paying a month, right? So let's not forget that. I think sometimes people think that like, the down payment is some sort of like, consequence you have to pay for like getting the house. It's like, you gotta pay the down payment.

It's like, we're gonna wave the down payment. You can take out a hundred percent on the loan. Like that's- That's not a win. Like that's not a prize that you get. So I think reframing it in our minds that 0% down or 1% down is not a prize. It's actually putting you in a negative position,

not negative, but in a less favorable position when you buy this house. And so that's part of it. We wanna know that there's equity there right when we move in, that gives us peace of mind. And the bigger part is if you're not putting anything down, I wanna know what this payment is getting ready to be. Because when we're putting money down,

we're making that payment lower and lower and lower, which is it's a smaller and smaller percentage of our world and our monthly budget, which is what we're aiming for. So the question I would have for you is why do you wanna put 0% down? Because if you're telling me you can't afford to put 5 to 10% down,

you're also telling me you can't afford a home. Because what I find all the time, and this is the sad part, people will go in and buy a house for three or $400,000. They can't afford the payment. And then when something like the AC breaks for three or $5,000, they can't afford it and they go into debt for it. So you got to make sure your mind is right. Homeownership is an expensive endeavor

and it's more than just the monthly payment. I mean that is definitely the starting point but this is something, it's your biggest asset you're going to have and you want to make sure it's a blessing and not a burden and if you go to that thing and say, hey, I can't afford 5%, I'm sorry to tell you, you just can't afford to buy yet. And there's a ton of red tape and very strict rules to even qualify for any of these. And even if you do, guess what? They're gonna get you a different way

with a crazy high interest rate, with tons of fees built into the loan costs somewhere else that you're not seeing because you're not paying attention, you're just starry eyed. You got private mortgage insurance to pay. That's right. And I've never seen this workout where someone's like,

this was a great idea, we can totally afford the mortgage. It's usually broke people trying to get into a house before they're financially ready. And they see these advertisements, which if it's being advertised, that's probably a sign to you to step away. And I hate to say it, George, but you make an excellent point, which is so true.

A lot of times these deals are marketed to folks who truly can't afford it. And it's like, it's marketed as your way in or your window in, but really they, they're kind of like treating you like a sucker. It's like, this guy will fall for this. We can get them to go for this because they're so desperate, right?

And kind of knowing, hey. They prey on these people. It's borderline predatory. A lot of these USDA loans, FHA loans, even VA loans, hey veterans, 0% down. And you're like, you're gonna cause them, you're gonna causing financial harm because they're getting into a home they can't afford,

but they think they can because the lender said they could. That's right, that's right. Stay away. Just beware, just beware. Don't let anybody prey on you. You're not desperate, you're not behind, you're running your race. And when you, let anybody prey on you. You're not desperate. You're not behind. You're running your race. And when you, it's you against you.

So when you hit that milestone of buying the house, that was when you were supposed to cross that finish line. Just remember that. Yeah, don't let a lender tell you when it's time to buy a house. You decide. Sage is up next in San Antonio, Texas. What's going on Sage?

Hey, how's it going? I had a question basically. I'm, uh, I'm 25. I just had twins two weeks ago or three weeks ago. And I actually had a stroke last week, a small one, but I'm doing better now and I'm back at work. Oh my goodness. I yeah, I have, I also have a toddler he's two. And that being said, about two years ago when my son was first born, I got into a really horrible financial decision.

This was before I knew the Dave Ramsey show and everything that y'all preach about. I got a car from my wife cause I, we needed two vehicles I was working out of town. And when I say I have a horrible interest rate, I'd yell it's horrible. It's 22%. It was a stupid decision. I'm debating on either doing a voluntary repossession. It's not that I can't afford the vehicle But it's just I've had the vehicle two years in two thousand dollars has been paid towards the principal man I'm under dollar a month payments

another thing being said I did recently get approved to get refinanced at a Lower interest rates still not great. What 13% I'll take it I'm basically asking if I should refinance it or just go ahead and do a voluntary repossession. Why can't you sell it? How far underwater are you? It's pretty bad. The vehicle's worth 7,500 and I owe about 18,200.

When I, it was a horrible decision on my part. At the time I was extremely, extremely desperate for a vehicle, went to the first place I could didn't even look around. She needed a vehicle. And I needed my truck for work. I was working about four hours from home at the time, and staying out of town. And she of course had our newborn son, my oldest one who is currently two. What other debt do you have?

I have a credit card Oh $400 on I'm actually going to pay that off today. And then I have my truck which I owe $7,000 on that the truck loan it is a low interest rate because I did a collateral loan on it we moved into a house renting it and it was what's the time I did the trucks worth pretty much what I owe on it it's worth about 9,500. And then I have a vehicle that is paid off, another truck. So the reason I was debating voluntary repossession of the Jeep was I would get for the truck that I currently owe on.

It's a nicer truck, big back seat. It'll fit all three of the kids, the double stroller in the back. And it's got the best AC I've ever had. Why can't you drive the paid offoff truck? Yeah, so the truck alone I'm currently doing I'm currently driving my paid-off vehicle. Okay for work I'm a welder and then my other truck. It's uh, you said there's 2,000 in equity in that one Yeah, I could probably if I were to sell this one the paid-off one I could probably get about six or seven thousand. Oh, so why can't you sell that one and drive the one that's got 7,000 ago?

Because it's kind of a funny situation with that one. That one I don't necessarily make the payment on it. That makes sense. I'm my I have 12 siblings and my younger one of my younger brothers is actually making the payment on it every month. So he pays the insurance, he pays the payment. It was to kind of help him out in a sense and to kind of get rid of that payment for me. How was that helping him out?

Well, cause he's making a payment on a car he doesn't drive. Is he on it? Or did you guys co-sign together? No, the loan completely in my name. My dad wrote us up a contract to where once the, the loans paid off, the title goes to him. And then for some reason he doesn't want the vehicle

by the time he pays it off and everything he put into it, if he does not get any of it back, it would just go towards the loan balance. And then I was just making that payment. Okay, this financial inbreeding needs to stop. This is chaos, what you guys have done to your family's finances. Yeah, it's kind of a sticky situation.

You could say he's 18 and he went out and about and he was going to be in the same situation I was in. He was actually calling. He called me four times a day. He was about to. I can ask him when you want to call. So let's not go down. That's not trace that rabbit too far. So the car is supposed to go to him. There's 2000 in equity in it. He's been paying the note. Can you just get this out of your hair and just? Yeah. So that's our next step with the bank. We're actually talking to the bank about getting the truck that I have the loan on out of my name and financing it into his name. The only

situation with that is because he's only 18, they're wanting to give him a lot higher interest rate. Okay, but that's not your... Nothing down or nothing. That's not your problem. You need to give him the ultimatum of, hey, this weekend, we either go and move this into your name or I'm keeping it and I'm doing what I will with it. Like that ends this weekend. That's what I'm doing.

And then what's your household income right now? Is wife staying home with the kids? Yeah, she's a stay at home mom. I make about currently probably $5,000 a month net. Okay. You guys have a lot of car in your life. You either need to save up the difference Well, it's currently probably $5,000 a month net. Okay. You guys have a lot of car in your life. You either need to save up the difference that you're underwater on, or you need to

go get a loan for the difference to lower your debt amount. I don't know that you'll qualify for that, but do not do a voluntary repo. It's going to destroy your financial life. You're going to sell it auctioned for pennies versus what you could sell it for, and then you're still going to owe the difference. Do not do this. From Ramsey Network, this is The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth,

do work that they love, and create amazing relationships. I'm George Campbell, joined by Ramsey personality, Jade Warshaw, and we're taking your calls at triple 8, 825-5225. Be brave brave call us. We'll help you take the right next step for your life and your money Haley's gonna kick us off in Huntsville, Alabama. What's going on Haley? Hi, how are you doing great? What's going on in your world? So we are about just over $60,000 in debt and we are wondering how we can get ourselves out

of this situation and what the next steps are. How'd you get into it? Bad choices, bad decisions. What kind of debt is it? Auto, loans, some hospital bills and a little bit of credit card. Can you break it out for us by by amount for each of those categories so we kind of see what we're dealing with? Yes, we have 44,000 just over 44,000 in car loans How many cars? Two. Okay, is it split even like 20 and 22 or what is it? Oh, no

Mine still has 26,000 left and my husband's we just got and it has about $18,000. Okay, gotcha. Okay, what else? And then we got about three loans combined that's about $13,400. Okay. Just personal loans? Total credit card. Two are kind of personal loans and one was a Shed.

