The Ramsey Show - App - Take Care of Your Four Walls Before Addressing Your Debt (Hour 1)

Episode Date: December 5, 2019

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Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Dollar Car Rental Studios, it's the Dave Ramsey Show, where debt is dumb, cash is king, and the paid-off home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host. You jump in, we'll talk about your life, your money. It's a free call at 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225. Merry Christmas, America. Michael is with us in California. Hey, Michael, welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show.

Hey, how you doing? Better than I deserve. What's up? Hello? Think than I deserve. What's up? Hello? I think we lost him. All right. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Lisa is with us in Colorado. Hi, Lisa.

How are you? Hi. As good as I can be. Good. How can I help? I'm calling because I took out a loan against my 401k, and I just lost my job, and I'm pondering whether I should pay off the loan or take a hit with the penalty and the tax. Do you have the money to pay off the loan?

No. I do not have enough cash to pay off the loan. How would you pay it off? I could use some cash, and I could take out an advance on the line of credit I have. Okay. All right. I probably would do that because if you don't pay it off within 60 days, it's considered an early withdrawal, as you said, and you'll be charged 10% penalty plus your tax rate. So if you're in a 25% tax bracket, that would be 25 plus 10, 35%. And that's a pretty heavy interest rate. Yes.

It is. That's why we tell people not to borrow on their 401K loans or on their 401Ks ever because they find themselves in a situation like you are in. Are you married? No, I'm single. Have you landed a new job? No, I have not. I just lost my job a few weeks ago.

Okay, cool. What were you doing? I'm an accountant. Okay. And having trouble landing an accounting position? What part of Colorado are you in? I'm in Denver, and I don't think it'll be difficult to land a job. I'm just relocating to Florida to be closer to family.

Oh, okay. So I'm just kind of waiting for a good transition period with my son and his school, and then I'll move out to Florida. Okay, which would be like now when he gets out for christmas right right okay because i don't know how are you living so i mean you don't it doesn't sound like you have any money how are you living um well colorado has pretty good unemployment and i do have savings. I do have about $7,000 in savings, and I have my emergency fund, my $1,000. I'm kind of bridging my household budget with my savings and the unemployment,

and I have a renter who rents my basement. So I've been able to not dig in any more debt. I'm wondering if there's some people though you couldn't get some contract worth work here at the end of the year right there in denver until you get ready to leave i bet you could probably find a couple weeks worth of work people doing wrap-up stuff on your end books yeah i think that's what my thing was going to be to try to find some temporary work until you know while the season's here people are taking vacations yeah how much is your 401k loan to do that it's a it's only nine thousand dollars okay i would not pay it i would not pay it off i don't want to pay yeah i would not pay

it off today i want you to get moved and get reemployed because seven thousand dollars that you have in cash is very precious right now. We need to protect that money. Yeah. And that's why I was concerned. I'm like, should I keep the cash or should I pay off the loan, which would be the best option to do? Well, I do want the loan paid off, but I would not use any cash to pay it off. You know, I tell you, if you want to hit that line of credit and pay it off with that line of credit right now and just move it to that,

at least that will keep you from getting hit no matter what and because i don't want you to get up to the end of the 60 days and and not have this done so let's go ahead and get that done with the line of credit 100 don't use any of your cash yeah okay and then and then then you when you get moved if you've got any cash start your snowball, which would entail paying down the line of credit, of course. So we're going to turn around and use the cash, but only after the crisis is behind us. And you're square in the middle of a crisis. You've got very little money, and you're making a move from Denver to Florida. And you're going to wait 30 days or so to do that.

So, you know, you've got to get with this because you've got to get that other job. I think I'd make a trip or two to florida and start looking for a job i don't think i'm gonna wait till i get there to look uh because i'd love for you to start work like the second week of january in florida and your son start his new school um yeah let's get let's get really assertive and proactive on this whole situation. All right, let's go back to Michael and see if we can get him to work this time or get his phone to work anyway. Michael, how can I help? Hey, Dave, how's it going? Better than I deserve.

