The Ramsey Show - App - The Antidote to Fear Is Action (Hour 2)

Episode Date: July 7, 2020

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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. My co-host today on the air, Ramsey personality, Christy Wright, and number one best-selling author of the book, Business Boutique. So join us at 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225.

Will is in Qatar. Hi, Will. How are you? Doing better than I deserve. How are you? Better than I deserve, sir. What are you doing in Qatar? Are you in the military? I am. Yes, sir, I deserve. How are you? Better than I deserve, sir. What are you doing in Qatar? Are you in the military?

I am. Yes, sir, I am. Thank you for your service. Thank you. Thank you all for paying taxes. So I'm a reservist deployed. My beautiful patient wife is back home. We're currently on baby step two and just finished class three tonight of the

financial peace military edition. We have 29K in student debt left, 3K on a car loan to complete step two. I'll be coming off of orders in November. Should we continue to knock out the 32K between now and November or switch at some point to preparing for me to be out of work potentially in December and January and February, and then back on orders in March. Okay, so you're back in in March. Yeah, yes, sir. So what you've got to find is something to fill the gap between November and March. Correct. What what you've got to find is something to fill the gap between November and March. Correct.

What do you make? Annually? Combined, about $140K. What do you make? $100K. Okay. And so you're going to lose that for a period of, what, six months? Yes, 46 months.

Okay. So she makes $40,000. I'm just trying to figure out if you can live if we stay on the debt plan. It sounds like it's going to be really tight if you do that. So you're probably going to have to have some nest egg built up to survive the downturn in income unless you have something lined up in between. What have you done before when this happened? That's a really good question. Left off of credit cards, that's the answer.

Okay. Well, we won't do that plan. All right. All right. So, well, I guess what i would do is run the math out so what what do you what do you mean did you you didn't work when you were between orders before i was a knucklehead i was a huge knucklehead okay all right so let's pretend have you got any ideas for income yet during that time?

Yes, I've applied to some jobs, contractor GS civilian jobs, and then there's a local parochial school that I've worked at before, but for volunteer, haven't taken pay from it. Okay. So what I guess I would do is I would say, you know, to the extent you can fill the hole up by creating an income, then you don't need to save up money, right? Correct. And to the extent you can't fill the hole up with your income,

either because you don't land something or whatever, then you would need to have some money to cover the difference through a period of time. Is that correct? Correct. All right. So let's target what that is and try to figure that out if I'm in your shoes. And I think then you can build up a fund to cover that.

Let's just say I'm almost positive I can make X, and that means I'm going to need Y. So let's make sure we have Y, whatever your plan is, let's make sure you have Y ready for you, right? Right. And so if you're almost positive during that six-month period of time, you could 100% replace your income, then you would need no money. If you're almost positive during that six-month period of time,

you can only replace half of it, then you might need $20,000 to make the difference up, right, or something like that, whatever it is, right? Let's just run the calculation out, and then based on that, make sure you slow down or stop your debt snowball soon enough or now for a little while until you've got that pile of money to cover that interim because credit cards are not an option anymore we all know that right right they're abolished yeah so does that make does that make sense to you

it does i'm i'm the nerd so i'm thinking my wife's income of $40K a year, that $4K a month, rice and beans, like no buffer other than the $1,000 a month, that like worse comes to worse. If you can make it on that, if you can make it on that and you go, and I'm pretty sure I can add something to it, doing something, right, then you're probably okay. Then you're probably okay to just, right? Then you're probably okay. Then you're probably okay to just, yeah, then you're probably okay. I mean, you can go deliver pizzas and make $1,500 a month

and add that to whatever she's doing or whatever. I don't care. But, I mean, if you guys can run the budget out and make it on hers, plus just a little bit that you know you can scratch up something, right, then you don't have to do anything to get ready for it. You're just going to be ready for it. And the better a job you get, the better this is going to go. But go ahead and knock the debt out because that lowers the need for the income.

Because you can be debt-free before this happens, right? I believe so. It'll be right to the wire. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know, Christy. What are you hearing? It's just amazing when you write it down.