Okay. So 13,000 in loans. What else? Then about 750 in credit cards and then hospital bills is almost 2,000. Okay. Cool. What's your household income? Together, we bring home about 90,000 a year.

Awesome. Let's take home. Okay, good. Are the, is that the car that you just got, your husband's, is that still worth something since you just took out that loan? It's worth more than $18,000? Well, Kelly Blue booked it and it says it's about worth $12,000, so somehow it fell down. You just got it?

Oh gosh. I just got it. Did you roll over? Did you roll over bad equity? No negative. Um, I got it myself I got it as a surprise to him because I started working because I've been a stay-at-home mom So I got a really excited making money. So made a bad decision. Okay, so what happened then because you know, you've been in this mindset of The person who just bought this car is now the person who's calling. So what happened that triggered you to go, wait a minute, this is not good.

Kind of just seeing it all together and I don't know, I was something was going through me. I guess I got a little excited because I was finally making money that I made versus him. And I guess I got excited and thought he deserved what he said. He loved it. He's quite different for me. I don't think he cares as much about the debt. That could pose a problem for this journey you're about to embark on, right? Cause we're going to, we're going to suggest some extreme changes and he's got to

be on board with that. Do you think he could get on board? Y'all are gonna Y'all gonna hit on my head. Y'all gonna tell us to probably sell some stuff I was like, I already know what they're gonna say what but what's he think to that? He usually just agrees with me Okay. All right Would he agree with you to sell these cars to get out of this debt? Yeah, cuz you'd be taking back the gift You just got him.

Yeah, I've wanted to do that, but together it's 19,000 negative equity and we've tried to get a loan to cover that difference. So we could sell them and we cannot get a loan. Okay, the good news is, here's the good news. The cars together, they're not, you know, you could reach in and pay these off probably over time. The 715 credit cards doesn't scare me. You should pay that off this month

and cut those credit cards up and be done. You should feasibly be able to reach over and pay off the $2,000 of medical debt really fast. That's out of your life. And now we've got three you know loans dealing with actually the personal loans I think you could probably break those up in the snowball and knock those out relatively quickly so there's some parts of the the debt-free journey that really are this is the debt and I'm just

locking in and I'm there's no get out of jail free card that I can cash in I've just got to work more you know pick up an extra job sell some of the things I like and just hit a hard yeah my guess is your expenses are pretty high because as you guys have made more money you've increased your lifestyle yeah we have including all the debts it's about five thousand a month with regular bills, everything else. Okay, so that should leave 2,500 of margin, right? Yeah, and I don't know where that's going.

It should leave, that's the key word, it should. So we're gonna give you every dollar before you get off the call, and I want you guys, this is date night this week. I want you, you've already kind of foreshadowed that you're going down this path. I want you to tell him, hey, I called in the show. They gave us this gift with the caveat

that we would make it our next state night. And we're gonna sit down and we're gonna list everything that we're spending money on. I want you to have the bank statements from the month of May ready, right? To see, here's really what's happening each month. Yeah, and so what's gonna happen is you're gonna do May's budget,

even though we're already in May, and you're gonna see how much you're probably already over budget, right? And is you're gonna do May's budget, even though we're already in May, and you're gonna see how much you're probably already over budget, right? And then you're gonna start June's budget together on the right path. So it's perfect because you'll be all ready to start afresh for June. And then from there on, yeah, with the 2,500,

yeah, you're knocking out the medical debt in June. You're probably gonna find, because you're gonna cut back more, so you're gonna be able to pay off the credit card in June as well. That feels really good, doesn't it gonna find, because you're gonna cut back more, so you're gonna be able to pay off the credit card in June as well. That feels really good, doesn't it? Yes, it does. And then- Would he be willing to cut up cards

and never use a credit card again? Yes. You said he'll agree with you. So if you say, hey, we're cutting up the cards, we're only gonna use money we actually have. We're not gonna have a promise that we'll have it. Yeah, we could probably do that. Because I found that changed it for me, Hailey.

When I was getting out of my debt, I realized that cutting up the card was one of the best things I did cause it's burning the ships. It's saying there is no option to go into debt. I froze my credit, so I couldn't even open up a line of credit if I wanted to. And do you see what I'm saying?

You have to add friction back into your life as you've gotten more out of control. And Hailey, another thing that I want you to talk about when you guys do this budget date night, because George is right, you gotta stop with the credit cards. But my thought is if you tell your husband this, what's his name?

You don't have to tell us. It's Chase. Okay, I was gonna say we can call him Biff, but Chase. I was gonna guess Chase. I love a Chase from Huntsville. Let's say you gotta tell Chase the deeper meaning of why you wanna do this. Because if it's just, we got too much debt,

we gotta sell these trucks, we gotta sell these vehicles. He's gonna be like, what is happening? What happened to the woman that just impulsively got me a surprise truck? Yeah. So you've gotta, and this might take some soul searching for you, Halif, to sit back and go, what do I really want? What is it that I'm trying to achieve and why am I trying to achieve it?

Is it peace? Is it stability? Is it, you know, some sort of identity that you're searching for? Because you did mention that when you started making money, it made you feel like, oh, I'm here. So there's something there that if you can articulate what it is for you first, and then now you'll be able to articulate it for him. And then that's probably something he's going to be able to connect with you on. Right? He might not get on board with, let's just cut up our credit cards because it's a smart thing to do. He might not get on board with that. But if you say,

for the first time in my life, when I made a little bit of money, I felt like I was here and I was seen. And I realized I don't want that to be for naught. I want that to mean something. And I have a chance to be here with a legacy, like talk to him. And then he'll get it. Create the vision. And then selling the car becomes a byproduct of reverse engineering this vision. That's a very different story than we got to sell the cars, because Dave said,

it's I want peace in my life. I want freedom. I want our kid to not know debt. And we've had debt our whole marriage and we've got to change our family tree it starts with us if you're tired of living paycheck to paycheck you're wondering where your money's going your first step is getting on a budget our team is hosting free budgeting trainings this month you can jump in on where you're wondering where your money's going, your first step is getting on a budget. Our team is hosting free budgeting trainings this month that you can jump in on where you're going to learn step by step how to make and stick to a budget using EveryDollar. We're going to make it easy and dare I say fun. Plus, you can get your biggest budgeting questions answered in a live Q&A.

So spots are limited. Go sign up for free at EveryDollar.com slash webinar. Sasha is in Baltimore up next. How can we help Sasha? Hi guys, how are you? Doing great. Better than we deserve. What's going on?

Good. So my question is I need some help trying to navigate, navigate if I should sell my house, rent my house or stay in my house. And I'm a mom of two, I have a 12 year old, I have a newborn and I'm really just trying to, I'm starting to really feel the heat of wanting to save for retirement, save for college, just having money to build experiences with my daughters.

So. And this house is a burden, can you not afford the payment? So the payment is, it's decent. It's just that I feel like I'm one house emergency away from. So my mortgage, the mortgage I have now, I also have two extra mortgages or what they call partial claims

because I ran into repairs and it really set me back and I wasn't able to make that mortgage payment. So I'm just like, I'm at a space where I... So you basically owe the back mortgage payments that you missed. How much do you owe total? So total is $130, I would say $140, it's $138 and some change. $140 total between all the mortgages? Yes.

And what's your monthly payment that you have to make? Twelve seventy nine. And what's the take home pay per month that you're bringing in? About forty four hundred. I make about eighty five K a little bit over eighty five K. Okay. Okay. So you're right there. Tell us what else, what other debt you have because something else is eating your lunch here

Well, I have a newborn. So that's my you know, the cost of having a newborn But I also have I don't have any consumer debt. I have a car payment and I have a student loan. That's it Okay car payment. That's all that's consumer debt So how much is your car? How much is your car? What's the balance? but what do you know the car is about 16 K and My car payment is about 550 a month. Okay, and what's the car worth? Have you looked if you were to sell it today and get something cheaper? Do you know what you can get for it? I have their book. Okay, let's call that homework number one today. When you get off the call,

we want you to go on kellybluebook.com and we want you to look for private sale if you were to sell it today on your own, what it would be worth, because it could be, yeah, you sell that and you get 500 bucks back in your pocket. That'd be great if you can at least break even on it and then get something, you know, a little less nice and cash, right? So- What's left on the student loans? I guess what my issue is, is even with the housing, so I live directly across the street from a hospital.