What's up? Yeah, so me and my wife, we're in a bind. We just recently moved back from Texas to California to move in with our in-laws. We are $87,000 in debt. Most of that is in collections and have been accumulated over the last three years. I'm trying to decide, should I go back to work? My wife is currently working. We have three kids with a newborn at the home that I'm taking care of full time.

I had a medical condition, and, you know, I had to stop working at the tail end of last year. And it's been kind of tight for the last year, and we're trying to just figure out, you know, should I go back to work or start my online business, which I spent the last year learning about online business, something that I didn't know anything about previously. You've been learning about it for a year and have made no money with it? Well, I had a bunch of medical stuff in between that, so when I could, I would learn if that would make sense. Yeah. Well, no. I mean, I understand you've got a medical issue or four, but it doesn't take a year to learn how to do online and turn online into money.

It takes about a day. So, I mean, it's really not rocket science. So, you know, you've got to decide, you know, online is just another way of connecting to people and another way of uh you know turning some business model in a digital format into actual money monetizing it so it really it shouldn't take a year it shouldn't take a month so yeah here's the problem i don't know your medical situation i don't know what all you've been facing uh it's obviously been pretty overwhelming uh but what i am hearing loud and clear is that you guys need money and the only

way i know where the only thing in place i know money comes from is work and so i don't know what kind of work you do whether you do it from home whether you do the online i don't know what you do but yes you need to be generating an income yesterday. Somehow, some way. You have three little kids. You're living in your in-laws house. You're $87,000 in debt and it's all in default. Yes, you need income. Lots of it. As soon as you can create it. I don't know what you can do given your medical situation. You've got to decide that. But mathematically, yeah, income will solve a lot of your problems. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. How often can you get the best of both worlds? Not very often, right? Well, with the Rate Secured program at Churchill Mortgage, it's possible. You can secure a low rate now to nail down your budget, and if rates drop while you're shopping for a home, they'll give you the lower rate.

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Go to ChurchillMortgage.com or call 888-LOAN-200. That's ChurchillMortgage.com. This is a paid advertisement. NMLS ID 1591. or call 888-LOAN-200. That's churchillmortgage.com. This is a paid advertisement. NMLS ID 1591. NMLSconsumeraccess.org. Equal housing lender. 761 Old Hickory Boulevard, Brentwood, Tennessee 37027. Alicia is with us in Oregon.

Hi, Alicia. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Thank you, Dave. It's actually Elisha. Oh, I'm sorry, Elisha. I apologize. How can I help? No worries.

I had a question regarding home mortgages and escrow accounts. I've always had an escrow account with my mortgage, so my taxes and my homeowner's insurance is taken out automatically. My question was, would you recommend not having that and putting that money in my money market account throughout the year to build interest or to keep that escrow account? It mathematically doesn't matter because you're not going to make enough interest on it to screw with it. It's not enough money to worry about. But most mortgage companies on a traditional conforming first mortgage require

an escrow account. It's not an option of yours. If you are in a situation where you have it as an option, the upside is that you, of not having the escrow account is, as you said, you've got control of that money all year long, and you simply pay your own taxes, and you pay your own insurance when it's due, and you save the interest on that money throughout the year, and you pay the exact amount, and there shouldn't be any real errors. The upside of the escrow account is it is built in discipline so that you are setting aside a twelfth of each every month in your taxes and insurance portion of the escrow account, which is what the escrow account is for. And then they save up the money at no interest, and then they pay the bill. And so it's a built-in budgeting technique, and for most people, that's a good thing. The downside of the escrow account is you do lose the interest. Like I said, though, it's not enough to really worry about.