I think like you're saying, if he can write this down, okay, here's how much I need. Here's how much I can live on. Here's how much I need to make to fill the gaps. When you see it, it relieves your stress. It's the unknown that overwhelms us. It's in our head. It's like, I don't know how much I need. It feels like this moving target.

If you can sit down with your wife, if you can sit down, you know, over a phone call or whatever, look at the numbers, then it's amazing the peace of mind that will provide, even if the number seems high, it's like, okay, well, I can do this. I can either save this or I can fill the gap with taking a part-time job, full-time job, whatever in those four to six months. When you can see it, it just, man, it takes the fear out of it because when you can see it, you realize what you need to do to get through. Yeah. So after talking through this a little bit, it sounds like that you can live on her income plus whatever little you generate if you're in a worst case scenario. And if you can live on that and you don't add that, then there's no reason to save anything.

Yeah. You can just make it. And then the, you know, it only gets better from there based on how good a job situation you get when you get there. That's just gravy on top of that. Yeah. But if you can't, if you both can't agree that we can make it on that, then you'll need to stop and pile up some cash to subsidize the whole until you get orders again in March. Again, thank you for your service, brother. Yes. We appreciate you.

Open phones at 888-825-5225. Some of these things, you know, what you're talking about there is we see that with business plans, when you're working with ladies, and we're talking about confidence a little bit earlier, our confidence is affected. And like, if you don't have all your debts written out, and in your your mind they're probably bigger than they really are yeah when you write them all down it's like yeah and when you do a budget you're like why are we where's all this money going yeah and and all of this is the monster of the unknown is much bigger than the monster of the known yes and when you write it out and lay out a game plan like he's doing here, it's very wise.

Yeah. It takes the overwhelm out of it. Takes the stress out of it. Yeah, good point. Christy Wright, my co-host this hour here on the Dave Ramsey Show. For over 20 years, I've recommended Zander Insurance and their term life programs. I'm still amazed at how many families have no life insurance or not enough and would be financially devastated if a spouse or parent died. It's inexcusable since the cost of term life is just plain cheap, and Zander really has figured out a way to make it simple and straightforward. They only sell the plans I recommend, and their system is built to your needs.

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How are you? Hey, Dave. Hey, Christy. How are you guys doing today? Hey, awesome. How can we help? Yes. So I had just a quick question on career

choice. I'm wanting to get a new position in my workplace. I work for a major known, well-known hospital and I would like to branch out a little bit, but I got diagnosed years

ago with ADD and I I am very, I'm trying to think how to explain it, like, sorry about that, on ways on how to get a new career, because I always am always nervous asking myself, can I handle this job because of my limitations with my attention deficit disorder. What do you do now? I work for Mayo Clinic. I transport linen in the hospitals. Okay. What is it you want to do um my career goal would is to be a radiation

therapist and help people with cancer wow good for you and so what would you need to do to do that that you haven't done you need certifications uh what would you need to do to get qualified for that? I would have to go through the schooling, which is two years. It's like a two plus two, so I'd get my associate, and then I would get my bachelor's in radiation therapy. Okay. Is the hospital willing to help with tuition? Yes. They give $3,000 a year for undergrad and $5,000 a year for master's. What's the downside of starting that? Just my own inner personal self of just having the confidence knowing I could do it and just believing in myself because I've had AD, since I was diagnosed in first grade and just, um, and just knowing

my, knowing what I am capable of. And so the, the long story short, I've always had just the confidence level that is lower. Um, and that's logical pushing me back. Yeah, that's logical. It's just pushing me back yeah that's logical pushing me back yeah so but here's the thing you know confidence is built by uh doing something doing it well and then you know you can do it right so what if you started taking the classes and by going through the process of getting the certification i think your confidence would be built, don't you?