I'm able to move back in with my mom and have space and everything, but it's just even the idea of renting it to like traveling nurses and things, it's just the money for the repairs. So even just selling my car, where was that? Where's the money going to come from to buy another car that I need now? Well, I think it's working. It's aspirational, right?

So if you say if you look, if you do the homework tonight and you look up and you find man, I owe 16000 and, you know, maybe the car is worth 14, right? Let's pretend that you're at a deficit and it's 2000. Now you can at least start to, you have the information to go, okay, what would it look like for me to save up 2000? And then what could I,

how quickly could I save another 5,000? And what's out there for 5,000, right? You can start to use that as a jump off point for different ideas. Because a lot of times when you're in your situation, it feels like you're painted into a corner. And the best thing you can give yourself right now are lots of options and ideas forward.

So right now, one option you have forward, like you said, is I could go live with my mom, or I could rent the house. You're already laying out ideas, and I'm just giving you more. So I would say the idea of renting your house doesn't feel like the right move because what makes home ownership stressful is you're on the hook for everything, right?

And you said that earlier, you know, I fell on hard times, I couldn't pay for it, and now look. So if you're gonna sell the house, if you're moving out of the house, sell it. I wouldn't move out and keep it, but is the allure to move in with mom? Is it for childcare? Tell us more about that. Well, the allure to move in with mom is just based on speaking to

real estate agents. And the allure is to get out of debt. It's really just to get out of debt, simplify and just really try to rebuild from there. Plus, it my mom would be there, so I would have the support. Is she local? Yeah, she's local. Okay, so you got the 16,000, let's look at the size of the problem. You got the 16,000 on the car,

how much were the student loans? The student loans are 20, 23. Anything else? No, that's it. So you have 39,000 in debt and you're making 85K. This is a very solvable problem. That makes me feel really good, do you hear? Yeah.

But I think what you're searching for is a shortcut to make the problem go away faster, but you are the solution. You put this income to work, everything above food, utility, shelter, transportation goes toward the debt. I mean we can crunch some easy numbers here. Are you able to get your income up at all with side hustles? Drop the kids off at mom's and you go to work at night? Not at the moment, no. I'm not able to. And that's what a lot of the things when

I was trying to think about like, how would I, especially with this newborn, maybe when he gets a little bit older. Maybe. And it sounds like you're doing this all on your own. Dad's not in the picture? I am. No, not really. No child support, no alimony?

No, and really honestly, it's making me feel a lot better if I could figure out what I can do instead of just putting myself out there again to try to see if somebody else would help me. No, that's not what I'm advocating for. I'm trying to make sure there's not other income that is coming in or should be coming in to help you get through this.

Here's the good thing. It's all on me. The good thing is, and I wanna validate this, A, a lot of times people call in and the mortgage is the problem. For you, that's not the problem. So that's a green check. I want you to leave off the phone feeling really good

about where your mortgage is. So I don't think that's where we look for the solution. The second thing, Sasha, is there is a seasonality to life that's very real, especially when it comes to the baby steps, not just when we're in debt, but at different points of time. When you have really little kids,

that plays very majorly into what you're able to accomplish. Now add into the equation that you're a single mom, and it doesn't change what you're able to accomplish, it changes how fast you're able to accomplish it. So there's part of this that I want you to know, hey, as long as you're looking at this and saying, here's where I see the problem is, here's where I'm gonna start to make adjustments in that area.

But just knowing, hey, probably for the first year, this is going to be really tough and I might not have the time to do some of the things I wish I could do. And that's OK. And in this time, the main thing to do is say this. Hey, number one, I am not going into any debt. Like I've drawn a line in the sand. I don't borrow money period. That is your numero uno right now. No matter come hell or high water you

don't borrow money. So if you can do that, that's a win. And then number two, George, if I were my number one goal would be I'm gonna have a thousand dollars saved. By the way do you have any money saved? Yes I did save my thousand dollars for the first baby step and I think I have like maybe two more G's. So my number- That I was trying to figure out how I would do like improvements with the house and stuff like that.

No, yeah, improvements with the house is on down the list. I think your number one goal, first homework, I find out what the car is worth. Second financial goal is how quickly can I save $5,000 so that I can get out of this car. Because for you to get out of that car and have that $500 payment back, that is the breathing room you're looking for, and you can start to make some progress towards kicking out the rest of the student loan.

Are you doing any investing right now, Sasha? No, nothing. Nothing going toward 4,000K? No, no. Okay, good. And I really wanna get into that, yeah. And you will, you will, but don't let that be the thing that's making you feel like you're behind or like something's not right.

You will get to that. It is truly step-by-step, baby step at a time. Think about this, Sasha. If you can find 1,600 bucks to throw this debt every month out of your take-home pay, you can be out of debt completely in 24 months, worst case. Wow. Worst case.

If you just consistently, no matter what, like Jade said, you're being very intentional with that budget, throwing this money toward the debt, it's going to happen. And that's if you don't sell the car. So you can do this. I just hope we can show you the forest from the trees and show you there's a way out that doesn't involve selling your house,

renting it out, moving in with mom. I would pause on that and see what progress you can make on your own. Welcome back to the Ramsey Show. If you're enjoying the show, if you ever have, do us a quick favor. Hit the subscribe button, hit the like button, hit the review button, share it with a friend. All of that really helps us spread the word, get this message out to more people, and it works. The algorithm says, hey, let's show this to more people, and we can help more people that way. All because you clicked a button. So, means the world. Thank you for doing that.

Alyssa is up next in Los Angeles. What's going on, Alyssa? How can we help? Hi, thank you for taking my call. Sure. So I'm calling to ask if it's okay to use a portion of our children's 529 plans that we have been setting aside to help fund my graduate program. Okay, what's the graduate program? It's a doctorate for nurse practitioners. Awesome. How much is it going to cost? The total program's $81,000 without scholarships and grants, which I'm really hoping to get. And how much is in the $529,000?

About $48,000. is in the 529? About 48,000. Okay, so you would take all the money out and still have a deficit? How would you pay for the rest? Okay, so the program I'm going to do part-time and it's over five years and I'm going to try and cash flow most of it. I don't know because I'm still kind I'm kind of transitioning from stay-at-home mom to working. I do work as a registered nurse right now part-time. I don't know how much I'm

going to be able to work while in the program and so I'm just trying to figure out if I need to dip into it, you know, can, is that wrong to be taking out of the 529? It's not morally wrong. You'd have to change the beneficiary to you, which is totally legal. It's more just, you know, knowing that you're not going to have money for your kid when it comes time for college unless you replenish this very quickly. Yeah, how old are the kids? Um, 14 and 16. And I think that their plan is is they're trying to do service missions and fetch after high school. And so they would probably be entering college at the same time that I would be graduating. And my in-laws graciously have made a 529 plan separately that could actually

fund their first year of college. And then you would cash flow the remaining years? Right. And actually, we don't need any of my income. We live off of my husband's income. And so really, like my first year out of this doctorate program, like I'd be able to give all of any income I make to my kids' college. Okay. What's your husband make?

So after health insurance, what we, taxes, what we pay to retirement, because we're in baby steps four, five, six. Awesome. It's about $122,000. Great, so you got 10 grand a month coming in, that's more than enough to pay your bills. So what you're really saying is,

can I use these funds and then replenish them or cashflow them, you know, three years from now, four years from now? Right. I think that's a great idea. I mean, as long as you're not going to debt, you're cash flowing this. Now you earmarked it for the kids,

but if you're saying grandma and grandpa have another fund set aside, we're gonna be able to cash flow this, we've communicated to the kids the plan, you know, I just don't want them to go, I'm not doing missions, I'm gonna go to a school that's $200,000 and you know, regardless of what you say, I just want to make sure that we're all very clear about the near future. Yeah, so we did, we actually did have a family council about this and we talked it over with our kids because we're pretty transparent with finances

with our kids and so like they're okay, they're okay with me returning to school. They understand what we've agreed to pay for for their college. They know about the 529 that their grandparents have made for them and like everyone's on the same page and they're okay with it. They're supportive of it. Good. Love it. I love this. Green lights. I love this family council situation.