The other downside of the escrow account is probably 50% of them are inaccurate. And so they stay screwed up. There's a shortage because they didn't pay in enough or there's an overage. Now you've got too much money sitting in this stupid account that you don't need and and the people helping balance it on the other end are entry-level customer service people with a headset on in a cubicle farm and and you can't get intelligent life to get actually sixth grade math done to get the stupid thing to have the right amount taken out and so you, when I used to buy houses, and before I went broke and quit borrowing money and all that,

with mortgages, I swear to God, I spent half my time on the phone with these escrow people trying to get the thing straightened out. Yeah, that's kind of where I'm at right now. Yeah, it's constantly aggravating. But the problem is, at the end of the day, most places simply require it. Okay. And you don't have an option. I know that mine does, most places simply require it. Okay. And you don't have an option. I know that mine does not.

I asked them that. Okay, they don't. And they're screwing yours up all the time? Yeah, I just did a refinance, and they're screwing up from the new escrow company with the title company. Both of them made my tax payment this year in November, so they're both asking for extra money to cover the balance. So it's just, it's a mess. That's why I asked. And I know what my taxes are.

I know what my insurance is. And it's about a little over $4,000 a year. Yeah, I would probably, if you're disciplined and you're living on a budget and you're doing the other stuff we're talking about, because it will be accurate and you'll get rid of the hassle that you're dealing with of their incompetence, I would take it over. Okay. Since you have the option. But now, if you're not, you know, if you're still carrying credit cards around and, you

know, promising yourself you're disciplined but you're not, and you're conning yourself and you're rationalizing and you're going to end up not paying your taxes on time, well, then I wouldn't. I'd put up with their hassle because both of you are incompetent then. Okay, yeah. I'm on baby step. I just started baby step four. Okay, all right. So you've proven to yourself that you can live on a budget.

Uh-huh. Yeah. Okay, good. Then, yeah, I would take it back, and you handle it. Hey, thanks for the call. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Sue is with us in Colorado. Hi, Sue.

How are you? Hi, Dave. Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas to you. My question is about your opinion about taking Social Security at full retirement age versus waiting until 70 if you don't need the income and if you are in very good health and have a family history of living into the 90s. I didn't know if it was, most people obviously advise taking it, waiting until 70 if you don't

need the income because you'll get that larger amount. However, I didn't know if this fell into the same thing you talk about with taking lump sums for pensions. Like, would it be a good idea to go ahead and start taking the money at full retirement and investing it? That's what I would do because the amount that that will grow to and the amount of money that throws off will offset the difference. And you've got control of the money the whole time um now again there's different calculations depending on where you are in your social

security situation but um you know obviously you know you've got the ideal situation to not take it because you've got longevity in your family and you're in good health. The joke always is if you know when you're going to die, it will tell you when to take out Social Security, right? So, but, you know, I might even take it early, not because of longevity, but just because I want to get what little money I'm going to get back, considering all the money I've given those doobers, and get control of it and invest it. And then it's in my estate, because obviously when you die,

Social Security is not inheritable. But if you take it and it's in a bank account, well, that bank account is a part of your estate then. So I'm probably going to take it and invest it and not take it and spend it. And the investment returns should give you, in most calculations, in most situations, enough to offset what you would have gained were you to wait. In other words, your difference in a payment at 65 and a payment at 70, you take that five years of income, put it in an investment,

that investment would throw off enough to cover that difference in most of the calculations that I've done. So, hey, good question. Thank you for joining us. Raymond is next in Puerto Rico. Hi, Raymond. How are you? Hi, Raymond. Hi, Dave.

I'm so nervous. It's okay, brother. We've never lost a patient. What's up? Well, I just can't see a way through at all. No light in the tunnel, nothing at all. I owe almost like $100,000 in credit card debt. Wow.

What'd you buy? I opened my little, like, repair, cell phone repair shop here, but after the hurricane, I've used so much debt. Even to buy a home after my first mortgage, my first home was flooded with the hurricane, Maria. And I used a lot of credit cards for the down payment repairs on another house. That first home, I still haven't paid it off, and I owe that mortgage. I'm like 12 months behind. I just don't know what to do. I was considering bankruptcy, but I don't hear any of your videos or shows, you know, ever recommending bankruptcy, so I really need advice. So what are you doing for a living now?