Yeah, it's so interesting because I think sometimes we wait, Matt, for permission or for affirmation from another person to give us that confidence, but that'll never be enough. It has to be from you proving to yourself that you can do it. And what's so great is you're not jumping in the deep end where you're going to leave this job and try to do a job that you're not sure you're able to do. The classes would not only prepare you from an education standpoint, but it gives you those reps, that experience, that practice where you go after a course is completed,

after, you know, several different things that you have to do, you'll look and go, oh my gosh, I'm doing it. I can do it. And I think a lot, I know that what you're facing, Matt, is real. It's medical. I understand that. I think there's also a piece of it that we tend to put labels and limitations on ourselves or other people do. And then we live within them as if that is an actual barrier that keeps us from doing these things. I don't think that you have proof that that's a barrier that's keeping you from this job. I think in your mind it might be. And like Dave

said, there's a part of it that's logical because you're being wise with like, what are my limitations? But you have an opportunity to try this class, try some of these courses, try to just, you know, see if you could even shadow or meet some people in that department, have an informational interview, ask some questions. What are their days like? And then the more you do that one tiny baby step at a time, you're building confidence. You're like, oh, I did do it. Oh, that wasn't that hard. Oh, that was really interesting. Or I was able to maintain focus here because this really engages me in this way.

And so I think you're going to surprise yourself. And I think you're going to break out of the box that you've been living in or think you're living in and building confidence with you. But it doesn't have to be this terrifying leap. It's just tiny baby steps in the direction of where you want to go. Yeah. The reps. Yeah. And once you take those steps, your confidence is going to build.

That's true of any of us. I mean, first time you're on a bicycle, first time you drive a car, first time you go on a date, the first time you do anything, you know, we're all a incompetent and b scared and c not really confident and good at it yeah because you've never done it before first time i turned on the microphone i was scared out of my mind i know what i was doing i knew how to answer the questions but i sounded like a hick on the air and it was awful uh i gave the right answers and so i got to come back the next day but that was it you know and so here i am 30 almost 30 years later doing this every day and so obviously i'm better at it now and more confident than i was back then but because of reps yeah you know first time you you know we do both of us are public speakers and writers first

time you write a book you know first time you do anything you know you're everyone builds confidence by building their competence and competence comes from increased learning and reps yeah i tell people i tell people all the time the antidote to fear is action nothing will silence your fear of doing the thing like doing the thing so go do the thing it's in doing the thing that that fear lessens and your confidence grows. And you go, oh, my gosh, I can do it. I did it once. I can do it again. That's even true.

Like when you're doing. I got on. Man, I was skiing in Telluride with the boys. And I got at the top. It was the end of the day. And I got at the top of this dadgum black diamond. And it was so. I thought I was.

I thought if I fall, I'm going to land all the way in the village. Yeah. It was so i thought i was good i thought if i fall i'm gonna land all the way in the village yeah it was so steep i couldn't even see off it was like a cliff yeah and i i mean i'm 60 years old i got up there my heart started racing i felt like a four-year-old boy i told i told my son-in-law bill i said man we got a ski because if i don't get going i'm just gonna freeze up and walk down i'm gonna because if i don't get moving, I'm just going to freeze up and walk down. Because if I don't get moving, the antidote to fear is action. I knew if I did not start moving those skis down that hill that I was going to freeze up at the top of that thing. But what happened when you made it? I climbed.

I mean, I crawled. I was not skiing fast. But when I got down to the bottom, what happened was I'm not ever going up there again. That's what happened. It's just amazing that when you survived it. I got through it and you know and I still but I still remember because it's been a long long time for me where I was physically scared and I thought I have gotten myself into a mess here and I've got it and I knew if I stood there and thought about it too long yeah

I was I was gonna end up taking the skis off and walking down and that would be a two and a half hour rude deal so I just went no we're going i gotta go because if i sit here and think about it yeah i'm gonna screw this up you just gotta go for it you'll appreciate this story so last weekend my husband and i went down the lake i've only water skied like maybe 15 times in my whole life i didn't grow up on a boat or anything like that and so this last weekend we didn't have the kids we had child care it was just a weekend matt and i and i decided to try to drop a ski to slalom good for for you. And I was like, you know, you're scared. You're nervous. I'm like, I'm not a professional skier.