Yeah, and you're pursuing an awesome graduate program. You know, if you were just going because you were like soul searching, that's one thing. Right. Just to go to more school. But this is going to very much increase your income. Do you know by how much? From what you're making now to what you would be making? Well, so I'm just doing kind of an as needed right now. I probably make about 18,000 a year, which is nothing, but registered nurses make, they can make a lot more. Um, but as a nurse practitioner in this area,

and I want to do a pediatric acute care, which is like emergency, um, they could probably bring between 110, 140,000 a year. Awesome. Hey. That's a sweet upgrade. And the program seems reasonably priced for five years of school for 80 grand. Is that what you're saying?

Yeah. Okay. Wow. And you'd be Dr. Alyssa. Pretty cool. That's pretty sweet. I like this plan, Alyssa. Thank you so much for the call. This is great. I got a lot of most of my families in that.

I'm the black sheep. Yeah, yeah. I'm not going to do any of that medical stuff, but they're great fields. Yeah. The less debt you have, the more fun it is. I think that's amazing. If you can cash flow all of this, I'd go for it.

Sherleen is up next in Orlando. What's going on, Sherleen? Hi, you guys. Thank you so much for taking my call. Absolutely. I just wanted to say praise God for you guys I have some hope again after putting my head in the sand I have a lot of medical school debt and we're just in kind of I would say one-third of the way through baby step two but I still have a lot of medical school debt left. And so my question was, I have

this high medical school debt, but I also have high interest rates on them. So I was wondering if I should consolidate to get a lower rate so that as I'm working through it, I'm not just kind of treading water. Maybe tell us more about the debt. How much is it and what are the rates? How many are there? It's about it's a seven hundred thousand in medical school debt. Mm-hmm That has you know accumulated over time and it's broken down into eleven different loans Mm-hmm, and it's between six point eight percent and eight point five percent. Are they private? No, they're federal. Oh federal. Okay. Okay

My gut says I would consider refinancing before consolidating. I'm not a fan of consolidation because you're just moving the debt around and it hurts the debt snowball momentum. So I'm wondering, and Jade, I know we've got a partner over here on the Ramsey show that helps with this. I was just about to say Laurel Road does do that. And so you can go over there, you can do a five minute consult.

And I mean, they're looking at your specific situation. So I think that you 100% qualify to do that. Here's the trade off, and I wanna be really clear about this. So sometimes when you do, if you were to do a consolidation, what I don't like about that is it groups it all together and you've got this one payment.

And when we talk about doing the debt snowball, that almost feels insurmountable. But if it's something that they could go in and refinance, it sometimes does still lump it together. So just understand that going forward and figure out what makes sense for you, what's better. Would you rather have a couple of these that have a higher percentage

or maybe it's some of them that you refinance? Because you're going to have to work through this. What's you guys' income? It's about $450,000. Okay. So how much? Okay. So the shovel to debt ratio feels more normalized when you put it that way. How many loans is it right now if you broke it all out? It's 11. 11 different loans.

So yeah, I mean, I'll tell you my thoughts on it. You know, my husband and I had 280,000 of student loans and the biggest one was 90,000. And the rate, I would say probably about that time, the ratio that we were working with was similar to your guys's. And it's just, I would say probably about that time, the ratio that we were working with was similar to your guys's. And it's just, I'll tell you, it is daunting to look at a big old sum like that

because a couple of them had been consolidated for a better rate. So I'll just let you know upfront, like that's what you're facing when you do that. And you have to ask yourself, with the speed at which you're moving, are those percentage points worth it for that overwhelming feeling of saying,

I'm not gonna get those dopamine hits every time I pay off one of these guys, if that makes sense? Yeah. So a few things to consider, Charlene, is make sure that it's 100% free to refinance, that you can get a lower interest rate. None of these are variable, right?

They're all fixed rate? They're all fixed rate? They're all fixed rate. Okay, good. Make sure that you're not signing up for a longer repayment period. And all of that can just help you make a smart decision instead of just chasing a rate at all costs. But you guys can do this.

I mean, is this like a three year journey for you guys at this point? To get out of debt completely? Yeah, I think so. Yeah, that's what the numbers show. And we're being very intense about it and got every dollar and we're on the way and I I'm probably gonna cry but um, I had my head in the sand for so long and started out with 400,000 and then accumulated this 300,000 and I feel like you guys are such a godsend. I feel like this

is exactly what God was telling me to do. Good, good. And I feel like we can be the lenders, not the borrowers. That's right! Preach, preach, Charlene! Beautifully said. We're cheering for you. Are you staying on track with the Baby Steps? You can take a quick quiz to check your progress and get a personalized plan made just for you. Simply head to the show notes, click on the link titled Are You On Track With The Baby Steps and complete the quiz. Chris is up next in New Orleans. What's going on Chris? Hey guys, appreciate it. Thanks for taking my call.

Absolutely. How can we help? So my wife and I were on baby step seven. I'm 36. Yeah. Yeah. Amazing. Appreciate it. We've, you know, we've grounded away our whole lives, uh, live below our means, done all the things that you guys say, it's worked well. We've got a couple of young kids and we're rolling into a nice summer and we've got the itch to put in a pool. Yes. My kind of call. That's right. Um, right. A lot of money. The biggest thing for us is it's something that we're gonna do it. We want to do it while the kids are young, but we don't want to put our retirement future in jeopardy either. You know, we want to

be able to thrive in our late 40s, 50s, and 60s. So I want to know what you guys would have to say about it. What's the pool gonna cost? You got some bids? Well, yeah, yeah, to do it right, it's probably gonna be about $150,000 or so. That's right. That was my guess. Spot on. Yeah. Okay, that sounds about right.

How much money do you guys have now outside of the emergency fund saved up for this? Yeah, I feel like we've done pretty well. We've, for retirement and investments, we've got about $3, $3.5 million. Woo! That a thought? Now, wait a minute.

Yeah. Is this a prank call? Why are you even calling us? You didn't need to ask us this, Chris. Now the caller, now everyone listening is mad at you. They're like, this guy's a humble bragger. OK, how much do you have that's non-retirement that you can use on the pool today?

Yeah, so it's about 50-50. The split between brokerage. Oh, okay. So you cash out, you know, 150 grand of the brokerage, a little more to counter factor in taxes, right? Capital gains. Yeah, it would probably be a mix of that and then just cash flow in it with what we have coming in.

Do it. Yeah, do it. And I try to cash flow as much as possible. Yeah, wow. Okay. All right. I didn't think it would be that easy. It's just we've never been accustomed to spending that. Don't get me wrong. We haven't lived coasters. We've lived a good life, but we have tried to live below our means. So when we're talking six figures to dig a hole in the ground and put water in it, it seems a little bit crazy, but that's not where we are. You do have to consider one really important caveat

to this whole thing, which is if you do this, you have to invite George and I over for a pool party. 100%. You got floaties for me? And do it New Orleans style. That's right, that's right. We can do it. Are you gonna have a pool house too?

That's like this neat, you gotta up it at this point. Now we're mad at you. I know man. For not spending enough. Yeah, this is gonna start the ball rolling. This is very exciting. In y'all terms, baby steps, right? That's right.

Maybe one day. And you've earned it, you've earned it. You know, a lot of people think. Oh, it's good to be Chris today, man. People think, all those Ramsey people, they don't want you to have a good life. They want you to be frugal forever. I'm like, nope, you forgot the part where it said,

live like no one else. So later you can live like no one else. I know that's right. Later for Chris is a lot earlier because he worked his butt off. My guess is they've had a high six figure income for a long time, kept their lifestyle in check and then put away the rest of that money.

Do you have $3 million, 3.5 million in just investment accounts? Yes. It's insane. And if I may, let me, I gotta get on some folks real quick. If I may, cause George, every once in a while, my silly self goes and looks at some of the comments of the YouTube channel.

I could have warned you against that. Let me do that, Jade. That's my job. Every once in a while I do. And you guys, what George says is right. You guys get mad at people like Chris who call in and they've done something good. Don't be haters.

Don't sip on that hater rating, go in the comments talking about, oh, this guy's humble bragging. He didn't need to call the shovel. Don't do that. He's our hope. He's the one that we can look at and go, Chris did it, I can do it.