Repairing cell phones in a small shop. Me and my wife, we work together six days a week, 40-plus hours. But what I earn here, I just can't pay my debt. What are you earning? What are you earning? Well, and before taxes. What's you earning? Well, before taxes. What's your cell phone business making before taxes? Before taxes and everything, like maybe between $45,000 and $50,000.

$1,000 a year. Yeah. And are you talking about before business expenses or before taxes? Before, yeah, before taxes. After I take out, like, most of the expenses of the cost of the merchandise and everything, that's what I have. And then from there, I have to pay, like, my rent and all my other expenses. Your rent on the business? Yeah, of the shop.

Okay. What did you do before this? I was a phone interpreter. And what kind of money did you make doing that? No, that was, like, $7.25 an hour. Okay. All right. I'll tell you what. I'm going to put you on hold.

I'm going to talk to you after this break and see if we can walk you through some of this. This is The Dave Ramsey Show. In a season of giving, what better gift can you give someone in the coming year than a new job? Business leaders, if you're looking to add to your team in 2020, get started now with LinkedIn Jobs. At Ramsey Solutions, we post on LinkedIn Jobs because we know the right person will have an impact on our company for years to come. And LinkedIn Jobs matches the right person with the right job. It's no wonder a hire is made every eight seconds on LinkedIn. and over 600 million members visit LinkedIn to make connections, learn and grow as professionals, and discover new job opportunities. So find the right person for your team and give the gift of a rewarding new career. Get started today and get $50 off your first job post.

Visit LinkedIn.com slash Ramsey. That's LinkedIn.com slash Ramsey. Terms and conditions apply. In the lobby of Ramsey Solutions on the debt-free stage, Jeff and Anna are with us. Merry Christmas, guys. Welcome to Nashville. Thank you so much. We're honored to be here. Well, we're glad to have you.

Where do you live? Lutes, Florida, just on the north side of Tampa. Oh, fun. Okay, cool. Well, good trip up to Nashville then. Yes. And all the way here to do a debt-free scream. Yes, sir. How much have you paid off? $88,478 up to Nashville then. Yes. And all the way here to do a debt-free scream. Yes, sir.

How much have you paid off? $88,478. Good for you. And how long did this take? 19 months. Cool. And your range of income during that time? $110,000 to $124,000.

Cool. And what do you guys do for a living? I'm a warranty manager for a new home builder. And I'm a payroll specialist for a PEO. Okay, cool. Very good. Good. What kind of debt was your $88,000? Pretty much a little bit of everything. Credit cards, my school loans, a HELOC, and a car and a truck. Oh, wow. So you're kind of normal? Yeah. How long y'all been married?

Oh, gosh. Two and a half years. Just a little over two years, yeah. Okay. So it sounds like you got married and combined some debts. Yep. And two normal people get married, and now we've got a normal couple. Yep. And a little bit of everything going on, normal debt, just red-blooded American, borrow on everything. Yes, yes. And we get married, and shortly after marriage, something happened.

What? Tell me the story here. 19 months ago, huh? It actually literally started the day of our wedding. Whoa. Yeah. I have pulmonary fibrosis and was diagnosed in 2007. And over the years, it progressed.

The day of the wedding, I love to dance, of course. At a wedding, that's what you do. Sure. And with all that dancing, I had a pretty long coughing attack. Yeah. And my heart was racing. So I knew something wasn't right. Oh, and that's when you discovered the diagnosis?

