The Ramsey Show - App - The Fear of Facing Bankruptcy

Episode Date: June 15, 2022

Dave Ramsey & Ken Coleman discuss: Buying a house with no credit, Following the baby steps in order, The fear of facing bankruptcy, The difference between tithes and offerings Want a plan for your money? Find out where to start: https://bit.ly/3nInETX Listen to all The Ramsey Network podcasts: https://bit.ly/3GxiXm6

🎵 Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Ramsey Show, where debt is dumb, cash is king, and the paid-off home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice. We help people build wealth, do work that they really love, and create actual amazing relationships. Ken Coleman, Ramsey Personality, host of the Ken Coleman Show, number one best-selling author, is my co-host today as we talk about your life, your career, and your money. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Reed is with us. Reid is in San Antonio, Texas. Hi, Reid.

How are you? Howdy, Dave. Hey, Ken. Thanks for taking my call. I'm glad to be on the show. Sure. What's up? Hey, yeah.

So my wife and I got married about nine months ago. Really excited. And we are thinking of buying a house. And we are adamant about not having any sort of credit card or credit score. Now, how do we do that? Okay. You just have to have a mortgage company that does what's called manual underwriting, like Churchill Mortgage that sponsored us here for almost 30 years here on The Ramsey Show.

They do manual underwriting. Manual underwriting is what they used to do before there was a FICO score, like when I first got in the real estate business, okay? Right. And that simply means that they, in the old days, now we wouldn't do it exactly this way today, but in the old days, we would mail, the mortgage company would mail a VOD request to your bank, a verification of deposit to see if you have money in the account to do your down payment.

They would send a VOE to your employer, a verification of employment. Your employer would write down and say, yes, he works here and here's what he makes. Send it back to the mortgage company. That was all snail mail in the old days, right? But they actually went around and they checked with your landlord and they looked at your credit bureau report and saw what was actually on the credit bureau report, what was being paid. Were you paying the bills that you have on time?

And if you don't have any bills on the credit bureau report, they assumed you were smart because you are. Instead of dumb, like the FICO score says you're dumb if you don't have any bills because it's only a measure of how much you play kissy face with the bank. But that's what manual underwriting is. It means they manually actually have to verify that the human being is capable of paying the note, and then you can get the mortgage. And it's the same exact rate, no more, no less than a regular FICO score rate. The difference is if you've got a, you know, a 750 FICO score,. The difference is if you've got a 750 FICO score, a monkey can make that loan. They just look at the number and go,

whoo-hoo, big number, do it, okay. There's absolutely zero analysis, okay, other than they depend on the analysis that was created that created the FICO score to be their analysis, which is part of what caused the crash in 2008 because we were loaning people with high FICO scores money who were actually broke. And so we had a whole bunch of broke people buying houses, and it caused the 2008 crash. That's not happening as much now.

But one thing, FICO has gone in and worked on their algorithm because it sucks. But it's mathematically impalatable. But anyway, all that side issue from model soapbox but yeah you can get a mortgage just go to a mortgage company that um you know that does manual underwriting ben is in norfolk virginia hey ben what's up hey how's it going dave thanks for taking the call appreciate it sure what's up yeah so my wife and I will be finishing up Baby Step 3 probably January of 2023. I'm 37. I'll be retiring from the military in five years. And right now we have income enough to put so much down on our house that we can have it paid off in eight years, but I would not be able to do the 15% of my gross income into retirement.

So I was wondering what your thoughts were on that, even though I'd be gaining a military pension in five years, if I could play catch-up on retirement later and just get the house paid off super fast or do exactly per the baby steps or in that situation what you would tell people. I just like mustard better than ketchup. Thanks for your service, by the way. We appreciate you.