Instead of being like that, you need to be asking questions. You need to be calling up Chris and saying, Chris, bro, how'd you do it at 37? You got a pool? How I can do it. Instead of being like that, you need to be asking questions. You need to be calling up Chris and saying, Chris, bro, how'd you do it at 37? You got a pool? How can I do it? That's the spirit you need to have, not hating on Chris because he's doing well in life. Don't have that spirit.

That's an ugly, my mom used to say, like, you're too pretty to be acting that ugly. Don't do that. Oh, I like that. My mom never told me that. She never said I was too pretty. My mom told me that, you know. Here's my version.

Don't be envious, be curious. There you go. All right. I feel like y'all are setting up for like a read the comments, like segment where you go through and respond like you do on your show, George. We're ready.

It is fun. Yeah, that's half my job, is just responding to the haters. Now I'm like, what am I? I'm dragging myself into the mud with the pigs. You know, they're not gonna know who's who in the mud pit at this point. I've responded like two times and I immediately regret it.

It feels good in the moment. You know, it's like Taco Bell at midnight. You're like, this feels like a good idea right now. I'm gonna call, James, give me permission. I'm gonna call somebody out right now. So I, again, was silly enough to go in the comments and somebody was like, man, Jade's guns are big, but her stomach is big too.

I was like, why? Why would anybody say this? He was like, Jade legit has a gut. And in my mind, I was like, what's happening right now? So I'm just telling, I see what you guys are saying. And I almost responded. I almost responded, my milkshake brings all the boys to the yard. But I didn't. I didn't. I almost responded my milkshake brings all the boys to the yard

Oh my gosh, I didn't I would have shut down the comment section. I didn't write it. I said it instead on I'm a little upset. No one's ever commenting. Look at George's big guns. It's always look at Jade's big gun I'm sick of this Jade. I'm like he gave me a compliment then he gave me a backhanded compliment. That's not right Let me live. What a time to be alive. Yeah, I know. All right, Caleb save us from ourselves. He's in Knoxville, what's going on man? Hey guys, it's great to speak with you guys. Absolutely, what's your question today?

Yeah, I was calling to see if me and my wife should pause our tithe giving fund to pay down debt a little sooner. We currently give about 10% of our income. We save it and give it where needed, whether it's our local church or to missionaries overseas. But we were just trying to see if we'd probably save maybe 600 extra dollars a month if I were to either cut it in half or not give at all. Well, you mentioned the word tithe. Makes me assume that you are a believer

and this is a part of your spiritual belief, right? Yes, yeah. My dad instilled that into me for a long time. So I've been giving 10% for a long time. Yeah. And on paper, you're like, what am I, I could save this much and get out of that faster. Like they would want that, right?

Here's how I look at it. Jade may have a different take. It's kind of like saying, hey, should I stop showering and brushing my teeth to save 45 minutes every morning? We'd all be like, no, don't do that. This is a part of your values, your routine, something that makes you who you are. And that's why I would say, don't do that. This is a part of your values, your routine, something that makes you who you are. And that's why I would say, don't pause this.

And you're talking to the math nerd who's like, well, no, on paper, it's amazing. And so I'm okay with it slowing down your debt progress because I don't see it as the make or break of you guys getting out of debt. I see it as a core tenant of your financial values being lived out. Yeah. Okay.

Let me tell you, I think it bothers you. Otherwise you wouldn't have called in. And that's not me. That's just me thinking, if you didn't think there was a yin and a yang to this, you probably would have just done it and not thought anything about it. But because it is morals and values based,

the fact that you called us lets me know that something for you is not quite sitting 100. So that's why I might pull back and go, if this is, for me, if it's a values thing or a morals thing, if I'm not feeling 100, I can't do it, cause it's that nagging thing that's like, ugh.

Yeah, and that makes a lot of sense. And that's, you know, I appreciate that advice. And you know, like I said, we've been giving for a long time and I don't think it'll make it break us giving out a debt. But I was like, man, I could probably put six, 700 more. Here's what I would do, Caleb. And this is what I've done. I go, okay, how do I now create $700 of margin

without losing that? That's a good thought, George. Do I need to work more? Can we cut other expenses? And that encouraged me to get creative without losing my values. And so I don't want you to gain progress, but lose peace. It's not worth the trade off.

And I'll tell you one more. I'll tell you one more, Caleb, and this is not like any shame or guilt because you can walk around and do whatever you want from this. And God is not gonna, he's always gonna love you exactly like he does today. So there's that. But I can tell you when Sam and I were paying off debt, you're right, there is that temptation to be like, ah, you know, but actually Sam and I leaned into that and we started giving more. And let me

tell you, that for us was the pop off in a lot of ways. And it's not to say you give and God gives back money to you. I'm not saying that, but I am saying there is a principle of when you have your hands open, things go out, but a lot of things come in. And it just is something about the posture of your heart that God does honor in more ways than one and in many ways other than just money. So I think you know what to do here. Beautifully said. Thank you for the call, Caleb. And it's a good reminder that tithing is not a baby step. If that's a belief you have as a believer, it's something you do throughout all the baby steps. And remember, you can always give more once you're out of debt. From the Ramsey Network, this is the Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do

work that they love, and create amazing relationships. I'm George Campbell, joined by Jade Warshaw this hour. The number to call is 888-825-5225. Carly's going to kick us off in San Francisco. What's going on, Carly? Welcome to The Ramsey Show. Thank you. How can we help?

My question is, I don't know if I should sign a prenup before getting married. What's going on, Carly? Welcome to the Ramsey Show. Thank you. How can we help? My question is, I don't know if I should sign a prenup before getting married in two weeks. Whoa. That's a tight timeline. What's causing the dilemma now? So there isn't really a major dilemma. I always agreed from the beginning that that's fine.

And I'm not trying to take anything, you know, if it was already his, if something were to happen, I don't plan on leaving him or anything like that. But when I hadn't told anyone, and I kind of mentioned it to my mom, my mom and she brought up some concerns and I just want to make sure that I'm not being naive, like in certain aspects, I am pregnant. And so, okay, I just want to, what's the, what's the wealth difference? How much does, what's his net worth versus your net worth? So my net worth is like not much at all. And he has like over a million or so, maybe a little more. And how old is he and how old are you?

He's 42 and I'm 37. And was this money he earned himself or is this from like family and he's getting it as a trust fund? He earned it himself. OK. And how long have you guys been having this discussion about this prenup? We've known I've known about it since we've been together. And like I said, I never really had any concern

because I really respect him and respect that. So I'm not I'm not concerned. I just want to know, like, say we were married for like 20 years and God forbid, like something were to happen and we did end up like breaking up. Would I have anything from what we built together or does the prenup sort of- Yeah, I mean, the law protects you when you get married for, you know, an equitable distribution of assets. So there's not going gonna be a world where he just gets to keep $3 million and you get zero. Depending on what that prenup says there is.

But if you have the prenup where it says, hey, my million is mine, anything we build together is ours, but I have the million that you're not gonna touch if anything were to go down. But it sounds like he's not asking for this. Yeah, I don't, I- Has he ever brought this up? The prenup? Yeah, I don't, I- Has he ever brought this up? The pre-note?

Yeah. Well, yeah, we have a lawyer and it's gonna be done. And- Oh. Yeah, this is his idea. This is his idea, right? And you're worried about signing it? I'm not worried.

I just wanna make sure what I'm signing isn't going to be- How did he explain why he wants to do this? Is this a- I'm not worried, I just wanna make sure what I'm signing isn't going to be. How did he explain why he wants to do this? Is this a- He explained it. He said that it was basically because he worked really hard to get to where he is and he doesn't want,

I'm sure he's seen, like he's never been married before, I've never been married before. He's seen kind of what can happen sometimes and he wants to protect himself and I completely respect that to be to be honest. But you have you're carrying his baby right now? Yeah, okay.

I'm gonna be real with you and I don't want to blow up what's what's getting ready to go down. But I don't think a million dollar net worth because I'm guessing a partial portion of this is his home. Is that correct? Aside from the home, actually. Okay, so it's just a million dollars, kind of like cash in different assets. It's not his home.