Actually, that's when I knew it would progress even more. Oh, I see. I had a follow-up appointment the following week and explained that to my respiratory technician, and she says, you need to be on oxygen. And so this pretty much changed our lives that very day and it was a new way of life so that came with medical worries that one day lung transplant will be the cure and that will happen when it will happen is what we have to look forward to yeah so fast forward we had our honeymoon on a cruise in September with the new way of life of medical equipment and all that,

but we had the best time ever. And so, of course, there was the wedding debt, the honeymoon debt, and then we heard the bad news a few weeks later that his uncle was ill. And the worry hit us real bad, and we had to fly to go visit family and basically say our goodbyes. It was Black Friday. We took a flight, put that on a credit card, to say our goodbyes. And on the road from Las Vegas to Arizona, where they live,

I said, honey, you know, we haven't talked finances. What if the medical hits soon? We have nothing. We have debt. We have the medical that's impending, which is going to be an expensive surgery. And what if something happens and I pass? We have nothing to clear up and let him be. What if something happens to him and I have all this?

What does that leave us? So with that, I was like, honey, I know Dave Ramsey from my previous church, and he teaches finances, and this is something that I want us to do. So we looked at your Black Friday deals. While we're driving along to Arizona. Yeah, we listened to your podcast, and he's like, I'm all for it. All right. And that's what set the pace.

We did FPU. We bought the kit that had everything with it, did FPU. And we went crazy because now FPU was being held at our church. Oh, wow. And we could take that online course but actually be with community as you promote. Yeah. And we did that and it was the best thing in our lives. And we went gazelle intense from there on.

Very cool. So the seriousness of your health and then your uncle, you know, facing the end of his life coming to, you know, the seriousness of all that kind of, it causes you to get things lined up. I mean, you can kind of diddy bop along, act like nothing's going on until something's going on. Exactly. You know, and a friend of mine, I was speaking at, passed away and I was speaking at his funeral with another friend of mine who's a pastor a while back, and the other friend said a funeral and a birth are both tuning forks. Yes. They will tune your life up.

You know, you're out of tune. It causes you to stop and go, eh, I think I probably better act right here. And, you know, you're facing, you know a diagnosis with a oxygen and a possible transplant and he's facing your uncle's facing uh the end of his life and yeah that's enough to get you it's a wake-up call yeah and uh so you don't talk somebody into it then do you no it actually flooded me back to now having all this financial debt but it flooded me back to when my father passed away now 30 years ago. Yeah. I was 18 and my father passed away.

He left nothing. Yeah. No will. There was nothing for my mom to raise, too. You know, daughter, she was all on her own. And I was like, I don't want that for us. Yeah. Yeah.

You know, I don't want to leave. You know. We need to get ready in so many different ways. Yeah. Yeah. And we all do. Yeah. We all do because we did detailed research

none of us get out alive hey go figure yep human race has a 100 mortality rate exactly oh wow so absolutely amazing absolutely amazing so you come home you get an fpu and 19 months later you've paid off 88 000 when people, how did you do that? When you're like in the financial peace class, they're going, you had all this other stuff going on, and yet you still did it. What is the answer of how do you do that? You can stay focused. To me, once you set your mind to it, don't deter from it. We followed the book.

We actually started before and then went to the church and joined in there after we'd already started. So we were a little bit ahead watching it online. And we just stayed focused. You have different people. Well, that might work for you, but it won't work for us. Well, if you stay focused, it can work for anybody. Yeah. You're a systems guy.

Once you adopt a system, you go, right? Yep. That's the way your brain works. Yeah. Once you flip the switch. Cool. That's good. So you tell them they need works. Yeah. Once you flip the switch. Cool. That's good. So you tell them they need to do, they need to sell stuff.

What did you do? Cash and Universal Index Life Policy. Got rid of a car. Two cars. Actually, three cars. We went really crazy on all the stuff that we did. We sold stuff. We looked at our budget.