You're going to fall. I did. And I fell like maybe three or four times. I finally got the hang of it. But man, when I stayed up and I rode that slalom ski, afterwards I was like, my chest was popped out, my shoulders were like, I can't believe I did that. I can't believe I did that. To be

at any age doing anything new where you surprise yourself and go, I can't believe I did that. I can't believe I did that. To be at any age doing anything new where you surprise yourself and go, I can't believe I did that, that's a cool feeling. That's a really cool feeling. Those are two physical examples, but there's career examples. There's relational examples. There's spiritual examples of, yeah, the best antidote to fear is action. I really like that. That's good. That'll go.

That'll preach. That'll preach. That's good stuff. That's good. That'll go. That'll preach. That'll preach. That's good stuff. That's good stuff. Because we talk about it right here, even. One of our core values at Ramsey, that we've got 14 core values on the wall, that we really are. They're not brochure fillers.

And one of them is fear not. Right. And it's not that we are never afraid. It's that we don't make decisions based on fear. And so you can bully us. You can put us in a corner, and you might scare us. You might say, this is going to cost you $10 million. You might scare me. But that doesn't mean I'm going to make the decision based on that fear.

I'm going to figure out a way to whip your butt if you put me in that corner. And I've just got to figure out how. And the first step is to not freeze up and surrender. People think it's a sign you're doing something bad. Often it's just a sign you're doing something new. The black diamond, the slalom ski, whatever it is. I love how Joyce Meyer says, new levels, new devils. The moment you push yourself outside your comfort zone, of course you're scared.

You've never done it before. But it's in the doing that you lessen that fear. So go do it. Go do it. Start your classes right now. Go sign up today and get started on those classes. You've got four years of work before you ever get to do the job anyway. So you've got some time.

You're going to work through this. Go do it. Go do it. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. Calling from Pennsylvania for a debt-free scream. Travis and Barbara are with us. Hey, guys, how are you? We're doing great. Mr. Ramsey, how are you, sir?

Better than I deserve. Congratulations. How much have you paid off? $48,857. Love it. Awesome. How long did this take? 22 months.

Good. And your range of income during that time? We started out making $104,000. And we ended up making $132,000. Love it. Awesome. Very good. What do you guys do for a living?

We're both school teachers. So how did your income go up $20,000 in two years? Travis fried some fish in the summertime, and I served the fish to people as a waitress. And I also went from working part-time as a teacher to working full-time. Ah, there it is. Okay. Well, well done, guys. Congratulations.

What kind of debt was this? We had a little bit of everything. We were normal, as you would say. We had a pension loan of $24,000, two car loans just over $10,000, two car loans, just over $10,000, two student loans at $8,800, a utility loan at $4,500, and a personal loan at $800 to get a real estate license, actually. You guys were just, as you said, completely normal. You borrowed on everything. Absolutely.

So what snapped? What lit the fuse 22 months ago? Tell us your story. Thank you. Yeah. It actually started in March 2017. It was March 9th. Barbara and I hit a pretty low point when we had to go declare bankruptcy.

And that was on almost $20,000 in credit card debt. And as you know, and I know a lot of your listeners know, we've really never experienced anything like it. It was really gut-wrenching, and we were sort of lost and floundered around for just trying to buy groceries. And, you know, it was like, we are those people who are literally making too much money to be this broke, you know? And then over that next year, I found your podcasts and found your program. And Barbara and I, you know, we managed to get on board, and that just changed everything for us. Wow. So this much of the debt survived the bankruptcy then?

Yes. Okay. Wow. Yeah, that'll get your attention. So you kind of said, I can't keep doing what I've been doing or I'll keep getting what I've been getting. Something's got to change, right? Never again.

Absolutely, 100%. Yeah. Oh, absolutely. A hundred percent. Yeah. Good for you. Well done. Okay. And so you start paying off the debts and 22 months later, they're gone. How's that feel?

I can, it's the most wonderful feeling because we go, all the stress we have for not being able to pay our bills compounds into so many other things. Like one little hiccup and it bleeds into everything else in our life. And now we get to make our choices. We say, how are we going to spend this money? And that is freedom. And that is love. Like we get to be generous, and it's not just our bank accounts, and it's not just our budget meetings, but it's a part of everything we do in life.