Okay, I'll tell you, and George will be probably a little bit more impartial than I am. I don't love prenups to begin with. I know there's a place for them. And I think that, my opinion is they're more reserved for more extreme situations. This doesn't-

Like multi-millions, family business, blended families. This doesn't feel for Jade like an extreme enough wealth situation because it's not that big. I'm saying this lightly. We teach all the time on here Carly that you can be a millionaire. So it's not like, and you can have 1.1 million

and people calling all the time with two point, cause they just work the baby steps, right? So there's a part of this that it's a very big deal. And then there's a part of this that when you look at it in the grand scheme of things, it's like, okay, yeah you made a million bucks. So I don't think if you said like, we had a caller earlier that had 12 million when I was on with Rachel and we said, yeah, yeah, probably a prenup is a good idea. And even with that, there was still a work in of how

does the other spouse get involved in this as they're married longer and longer in your case. And in the case with your fiance, I would be like, hey, I don't, I don't feel great about this. I don't feel like this is enough that we need to create this separation going forward. That's just me and George, what do you think? Well, it sounds like this is a ultimatum on his part. If you said, hey, I'm not signing it, what would happen? Right.

Yeah, I'm kind of- I mean, you're carrying his baby now. The wedding's happening in two weeks. What happens if you just refuse to sign it and say, I'm not comfortable with this? Yeah, I definitely think that it wouldn't go so well. And I would feel honestly weird doing that because the whole time I've sort of been okay with it

because I just kind of trust the whole situation. But then when some questions came to me, like I started to think about it a little bit thinking like, oh, okay, well, I don't know what's going to happen. What if I were to, you know, carry our baby and like, and take care, like I take care of everything and then I would be just out of it with nothing. And you know, I don't know, I just didn't want to be, cause I've been naive before. And I don't want to be, cause I've been naive before. Is this both your first marriage?

Yes. Who, who, I want to know this, who brought up marriage the first time? Who, who started talking about that for you? Okay. Um, okay. Cause I was about to give you a leg to stand on, because my thing is like you proposed to me. Like you said you want to marry me. You said, will you marry me? And I said, yes.

So that means you want to marry me. Like, that's part of part. That's part of where I stand on this is like you either want to get involved on this or you don't. Or maybe you feel like you need more time for a million bucks. I'm saying maybe you needed more time to see if I'm the one. Don't let this baby rush us into doing something that maybe we're not ready to do. That might be where where my brain is on this. Are you anywhere near that thinking or am I way off? I think I'm I'm not there because I mean partially

because obviously we are getting married and stuff and but I think I'm not there because, I mean partially because obviously we are getting married and stuff and, but I think that I definitely wanted this maybe more than he did maybe. Not that he didn't want to marry me. I get it Carly, but remember this. Carly, I want you to remember this. If you don't take anything away from this call, I want you to remember this. And I'm really happy. Carly, I want you to remember this. If you don't take anything away from this call, I want you to remember this one thing. You are not married until you're married. And just because you're planning to be married does not mean you have to be married on the

timeframe that you're saying you want to be married. Nothing has happened yet. Nothing is done. And if you feel that you should listen to that because you should feel like the person that you're marrying wants to marry you exactly the same amount, if not more. You should feel that, that it is so equal and so balanced and we're in this. It should not feel like, well, maybe I pushed him or maybe I'm a little bit more gung ho. You shouldn't feel that.

And in two weeks, let me tell you something. You have all the power in the world. You get to say, we're not ready. And you want to know all the people that have Invitations they'll go great. I have my weekend back They'll go great. This is great I I can just take back the gift I got or whatever you give them back the Venmo's or give them back the cash apps They sent this is not done yet, and I just sense that you guys are not

We need commitment over contingency here and right now there's legal protection as a foundation instead of trust. And so I'm not saying he's a bad guy, but I think we need further discussions before you just sign away on this. Ethan is in Indianapolis up next. Ethan, welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hey, thank you for having me.

Absolutely. What's your question today? So my wife and I got married last month. We've been married a little over a month. We got married April 5th. And we're trying to use the baby step, seven step baby step plan and, uh, use the snowball effect and get rid of our debt much as we can. Um, cause, uh, I don't want to be a slave to the lender.

So I, I am a preacher and, um, I evangelize preacher different places on the weekends. Um, uh, I'm currently working, but I do preach out on the weekend. She is in school and, uh, trying to and trying to finish her, um, her license and as a dental assistant. And um, I just, I want to know kind of like when I end up going full time preaching, doing what I'm doing, um, we don't make a lot of money so what are ways I can decide getting out of debt things I can do to not have the stress of making sure that our livelihood is taken care of. I kind of worry sometimes that I'm not going to be

able to make ends meet especially with the the way the world is right now. So, uh, didn't know what you guys thought. Do you have like, um, when you say being a preacher, do you have kind of a thought in your mind of what that looks like? Is this I'm going to start, I'm going to plant a church and I'm going to pastor this church and I'm going to grow it and pretty, you know, and that's the vibe or is that I want to be a guest pastor and I go and speak at a bunch of other churches and that's kind of what I do. So basically what happens is, is, you know, pastors will call me and have me come preach at their churches or come speak at events or whatever. And, you know, most of them, not all of them depends on the size of the church or what the situation is. I don't do it for the money. I do it because, you know, God's called me to do it. And that's, and that's the thing though. It's kind of

like you're just stepping out on faith because, you know, not every church is able to pay you. Not every church is able to pay you what the previous church did or what the next church is. So there's two sides to that coin. I mean, I'm just going to use your sentiments back at you. There's the one side of you that you said, hey, I'm not doing this for money. And I believe that if, you know, if I'm doing this, then clearly there's part of you that thinks if I'm not, if I'm not doing it for money, then if I'm doing it, then God's gonna just take care of me and I'll be okay. But then here you are calling the show and you're worried about the financial side.

So that's the juxtaposition I feel. Right, it was different than when I was by myself, but now that I have a wife and have people to take care of, now that thought kind of weighs a little bit more heavy on me. Yeah, and I think there's a reason for that because you are called to take care of your family financially I mean everybody if you create family gotta take care of them financially So there's part of this where I go is there a way to do both? Can you can you have a segment of your time that's cut out to preach and there's a segment of your time? That's cut out to work, which is really what a lot of us do, right?

Bivocational is happening all over the country. And eventually you might get a great gig as a associate pastor or lead pastor one day, but there's a stair step to it just like anything else if you were starting a business or getting started in a company in an entry level position. So I would aim for more stability. I wouldn't be doing these volunteer gigs all over the country for fun right now when you

need to feed your family. Right. So right now I deliver, I would say I'm a truck driver, but I really I do a lot of other stuff too. So I do propane. So I make about 85,000 a year. Okay. Um, when she finishes, yeah. So when she finishes, um, her schooling, she'll be making about, about 40, 41, uh, thousand. And my thought process was before, you know, I called is that maybe I could get into, you know, getting a FHA loan and maybe buying a duplex and maybe investing.

Hold on, hold on. When did God call you to be a real estate mogul? I thought we were doing preaching here. Yeah, yeah. I thought it wasn't about the money. Now we're getting into rental income schemes. You got to choose a side, Ethan, because no one is faulting you for saying you have to make an income. That is 100% part of the adult experience. So you've got to decide, this is a personal discovery that you have to decide, is the thing that I preach and the money doesn't matter because somehow it gets taken care of? Or is the thing, do I believe that I'm responsible for making a living here? And preaching can be part of that. Or is the thing, do I believe that I'm responsible for making a living here? And preaching can be part of that.

So you're kind of, you're kind of going like this on what it is that's the problem. But here's the problem. You can't go, go then and say, well, debt is the solution. I preach and I don't have to get paid for that because money doesn't matter. But debt can be my solution. That doesn't feel right either. Right. So I think, you know what I mean? matter, but debt can be my solution, that doesn't feel right either. Right.

So I think, you know what I mean? I it's okay for you to do some other things that earn a living and do the preaching too. It's also okay to say, I can't do this for free. Yeah. Right. And so I think we keep pursuing this. If it is your true calling and you want to be a full-time pastor one day, then we can make strides to get there. Do you have any education in this space that would allow you to apply for a job at a church? No, not at the moment. I've been doing this since I was about 18 years old. I'm

27. I'll be 27 next month. And I've been doing this on the weekends since I was about 17, 18 years old. I'm saying to pursue this as a, let's call it a career. Would you need to go to seminary in order to do that? Probably, yeah. So that might be something in the future. As you work full time, you pursue seminary on the side. And you might get more gigs because now you have that qualification.

Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. So I wouldn't be fearful. I mean, we got a lot of pastors. You throw a rock and you're going to hit a church here in Franklin, Tennessee, and pastors can make plenty of money. They can make enough to support their family. Now, are they going to be living a very luxurious lifestyle? Very few of them, but it's not to

say that you can't make enough money. You might not make $85,000, but you can make plenty of money enough to cover your family and build wealth. And so, I don't want that to hinder you of just making it all about, I need to make this much. But I also don't want that to hinder you of just making it all about, I need to make this much. But I also don't want you to say, well, I just got to do it for free as a ministry for the rest of my life. Yeah, it's because like, I have people that I know that do that and they are full time, that's all they do.

And they struggle to like, you know, they're three months behind, you know, their mortgages. And then they get what happens, they get burnt out and they leave ministry altogether. Yeah. I've had multiple people, I've seen that in my own life. Pastors that I grew up with are now doing totally different careers because they got burnt out on the ministry life. It's really difficult and you've got to have a great financial foundation. How much debt do you guys have left? Um, I think we did the math the other night. I think it's around $22,000. I'm hoping to get it knocked out this year.

Yeah, I mean you make an 85 with $22,000. You can knock it out before she's done with her dental program, right? Right, yeah. What's your housing situation? Do you own? I do not own. I'm renting at the moment, but it kind of got a good deal on it. You gotta kind of bust me because my grandmother passed away at the end of 22 and my grandfather, my great grandmother passed away and my grandfather bought the house and didn't want it to go to just anybody. So, uh, he asked me if I would stay here and live here and take care of things. And, uh, the rent's like 500 bucks.

That's not bad at all. So you'll be there for a while. And then what happens eventually? Does it go to you? Uh, it goes to my mother. Okay. So at some point you're probably going to want to move out and, you know, start that journey for yourself so you can take advantage of the beauty of real estate for yourself.

So don't get locked into that simply because it's low rent because where true wealth building begins is at home ownership. So for you, you want that you want to be thinking towards that. Just make sure that when you do, you're considering the fact that your wife's gonna be making 41,000, and if you're doing this ministry thing, you might not be earning much to begin with. So don't take out a mortgage

based on what you both are earning now. Think about the future when you do that. And keep those expenses low for the foreseeable future. Keep living on less than you make, and you'll be able to pursue this calling. Buying or selling your home is a big deal. And there's a lot of headlines out there. There's confusing data. It's tough to know what's actually going on in the housing market.

So we're here to make the latest trends easy to understand. Median home prices. That's the middle went up slightly last month to about $430,000. There's more homes on the market, so there's more supply, and it's nearly the highest since 2019. But in many areas, there's still not enough to meet buyer demand. In some areas, demand is slower. And the average 15-year fixed rate rose to 5.9% last month, so it's still under 6.

So if you're financially ready, a small rate increase shouldn't hold you back from buying a home you love, it's not a make or break. So if you wanna learn more about the housing market trends, you want some free tools to help you buy or sell with confidence, go to ramsysolutions.com slash market or click the link in the show notes if you're listening on podcast or watching on YouTube.

Kayla is up next in Washington, DC. Kayla, how can we help today? Hi, so my father recently passed away and now I am left to kind of manage his estate and his affairs. And I'm just kind of wondering what the best way to do that would be. Oh my goodness, I'm so sorry.

How recently was this? Sorry, it was kind of like mid April. Oh my goodness, I'm so sorry. How recently was this? Sorry. It was kind of like mid April. This is very recent. How are you doing? Yeah, I'm sorry. It's hard, but I'm getting through it and just kind of taking it day by day.

How old are you? I'm 23. Do you have other family? No, I don't. It's just me, I'm an only child. I'm so sorry, that's so tough. Okay, so- And you're an executor of the estate?

Correct. So sometime last year, my dad had put a living trust and a will together. So I am the sole executor. I am the sole trustee. Everything is mine. Everything goes to me. Okay. And what's the size of this estate?

It's half an acre. So the estate is in a trust. It's a half acre. It's got two houses on it and both vehicles that my father owned are also in that trust. Okay and what's it all worth? I believe it's around 150k. Okay and how do you feel about that? Does that strike you as something that you want to keep managing or does that strike you as something that you, and I'm asking you this very early by the way, these are things for you to think about on down the line for the

next year, not for you to think about and do in two weeks. Think about is this something I want to continue to manage this property and these houses who do they have renters in them? No, no, no, no. My dad lived in it. He claimed it as a home stay on his taxes. So basically from my understanding, as I have until January to decide what I wanna do, if I continue, even if I've been a solid

or if I'm gonna live in it. Right. Were there any wishes in the will that you need to execute on or what's the next step based on everything in the trust in the will that you need to execute on or what's the next step based on everything in the trust in the will? The next step in the will is just collecting everything. So in addition to the houses and the land and the vehicles that my dad had, our conversations

were very few and far between when it came to talking about, um, hit, you know, the assets that he has, this is a very sudden passing. Um, but he did make me aware that he has a $500,000 life insurance policy with his previous employer. Um, and since I have the will and, um, I do have his death certificates now or they have them, but they're being mailed to me, so I'll get them probably next week. Um, I can go and collect those benefits. He also has another one with a certain bank. It's in the amount of $3,000.

Okay. So what's your financial situation aside from this? It's not terrible. I do have a little bit of debt. I have about, I'm going to go on like the more generous side. I'm going to say I have about $6,000 in debt. I do plan whenever I get that money to pay that off immediately. Um, it's credit card debt. Um, and then the rest,

I wanted to put it into a high yield savings and then maybe invest a portion of it because I know 500 K isn't a lot really, especially for someone so young, but I want to really make it last me as much as I can. And I'm wondering what's the smartest way to have that money work for me, because I still plan to maintain a day job and whatnot, I don't want to live on this.

Of course, that's smart. What are you making right now? Right now I am making 2,800 a month, more or less. Okay, what job are you doing? Right now I'm working in a hospital in the operating room. I'm a cell processing technician. Okay, cool. Yeah, go ahead, George. There's a few kind of tactical next steps, of course.

You got the death certificates on the way. Make sure you're reading the trusts and the will carefully. And then have you created kind of an inventory of all the assets in the trust? Bank accounts, real estate, the vehicles, personal property? Yes, all of that is outlined in the trust. So I have, I know what's in it.

Some of it is also outlined in the will. The trust only has from what I read in the trust, it only has the land. Just the vehicles. Uh huh. Okay. has the land, the houses and the cars. Just the vehicles, uh-huh. Okay. Yeah, and then the will has everything else. My dad did have quite a bit of debt. Because the estate will have to pay those. Okay, I was not aware of that.

Yeah, so whatever's there, whatever he owes, his assets will be used to pay off all of his debts. And then whatever's left would then go to you. So is it like, like bank account, like credit card debt? So let's say there's a mortgage on any of these properties. Oh, no, no, he owns everything. There's the only debt that I know for sure I have to pay back would be the title loan that he took out on one of the vehicles. I plan to pay that one off, but the rest of his debt is just credit card debt.

Okay, you'll wish. You can send the death certificate to the credit card company and they'll likely just wipe that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I already know. You have a good handle on this. Yeah. And if you want to help with this,

I would assemble a team of pros around you. You're saying this is not a lot of money, but this is more money than you've seen in your life and half a million dollars is quite the sum, especially that life insurance payout. So I would assemble a team, including a CPA, so a really good tax pro. You can find one of those at ramsysolutions.com,

click on trusted experts. And you might wanna work with an estate attorney. Did your father know one, or was there one that built the trust that can help you with all of this? Yes, an attorney did prepare all of my dad's documents. The trust and the will is prepared by the same attorney. I did call them the day after I had found out that my dad had passed away. They

were very unhelpful and they left me with a lot more questions than I had answers to. And I've been trying to kind of Google everything and research everything, but I also know about this show and I figure, hey, you know, if I can get on and maybe ask and get some guidance, it'd be really great because I'm lost, I'm 23, I just lost my battle out of the blue. Oh, absolutely. You don't need, the good news is none of this is on fire. Nothing needs to happen today.

And so just take it one day at a time and just do the next right thing. The next thing on to-do list, what do I need to do this week, next month, within the year? And that'll help you just break this all down because there's so many moving parts to this. Are you working with any financial advisors right now?