We minimized everything that we could minimize to get out of debt as soon as we could. Our goal was two years, but to do it in 19 months, we were just thrilled. But, yeah, once we hit selling my truck, which was heartbreaking, selling that truck, we had paid that off. That was our second-to-last debt, and we used all that money, and I said, let's get rid of it. The last debt was the HELOC, and we paid a chunk of that HELOC, and we had like maybe two paychecks left, and then that finished everything, and we were were like this is awesome here we did it yeah so now you don't have any payments in your adult lives have either one of you been debt-free i have yeah okay way back how far back about 10 years ago okay you know i had gone through

the bankruptcy and all that stuff before myself and when you're starting over you tell yourself you're never getting back into that and i just kept focused on it and stayed out of it until you know i actually did buy a car but i'm the type of guy that well i don't like the payment so i got rid of the car okay so you know you pay for cash as you go and if you don't have it you don't do it yeah amen so this was easy for you because it's kind of already the way your brain worked yeah and you know my parents have been debt-free for probably 15 20 years okay so my dad was a finance guy and you know, my parents have been debt-free for probably 15, 20 years. Okay. So my dad was a finance guy, and, you know, I always paid attention to what he was doing. Very cool. Great job, guys.

Thank you. Great job. Very proud of you. Who were your biggest cheerleaders? Oh, we have a host of people. I mean, everybody from church. Jonathan, Marv, Ed, Mark and Dana Reese, our friends, our parents. Definitely our parents um it helps

to have people in your corner oh yeah even at work my co-workers um even my clients yeah all right let's get to this i don't want to run out of time they're yelling at me clock okay so here's the deal jeff and anna tampa florida 88 000 paid off in 19 months, making $110,000 to $124,000. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Three, two, one. We're debt-free! Yeah! I love it!

Congratulations, you guys. We got a copy of Chris Hogan's book for you, Everyday Millionaires. That's the next chapter in your story. Well done. We're proud of you. Awesome. Thanks for joining us, America. We're talking with Raymond, who we started talking to in another segment and stopped into the debt-free scream, and back to Raymond in Puerto Rico. He's got a cell phone repair shop in Puerto Rico and made $45,000 last year, last couple of years, and he has $100,000 in credit card debt,

and they're just struggling, having trouble making it. And that's about how far we got in the discussion. Does that sound right, what you told me so far, sir? Correct, correct, Dave. I forgot to mention that I'm behind on all of my payments of credit card. I haven't paid them in like almost a year or the first mortgage. So that's why I feel like I'm so deep in trouble. I have not been able to make it.

So how much is your first mortgage payment? $550. Okay. All right. And it sounds to me like that you're making $45,000 gross revenue in the cell phone shop minus the expenses of operating the business, which includes the rent on the shop. Is that right? Yes, it is.

Okay, so it sounds like you're making under $20,000 a year probably household income. Actual taxable income. You file federal income taxes in the U.S., right? Yes, yes. Okay, what was your taxable income last year like like 20 yeah that's what i was guessing okay all right and so more than anything what you have is an income problem don't you yes you're not making any money both of you are working in the shop and both of you together working a lot of hours are making twenty thousand dollars a year correct plus i have a vehicle that i'm also paying i still

owe like twenty six thousand okay i would sell that i can tell you that in a heartbeat that's insanity in this situation to have a car that costs more than you make in a year that's just insanity so uh now let's back up and do a couple of things the first thing is crisis management okay when you've got all this stuff flying at you the stress gets very very high the worry gets high the hopelessness gets there and it can affect your marriage don't let it do that if it has already then y'all work on that you have to protect your marriage from the stress the number one cause of divorce in north america is uh is money problems and money stress and so you've got to manage that Then when we're coaching someone in our offices

or in one of our coaches' offices around the nation, we tell them the very first thing they have to do is take care of their four walls, which is food, water and electricity, shelter, and basic transportation. This car is gone. You've got to sell it. But basic transportation, an inexpensive $1, thousand dollar car that kind of a thing um okay and paying your mortgage and paying your lights and your water and buying food happens before anything else happens everything else can sit okay if these credit card companies were to sue you there's almost nothing that they could

get so i'm not worried about them today in the middle of crisis management crisis management is i want to protect you your marriage give you a place to live and eat and have lights and water that's the four walls of necessities then we work on cleaning up debts that are unsecured like credit card debt or what's left over after the sale of this car or whatever but you can't keep this car you understand that right yes yes i do okay now what are we going to do what are we going to do to get your income up dramatically? Because I'm not shaming you, but you guys just aren't making enough money, man. This is killing you.