Sure, absolutely. Here's the good news in this whole story. You're actually thinking. Most people don't bother. We have a whole population full of freaking zombies that just go along and do whatever amazon mastercard and apple tells them to do and then they google it and google tells them they're smart and uh none of this is true by the way so um the you're you're actually using thinking skills way to go dude i'm so proud of you i'm not i'm not being facetious

you really are if you pay keep paying attention like you're paying attention, you're going to be fine. Even if you don't do it perfectly, Dave, the way I would do it, okay, you're going to be fine. Because 90% of people winning is they pay attention. So, no, I would not do that. I would get out of debt like you're planning. And in January, I'd start putting as much as you can aside for a down payment until you're ready to buy. When you buy, put the house on a 15-year fixed and start saving 15% of your income towards retirement. And, yes, you're going to have the wonderful military retirement, which I'm very happy as a taxpayer to pay you. Thank you for your service.

One of the few things I actually think we do well out of D.C. But, yeah, all that to say, stay in order. Yeah, follow the order because you're going to be in such good shape. What do you plan to do in retirement from the military? What's that next chapter look like? Yeah, so I'm not 100% sure, but I'm looking at, I finished my MBA a few years ago, and so I'm looking into project management, maybe financial advising. I'm not sure. Yeah, so the point is everything Dave said, amen, amen, amen.

But you, by doing it this way, you're still going to be able to pay your house off because you're going to have that income, retirement income from the military, but you're going to be making money. And you're going to have a wonderful ladder for financial growth at a very young age. So you can do all of those things. Just follow the order of the baby steps, and I think in the long run, you're going to be glad you did. Well, and here's the other thing. Your income is not going to stay static. No. And your numbers you're running are based on static income.

So if you projected your income increases out, and then you're guessing what you're going to do when you leave the military, but you keep projecting that out, you're probably still paying the house off in eight years. Yeah, that's what I think. But it might be 10, but 10 is just fine. You know, again, because you're focusing, you're thinking, you're thinking outside of the normative stupid butt stuff that people do in this broke culture, and, you know, you're not just clicking on Prime all day long

and then wondering why you're broke. And, you know, you're just being smart. So that makes all the difference in the world. You know, Ken, I'm often asked in these interviews that I do, and I don't, anyway, it always comes up, what's the number one mistake people make with money in America? And they always, you know, they figure I'm going to say credit card debt. Well, that's one up. Student loan debt, that's comes up. What's the number one mistake people make with money in America? And they always, you know, they figure I'm going to say credit card debt. Well, that's one up.

Student loan debt, that's one up. Leasing a car, that's another one. Whole life insurance, that's another one. There's too many to have one, right? But really what happens is that the answer is not paying attention. Because no one sits down and goes, hey, I want to be stupid. Right. Let's see what stupid looks like.

But we just wander along like a zombie and come home with a new car or you know you impulse a bass boat oh my god you know and so that this is what happens people don't pay attention anything that if you're going to win at anything winning is an intentional act you want to win in your marriage you have to intentionally embrace engage the process of being married you want to win in your marriage, you have to intentionally embrace, engage the process of being married. You want to raise good kids, it's not accidental. It's a lot of work because they're weird.

You know, I mean, it's just a problem. So everything you win at, you've got to be intentional. This is The Ramsey Show. People all over the country are discovering a faith-based and budget-friendly way of meeting health care costs through Christian Health Care Ministries. Christian Health Care Ministries, or CHM, is a non-profit organization that helps members carry one another's burdens with health care expenses. And they have successfully shared each other's medical bills for nearly 40 years. See if CHM is right for you by visiting chministries.org.

CHM is a proud sponsor of Dave Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. Thank you for joining us, America. If you're looking to sell your house right now, there's a lot to think about. It's crazy out there in the real estate world. And people are buying houses. Prices are not going down. We are seeing some individual markets that are suffering from individual maladies. For instance, some of the markets in Houston around the energy and the oil problems that Biden has caused,

the energy world, we're seeing some of those prices go down. But overall, the American real estate economy is going up because there continues to be a shortage of housing as compared to the demand. If you're selling a house, though, you are going to see with this bear market, with these increasing interest rates, with us heading into a house, though, you are going to see with this bear market, with these increasing interest rates, with us heading into a recession, you are going to see a more normalized selling process. In most of my 40 years of fooling with real estate, I've seen about a 90-day period of time to sell a house. I've never seen anything like the last little bit where you would put a house on the market and 82 people would make