I did speak to one through one of my friend's dad. He let me speak to his. He kind of told me, I kind of went through like what my dad had. I brought him all the paperwork and he looked through it and he said, well, this is what we want to do. And he basically confirmed that I was kind of on the right track with what I wanted to do. Like when I get that money, pay off all my debt, take care of whatever debt that needed

to be paid on my dad's behalf, take care of that and the rest of it, invest some of it, keep three months worth of living expenses in a savings account and then the rest into a different like high yield savings account. So he was like, yeah, you're kind of on the right track, but I didn't have a lot of time with him. I might change a little of that. Here's my thing. I do think you need to invest a chunk of this.

I would not keep a giant portion in a high yield savings account only because it just will dwindle. You'll go to the Caribbean and you'll go buy a new dress and you'll see a vehicle that you like suddenly. So that scares me a little. What I would be thinking of, you're 23.

I don't know what your living situation is, but I might think about looking for something modest that I can buy outright. That's maybe half of this money so that you have it in a forced savings account, which is what a home is and you're not paying a payment knowing that you can pay the taxes and insurance on it easily. I might look at something like that as opposed, and then invest the rest as opposed to just this giant lump sum sitting there tempting me. Our scripture of the day, Habakkuk 3.19. The sovereign Lord is my strength.

He makes me as sure-footed as a deer, able to tread upon the heights. Tina Fey said confidence is 10% hard work and 90% delusion. There we go, spoken like a true comedian. I like that. Dustin is up next in Sacramento. What's going on, Dustin? Yes, sir. How we doing?

Good. How are you? I just had a car. Not bad. I didn't think I was gonna make it through. I'm very surprised but it's pretty awesome. Yeah, we're glad you made it. Here we are. Alright, so my wife and I, we have a question about these two car payments we have every month. One is a Tesla, one's a truck. We owe 55,000 on the Tesla, 55,000 on the truck. The truck payment is 800. The Tesla payment is 1,600. Ooh!

Oh, gosh! How was that possible? I don't know. We bought it when the value of the car was high and the interest rates were low. My guess is you're underwater by like $30,000 on this Tesla. Oh, my word.

Yeah. And I say that as a Tesla driver, so oh my goodness. Yeah. Okay, what are these cars currently worth? Have you looked into that? The Tesla I could get at high, I could get like $27,000. I got a dealer who would get me for it Oh my god, private party value because dealers are gonna take you to the cleaners with their

Markup scene mark down. Oh, I'm seeing him for sale between like 30 and 35 thousand. Okay model that I have Let's have some hope here and say 35 and you owe 55. What about the truck? Truck is fairly new, 2023, and it is worth like private value, probably 42, 45. Okay, so that's a little better. Okay, so let's say you're underwater by 30 grand minimum. Wow. What do you guys make? Together we make anywhere from like 40 to 45,000 a month.

Amazing. Okay, okay, thank God. If you had said a year, I was about to come through the microphone into your phone and get you. Like to be honest, we just have a lot of expenses every month and we're finding that we're just kind of got out of control here.

We had three credit cards, we were in debt, we paid the two off, we have one more left for about 19,000. Our kids go to private school school three kids in private school Christian private school. Is that a tuition that you pay or is there debt around it? Every month there's a debt. We try to at least say oh get enough saved up to put pay off one Keep that like monthly Okay, monthly debt a little bit lower. We have a second mortgage on a house that we don't even own anymore that we've sold that we're still paying on.

How much is that? A month it is $1,800. What's the whole amount? Yeah, yeah. Well, the whole amount is $56,000. Okay. I'm sorry, $156,000. $156,000. 56,000. Okay. I'm sorry, 100, I'm sorry, 156,000.

Oh my goodness. 156,000, okay. So there's the two, the two cards we talked about, 19,000 in credit cards, 156,000 in a second mortgage on a house that you don't even have anymore. What's your current mortgage? Just curious. 8,000.

No, what's the full amount? Oh, 800,000. Okay, so I wanna call out what I'm hearing, which is really common, Jeff, that,000. Okay, so I want to call out what I'm hearing, which is really common, Jeff, that I'm sorry, Dustin, I'm looking at the wrong screen. I'm sorry, I don't have my glasses on. The thing I want to call out that I'm hearing is you're very concerned with the month to month payment.

And I think that when you are doing very well, like you are, it's very easy to go. It's very easy to go, I can afford the payment. I make 45,000 bucks a month. I can afford the payment. I can afford the payment. And you're never looking at the big picture amount. And therefore, yeah, it does start to accumulate really quickly. So you've kind of got to turn your whole thinking around and go, what the heck does the thing

cost? How much is it? Is it 55,000? And I think when you start looking at it like that, even with this great income that you have, it'll cause you to make different decisions. Yeah. So how are you guys gonna get out of debt

if you're continually going into it at this point? Amen. I mean, do we need to pull the kids out of private school? That's kind of what I'm here for. I mean, I can't make that decision for you. It's a very personal decision and I step on a lot of toes. But the simple truth is at this state of your personal finances, we can't afford private school. And that is a ridiculous thing to say, talking to a guy who makes $500,000 a year. Yeah.

How much is the private school? What's the total amount? About, I think it's 3,000 a month. So you're paying 6,000 a month on private school? No, for everyone. 3K total. And you guys can't come up with 3K a month making 45,000 a month.

I think... I'm confused why you're going into debt for that. I don't think the private school is the problem. I mean, if I, if I have all the things I'm seeing, I feel like that would not. It's not gonna fix anything. I just think there needs to be a level of we're done with this and I'm not,

I can tell you're exhausted. I just don't know your level of intensity you're ready to take on and your wife. Do you guys have anything in savings we're ready to do it I Think but most of our savings we've been saving has just been going towards Tackling the tackle in the death and that's erasing them. That's great I mean, how much do you have in savings and how much have you paid off using it so far? We paid off one credit card 12,000 another one another one was 15 how much savings you have left

I think we're we have like four grand in savings going towards the The next debt that were okay. Here's here's one way to get out of these cars It would be to basically pause your debt snowball for a month or two and stack up 30, 40 grand in cash to get out from these underwater cars, to sell them and buy some beater cars in the meantime. You know, that's what we were thinking. I was driving around with this Tesla,

seeing what I can get for it. How would you, so you're saying, save? Well, you need the amount you're underwater on, you need the difference in order to clear the title in order to sell it. So that's what I'm saying. If you're underwater by 30 grand, stack up 30 grand really fast

so you can clear the title when you sell it. We're still, listen, you're gonna pay off your debt, but we're still not focused on the main problem. You make $45,000 a month, and we're talking about 3,000 for school, 2,400 on cars, that's 5,000. And now your mortgage is reasonable, it's 800,000, that's reasonable for what you earn,

so that's not killing you. The second mortgage is not killing you. It's your budget, dude. Like you guys are, you guys are just spending, I guarantee. No one is thinking on how much. Your wife says, I wanna get this bag. She buys the bag. You think, hey, let's redo the carpets.

We redo the carpets. I just feel like on a month to month, you guys are just going bananas because truly George, the things that he's saying, that's not busted. It still isn't out up to more than 20K. That's half. That's what I'm saying, not even close.

Where's the rest going? Yeah. So we do, so we're followers of Christ, we're Christians, and we do believe in tithing. We put aside 20% of our budget goes towards tithing and giving. Okay how much are you investing?

We haven't invested in just then we have we have three rentals. Okay. One that we make a little bit of money on but the the other two we just kind of make what the mortgage is on them. Okay. We're renting them to our friends and. It sounds like they're getting a deal and you're getting screwed.

The monies in these rentals, I think that if you really wanted to go through this fast, you could probably look at those and sell them and take some of the money and pay off this debt, take all of the money and pay off this debt and simplify your life. But I'm just not convinced that the behavior, because talking to you on this call, for me, I'm looking at this and going $45,000 is a lot of money

a month or $45,000 a month is a lot of money. Where is it? And you're having a hard time looking for it, which lets me know this is out of control. Like this has gone off completely off the rails. You need it every dollar budget. I want you to pony up the cash to go online and get it. Every dollar, you need to do that tonight with your wife.

You guys are gonna be astounded at what you're spending money on. Pull up your bank statements to see and use that to fill in your every dollar budget for the month of May. And if it's not food, utility, shelter, transportation, insurance or minimum debt payments, it goes away. Which means no more eating out, no more streaming, we're about to be living like we're poor

because we are poor while making half a million dollars. It's as insane as it sounds. We're rooting for you, Dustin. It's gonna be a journey, but you'll clean it up fast if you do this stuff.