I know. It's been more than a year that I can't sleep well. Yeah. Okay, so what are we going to do to get your house? What did your wife do before she worked in the cell phone shop? She used to work for another cell phone store. And so we decided, like, to open our own business. It's not going well.

No, but we're both college dropouts. You know, I don't have a degree. The business is not going well. There can be a lot of reasons, but you can't say, oh, that means I can't do anything else. Yeah, you could do a lot of other things that both of you made $20,000. Okay. Yeah, $8 an hour, $45 hours a week, each of you would double your all's income. Okay. So I'm not suggesting we close the store,

but one of you needs to develop a career path outside of this store because the store is not making it right now. It's a bad part-time job right now, and we have two full-time people working at it. Yeah. In terms of the income that it's producing. That's what's killing you, sir. And again, I'm not picking on you. I'm not trying to kill your dream, but your dream of being a small business owner has

turned into a nightmare. And so we've got to get that. Is there anything we can do at the store to increase its sales dramatically? Or are you all doing about all you can do? Yeah, I've tried incorporating, you know, incorporating computers and bringing other devices from major brands to sell, and I haven't seen any advance at all, any improvement at all. I'm trying to repair other things that I used to not repair, and still I don't see any difference. Okay.

Are there any companies after the hurricane and the rebuilding i know you guys were hit so hard with that hurricane and it was really devastating to the whole island are there any companies of size that are hiring uh technology people uh to you know to do computer repairs install computers for a big company and they do it like i've got three or i think I've got five guys here on our team that do nothing but fix our broken computers and install new ones all day long. Okay. And they make a lot.

I don't know. Yeah. But, I mean, if there's a company in Puerto Rico that, I mean, are you in San Juan? By a moon. Okay. All right. I don't know the size of that particular economy but

um all i'm trying to do is just to think with you here from some career options or income options because anything you could do to get some income coming in is going to help you a bunch to at least get those four walls covered because right now the car is killing you the house is killing you and those are part of the four walls we gotta get got to get the car sold, and we've got to get this house caught up, and you're behind a year on it. You need $5,000 to catch it up. Yes. Yeah, and that's your first goal.

Before you do anything else, get your house caught up and stop the foreclosure, and then keep your house current, but no matter what happens, don't let your house ever get behind again. And then, you know, keep your lights and water current. Never be behind a dime again. You make enough to do that and eat. But you don't make enough to pay a payment on a $26,000 car, and you don't make enough to address the $100,000 worth of credit card debt.

And you don't make enough to ever borrow money again. So hopefully all of that will help you. You keep online with us, and hang on. I'll have Kelly pick up. We're going to put you into Financial Peace University and try to walk with you guys while you're walking through this, and we'll also send you a copy of Ken Coleman's book, The Proximity Principle, to help with your career choice

and think about what you're going to do there from the next point forward. Thank you for the call. Open phones at 888-825-5225. It doesn't matter where you are on the income or on the, I don't know, what section of the economy you're in, upper income, lower income, poverty, where you are, we still deal with the basic math of income minus outgo. You still have to address income minus outgo. And if you can solve that problem, you can begin to work your way through a host of other issues.

Income minus outgo. That's simple. And so sometimes that forces families to move to areas where they can create an income. It's not unusual to go back in America's history and see an area that was struggling financially and people migrated away from it. The cotton fields of the South, a lot of those workers left, white and African American, and went to the factories of the North in another time in America. There's always been people migrating based on economics in the history of the world. And something to consider. You have to address those issues.

This is the Dave Ramsey Show. I'm James Childs, producer of the Dave Ramsey Show. Did you know you can now listen to the Dave Ramsey Show on Pandora and Spotify? For all the ways to watch and listen, check out our show page at DaveRamsey.com slash show.