It's freedom like I've never known, like we've never known. It's amazing. You get paid, you get to keep your money. Definitely. It's a good feeling. Yeah, not having the debt is wonderful but having control is even more wonderful oh and just just having you know having i mean we're just so grateful your your plan your wisdom you know i mean barbara barbara did all the hard work you know i i just

read the books and listened to some podcasts you you know, but it really changed the foundation of how we live our lives. We're just in deep gratitude to you, sir, and your program. Very cool. We're proud of you, man. That's amazing. Well done. Very well done. Who were your biggest cheerleaders?

We did. We had a lot of people in our corners. You know, I have an uncle who was very supportive, and we have to thank my mother for sure, my mom. Anytime I could pick up an extra shift or Barbara could pick up an extra shift, we had my mom right around the corner to babysit the two kids. And my mom was always a cheerleader, giving us all kinds of hints about how to budget and save money.

Yeah, cool. So what is the number one thing you tell people when they say, He's a cheerleader giving us all kinds of hints about how to budget and save money. Always. Cool. So what is the number one thing you tell people when they say, how did you do this? You pay off $49,000 in 22 months and make more money than you've ever made in your life in the process. What do you tell people the key to getting out of debt is? For Travis and I, I believe the key is communication and sitting down to have budget meetings because in the beginning it was hard. It wasn't always an easy thing to do, but the more we were committed to making it work, the better the communication got. And just like I said earlier,

like it bleeds into everything else in our life and our communication just is better all across the board. That's cool. And I think, you know, the discipline and integrity. You know, I mean, I have a touch of the free spirit in me, and any time I was ready to buy a new sofa, Barbara was right there with me to remind me, hey, you know, that's way far out in our budget future, and, you know, we're still waiting on that new sofa.

But when we get it, it'll be on our terms and it'll be in cash for sure. Amen. Well done, you guys. We got a copy of Chris Hogan's book for you, Everyday Millionaires, because that's the next chapter in your story. I want you to keep going now. Baby steps four, five, six. Let's build some wealth now and finish changing your family tree, okay?

Amen. Well done. Travis and Barbara in Pennsylvania, $49,000 paid off in 22 months, making $104,000 up to $132,000. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Three, two, one. We got it! Three, two, one.

That's what it sounds like when you finally get free. That's awesome. I love it. Congratulations, you guys. We're proud of you. Very well done. Our question of the day comes from Blinds.com. Find out for yourself why Blinds.com is the number one online retailer of custom window coverings.

You get free samples, free shipping, and new promos every month. Always use the promo code Ramsey to get the best deal. Our question, Christy. Yes, this comes from Alyssa in Tennessee. She visits DaveRamsey.com and says, With everything going on in the world right now, I find myself ashamed to celebrate my business successes because other small businesses and small business people are hurting right now. I've always shared my success with my customers to show them how amazing they are and how they show up for support. How can I navigate this time that we're in with grace and without making others feel bad? You know, what's interesting, Dave, is the people that ask this type of question usually aren't the ones that have to worry about it.

If she's self-aware enough to know I want to be considerate of other people, she's probably celebrating her business success in a way that already is filled with grace and social awareness. And she didn't say, how do I brag? She said, how do I celebrate what's going on in my business? What's going on with my customers customers there's nothing negative about that if you have a lens on it that is with humility and gratitude it's going to come across the right way you don't have to completely diminish what's going on in your business or with your customers uh if you do

it with the right heart i think it's how you go about it and you're not aiming bullets at other people no and so you're not saying you're a doofus and look how good i am you're just saying this is working thank you lord it might inspire them it might encourage them yeah people need to hear stories of winning at any time when times are great when times are bad they all need to see examples and hear examples. I know we've got a friend named Mignon Francois here in town that started a cupcake thing with five dollars and it's a ten million dollar business now and she started it in her house making cupcakes and I can't think of any reason I would want her to not celebrate that. Right, right. I think anybody in any business at any stage, whether it's good or bad, should go, I love hearing Mignon's story.