an offer in seven hours okay that is not normal for those of you that have been living in that world it's not a normal world and so that world hopefully is gone it's not healthy it's not good for the market it's crazy it's weird so if you're going to sell a house you need a good real estate agent now to walk you through the process and to work with the buyers that are in the market, and there are still buyers in the market, to get them into the house. It's not amateur hour out there right now. Yeah, let me ask you a question regarding this because this is wise to unpack for folks. So we are going to see now moving back to normalcy is what I'm hearing you say on the amount of time to sell. But it doesn't mean that you need to panic and lower your price because it's going to take longer. And that's why we want you with a pro who can go, hey, relax. Yeah. You didn't sell it in five days. Doesn't mean you need to drop it. Yeah. I mean, I talked to a guy

on the air yesterday. He's had the house on the market for two weeks and then got an offer and he's panicking. Uh-huh. Yeah. Because everybody like oh god because we're you know we're used to being a seller right that you're putting a house on the market is actually an auction and that's that's not happening anymore that's not going to happen in a six percent interest rate environment um and and in the middle of a recession and a lot of companies are laying off and so uh and you, it's just not going to happen. But do we sell houses in that kind of a market? We have always. As a matter of fact, that is a normal market to sell houses in.

I've sold houses in recession my whole life, you know, and as a real estate person years past. And we sold them in 1982 in a 17% interest rate environment, and people were buying houses. Not as many as buy at three, but it's not, you know. And so, yeah, if you're going to put your house on the market, you need to get a really good agent. And if you're going to buy a house, you need to get a really good agent. It's a good time to do both.

And there's a lot of people panicking and freaking out. There's a lot of fear out there. Yeah. Are you hearing people say, is it dumb, Dave, to pay 6% when 6% is, if you look at historical rates, it's not like a crazy rate. Oh, you're talking about the interest rate. Yeah. Oh, historically, it's not. Here's the thing.

Get the house. Right. If rates go down, refinance. There you go. Okay. I like it. I mean, but, you not gonna the house is not gonna go down and so oh yeah house prices are gonna crash ramsey you don't know what you're talking

about honey i have this thing called perspective i've got a long view and the let me tell you hope comes from having long ball yeah where you go you go into freak out mode and your brain starts melting and running out your ears is because you're thinking short. That's right. And, you know, and I understand even intelligent people become afraid and they lose their intelligence when they become afraid. But you're not looking at facts. You're not looking at data. And you're just freaking out because a lot of people that are very, very bright. This is their first. This is their first downturn.

That's right. I mean, 2008 was the last one. Think about it. A lot of young people have never even seen a market with 6% interest rate. They don't even know what it's like. Or never even heard the word recession. Right. Or never seen a slow real estate market, a medium real estate market.

It's always been a white hot. Because the last time, listen, 2007, we had 2.4 million new housing starts. Wow. This year, we'll have 1.4. Yeah. We have a shortage of housing. Big time. And supply is just not there.

So there's more buyers chasing fewer sellers still. That's correct. But just not at the auction level. I saw on the news today the CEO of Caldwell Bankers said that if there were 5 to 6 million new homes built right now, that would get us at what he would say a normal level of supply. Exactly. So that's how far behind we are. So when there's that much shortage, it's impossible to deduce in a logical mind that has a long track record

and is looking at data and is not working on feelings that the housing market is going to crash. Hey, the guy's right. There's a 5 million shortfall of housing units. The number of houses on the market the last three years is 50% of the number of houses on the market in 2007, 2008, and 2009. Right. 50%.

That's right. So just calm down. Get you a real estate agent, though. Go to RamseySolutions.com, click on ELP, and get an agent to help you sell it that knows what they're doing. And here's an idea. Maybe an agent that has sold a bunch of houses, but maybe even an agent that has been in the market a while.

So they have perspective because let me tell you almost all fear comes from no perspective here's what i was thinking about you're driving down the interstate today in nashville it's like 94 freaking degrees right it's hot and snot out there and it's it's also we got our little humidity thing going so you can cut it with a knife and put a block of humidity in the back of the car. It's unbelievable, right? So you're driving down the interstate and a tire blows. You're changing your tire, sweating like a pig.

Oh, yeah. And there's 18-wheelers blowing by you about to kill you the whole time. Yeah. That's right. Thankful for the breeze, though. This is what's known as fear. Yeah. This is a bad day.

Yeah. Horrible. My. This is a bad day. Horrible. My heart rate is up. I have a John Deloney call coming into his show for my mental illness that is developing while I'm changing the tire here on the side of the road. I'm being traumatized. Right. This is real. All the things.

I mean, can you think about how pissed off, angst filled, anxiety filled,-based you would be in the middle of that you're you're physically threatened you're hot it's horrible you bust your knuckles on the stupid jack yeah you know the whole thing right in 10 years do you even remember that no so did it really change your life? No. Great point. Not unless you get hit by an 18-wheeler. Other than that, it didn't change your life, right? I mean, in 10 years, did it really change your life?

No. It was a really, really scary, anxiety-filled moment in time. But when you pan back 10 years, you don't even remember it. That's right. You don't even remember it. You have to think hard about what happened there and even then it's almost a chuckle you remember that time oh that's what it is for me because of the futility that would happen on the side of the road you didn't even mention that well yeah i mean me trying to change a tire would probably be a great clip on youtube just because of the sheer ineptitude. We could get a lot of hits on the humor.

Because of ineptitude. Yeah, it'd be a lot of views. But the point is, think about all the bad things in your life, even something like a cancer scare. I had a friend who had a cancer scare this year. And they came in and told him. And then they came back and go,

oh, we missed it. It's not there. Oh, well, that's why they call it practicing medicine so piss me off right but anyway you know so but i mean but for about two or three weeks there we were all holding our breath praying with this guy man right and it was everything because it was front and center because fear is in the moment hope is in the long ball yeah yeah that's right you don't find hope in the moment very often most of the time your hope comes in the long ball yeah well perspective long-term perspective and if you'll back up a little bit from this and look at actual trends and data over 20 or 50 years in housing and interest rates you cannot be so afraid i know some of you are afraid

and some of you get real intellectual about your fear. But that doesn't make it not fear. And it doesn't make it right. You're just wrong. The data is real clear on this. We're going to do some more stuff on this. We're getting ready to announce a live stream. We're going to do a big deal on the real estate market and unpack some of the things like that for our

audience to show you exactly what's going on with this real estate market in detail with charts and graphs and stuff. Yeah, we'll let you know about that a little bit later. This is The Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. Thank you for joining us, America. We're so glad you're here. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Regina is with us in Las Vegas.

Hi, Regina. How are you? Hi, Dave. Hi, Ken. Thanks for taking the call. Sure. What's up? Well, I need some perspective. I

appreciate the last caller because I think you gave me a little bit on that call, but I'm looking for some more. I'm currently on baby step two. I've been four years gazelle intense, and I'm going to be looking at a court date here tomorrow that's going to end up increasing that debt to about the tune of $25,000. I have literally been in a bell and pen for four years, even during COVID, and my gas tank is on empty. I'm just not seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, and I don't know if I can keep up the pace that I've been doing. I have three jobs, and I'm just, my gas tank is empty.'m sorry so i don't know if i'm i'm looking at a bankruptcy or if i have to do something not stupid i'm sorry um how much

debt have you got not counting tomorrow 10 grand and i literally was i was coming for a debt-free screen in October. And what's your income? My income is $45 a year. I've upped it to $55 even during COVID, but the problem I'm having is I end up in court because all these extra debts are attorney fees. And every time I go to court, I don't seem to be in good favor with the court. My child support has increased. So it's a very long journey, and I'm just tired.

You pay child support? I do. We have 50-50 custody, and it doesn't work out in my favor any time I go to court because he's a full-time student making $10.50 an hour. Okay. And what's the $25,000 tomorrow? Tomorrow is the attorney's fee for the last two years of litigation. You owe $25,000 to an attorney?

Yes, sir. Over child support? Yes, sir. It was because of COVID. It was extended, extended, extended, extended, extended. So it's just... Well, if he wasn't working while it's extended, why did the bill keep going up? Because my ex-husband made sure that the bill kept going. He kept putting things in there and we kept having to respond.