Right. It's good news. It's good news. Sierra, good news. For goodness sakes. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. Thank you. Well, tax day. Wait a minute. What?

Yeah, tax day was April 15th. Now it's July 15th. And that's coming up any minute. Are you ready? Ah, see, they'll catch you off guard when they move it. Thank God they don't move Christmas. Christmas stays the same. You can predict Christmas.

It's going to be there, by the way, December 25th. Are you ready? Yeah, so be thinking about tax day and Christmas and getting ready. If you're going to file a tax extension, you have to pay your taxes anyway or you will get penalized and be charged interest. So you don't get to do an extension on the bill. You just get to do an extension on the paperwork. But if you need to do that or anything else, you've got complicated tax return, you need to get a tax advisor. I

certainly use professionals to do my taxes. I don't pull my own teeth either. So if you need some help with this and you want to find a tax advisor that we recommend, one of our endorsed local providers for taxes, go to DaveRamsey.com slash ELP and click on tax services and we'll get you a little help. All right, Susan's in Wisconsin. Hi, Susan, your question for Christy Wright and me. Hi, Dave and Christy. Thank you for taking my call. Sure, Susan's in Wisconsin. Hi, Susan, your question for Christy Wright and me. Hi, Dave and Christy. Hi. Thank you for taking my call. Sure, what's up?

I have a quick question for you about life insurance. So my husband and I just began baby steps four, five, and six, and we're somewhat new parents. So in our wills, we named my sister-in-law as our son's guardian if we were both to die so we just want to ensure that our life insurance policies are available for our son right away so to do that would we list our son's name as the beneficiary on our life insurance or do we list the name of the guardian you need a will that forms a trust upon your death okay if the if both of you die and the child

would go to your sister okay and then and you name that trust as the beneficiary and so you know you just call it children's trust or your last name's children's trust if you want to. And then if you were to both pass away, the life insurance would be issued within a matter of weeks into that trust and would fund that trust. And then in your will, you need to go ahead and dictate how that trust operates in the event that this happens. And so you're going to put half a million, million dollars or whatever in that trust, and there's three or four things there you want to address.

Number one is who's going to be the trustee, who's going to manage the money for the benefit of the child. In most cases, I would want that to be someone different than who's taking care of the kid. Okay, so we have my mother as the person to sell our house and handle all of our assets. Okay, do you want her to be the trustee of the money to manage it for the kid? Should that be a separate person? No, it can be her.

It can be the guardian of the child, but it just creates a conflict because here's what you're going to do in the trust. You're going to say, here's what I said in mine, and then you can pick out of this what you want to do. now mine doesn't exist anymore because my kids are now grown and so it wouldn't there i don't need a trust to take care of a minor child because i don't have any minor children anymore but here's what mine said when my kids were little uh we named the sister-in-law to take the child just like you're doing sister is going to take the child and then we say the trustee here's what we want you to do with the money okay we want you to invest it in four

types of mutual funds growth growth and aggressive growth uh international and just like we do just like we teach you guys growth growth and income aggressive growth and international we want you to invest it in mutual funds that have a 10-year track record or more than as the and then we want you to pay out of those funds every month a stipend to take care of the kids of x and you give them a dollar they pay them this much so it's almost like child support for your sister right because she's taking on the burden of your child it shouldn't cost her money it doesn't need to make her rich but it shouldn't cost her money okay and so you leave her five thousand dollars a month or whatever you want to leave her to take care of your child

then you say you can hit also the trustee can disperse funds for the good of the child on their 16th birthday to buy a car, to go to college. In the event of a major medical issue, the money could be dispersed to take care of that. So, again, not a burden on your sister. We don't want any financial burden on your sister. She's already got her hands full just raising the kid and uh and then if the child when the child graduates from college the money can be dispersed to the child then or a portion of it then and a portion of it two years later or something like that and that's how ours was laid out it did those kinds of things but you can make up anything that you want it to do and make those the terms of the trust. And then you name the trust as the beneficiary of the life insurance policy.

It does not left to your mom. It's not left to your sister. It's not even left to your minor child because then the courts will get involved and tell the guardian that they have to put the money in something stupid like a CD instead of invested well so always leave it to a trust so you got your will done christy yep all right good that and all the insurances and all the things for working but i didn't know that about trust that's interesting i didn't realize that when you like the way that it protects that you can

dictate how the money is used and all that within the trust yeah you can tell it to uh you know that only on uh you can only turn the money out on sundays i mean you can just make up so any bizarre people do bizarre stuff sometimes is it legally binding where whoever manages the trust they have like for example in your example of like investing in these mutual funds they have to legally invest in that way? Yeah. If they don't, they're liable. Okay. And the child could come back and sue them later.

Wow. For not doing what the trust says. And they don't have any options. They have to do what you tell them to do, or they can get sued later. And people do get sued for misbehaving. But, you see, if the guardian is also the trustee of the money, they've got the responsibility of the child, then there's more, and very few people would do this, but there is more temptation to say, well, I took this kid on, so we need a new couch.

You can see that. Oh, I can can see that oh we need a new couch we need a new car and it benefits the child so we're going to use this trust money inappropriately to buy a car but in my mind i rationalized it because my sister left me with this kid right and um most people don't think that way but it keeps you you know when you keep two different people one taking care of the child one taking care of the money that takes care of the child, it keeps a lot of cleanliness. And you have a higher likelihood of it playing out the way you wanted it to in that case. I'm not a big fan of professional trustees, meaning like a bank trust company. I wouldn't hire somebody to do it.

I would want a competent family member. And if mom's competent enough, in this case, to be the executor of the estate and take care of everything, then she's probably competent enough to execute that trust, especially if you cover it all with her before you die. Mississippi, Sandy's calling. Hi, Sandy. Sandy, how are you? Hey, Dave. Better than I deserve, but a little frustrated. How about you?

About the same. We're a little short on time. We're a little frustrated. How about you? About the same. We're a little short on time. We're a little short on time. Go straight to your question. I sure will. I talked to you eight years ago. I started a little photography business, and it's done quite well. This is my dilemma.

I average about 18 hours a week, and I make about $58,000 a year. I would love to get my part-time status up to full-time. I have done everything um i really don't want to go take on a second job because i'm averaging 60 an hour i have an undergrad in digital arts there's no way i can go out there make 60 bucks an hour you're killing it help me help me help me help me but i need to find a way to double those numbers i could easily take what kind of photography are you doing newborn okay and i do a package called the watch me grow so where why do you not have enough customers i don't know that's what i'm calling you i don't want to get into another field with

that kind of money for part-time work so you're so you're working 18 hours a week because that's all the demand you have. Exactly. It's not because, trust me, I'm an empty nester. I could work a lot more. Okay. I'm just going to give you the quickest low-hanging fruit since we're short on time. Referral-based business. You've got to incentivize your clients, past clients that have been pleased with your work to refer their friends.

You give them a fall session, a spring session, a different a different type whatever type of session just activate your client base you have happy clients that are paying you good money for these photo sessions activate activate them because in service-based businesses your sweet spot is word of mouth marketing that's who that's who does my hair that's who cuts my lawn that's who takes photos of my babies it's someone that i was referred by someone else because they did a good job so start oh those. Oh, those pictures are great. Yeah. You need to call Sandy because Sandy's my girl. That's right.

And they're going to say that because Sandy's going to give them something. That's right. For saying. That's right. A session or a discount or something. Exactly. Good lead. Good lead.

Hang on. We're going to send you a copy of Christie's Book Business Boutique, and I think that'll be of help to you as well. Congratulations on doing really well. It's a good problem to have. Yes. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. This is James Childs, producer of the Dave Ramsey Show.

On your smart speaker, you can add our skill by saying, Alexa, open the Ramsey Network skill. From there, you can listen to all our shows. Ask Dave money questions like, how do I invest my money? Or what is the debt snowball? Find out more at daveramsey.com slash smart speaker.