So, you know, as each response happened, it's that $2.50 an hour, you know. So it just, it's really spun out of control. Yeah, you needed a new attorney. Pardon me? You needed a new attorney $25,000 ago. I agree with you, sir, but unfortunately I gave him a retainer and I had nothing left in the tank after that. That was my emergency fund.

Yeah, I know. When you make $60,000 and you spend $25,000 on child support, that's not in balance. I totally agree with you, sir. I'm not fussing at you. I'm just crying with you. No, please, fuss at me. No, you don't need to be fussed at.

You've gotten fussed at enough. You just got a mess, kiddo. Yep. So you owe the attorney's fees, and the attorney has sued you for the fees? Yeah, tomorrow is the day. And we go to the judge. We've stayed off. We've done everything to try and...

Yeah, you're going to lose because you owe the money. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah. I'm going to lose. Yeah. lose because you owe the money yeah exactly yeah yeah i'm gonna yeah well you owe the money i mean it's not a it's not not there's not really a thing to you know he sucks as an attorney is not a defense um for the debt for the attorney fees i mean you took them on so um yes and this guy knows that you make sixty thousand dollars a year he represented me for two and a half and he knows that you make $60,000 a year. He represented me for two and a half years.

And he knows that you don't have any money. He knows that. What does he think this is going to accomplish? Do we have any idea? I truly don't know. I just guess he wants to garnish my wages, which is going to basically leave me and my daughter in a big deficit. It's going to change our world.

So. Do you have. I'm looking for options, I guess, or perspective. I would just tell him that we're either going to have to work something out that is a tremendous discount and i'll go scrape some money together and give you a lump sum at a tremendous discount or i'm going to help you get zero because that's called a chapter seven bankruptcy and and that's kind of what i did on my own because i knew what i was up against you told him that yeah i basically said you know what i have and you can go forward with this but you know what's going to happen and i basically you know laid it on to him and he pushed it he pushed the button so

i'm looking at this bankruptcy head on and i just i want to know i'm doing the right thing trying to say a step a step above and a step a step ahead for my daughter's sake um well i i would i always tell folks if you're going to file bankruptcy, and I never recommend it. It's a horrible process to go through, but if you're going to, make sure you've tried every single thing you can try before you do it, because it is a life-altering thing. It's in the same category as a divorce. It's something you want to avoid if there's any way you can. So you try everything. Now, you've tried almost everything here, but here's the thing.

Even if he gets the judgment tomorrow, and he probably will, then he has to act on it. And until he actually does act on it, it just sits there. Well, he's already filed the motion to garnish my wages. But there's not even a judgment. Is there a judgment already? Well, we put a stay on it, is my understanding. On the judgment? Because we want an oral argument.

That's correct. Okay. Well, the day the garnishment hits, that might be the day that you make your decision that you've done everything you can do. Well, the day the garnishment hits, I'm going to have to move. I mean, I'm that tight. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. If you file Chapter 7 bankruptcy, there's no garnishment. It goes away.

Understood. Okay. So I'm saying if he actually does do that, not just threatens it. And so what we want to be careful of is that we've, you know, one more time I'll talk to him, one more time I'll say, listen, if you do this, and just say it out loud, just say, you're not getting a garnishment. Okay, I had this negotiation one time. I was negotiating for a business guy that had a bank debt with a local bank,

and I'm sitting with the banker, and the banker says we're going to foreclose on the property, which obviously a bankruptcy stops a foreclosure. And I said, no, you're not. He goes, oh, yeah, I am. Yeah, I am. I said, no, we're either going to, there's two options. We're either going to work out something as we sit here with you guys and negotiate out some kind of settlement,

or the guy's going into a Chapter 11 bankruptcy or a 7 bankruptcy, but you're not foreclosing on the property. I can keep you from foreclosing on the property. So let's establish that you're not going to foreclose. Now, it's either because of a bankruptcy or because we worked something out. So which one do you want to do? It's your choice. Because, well, and then he comes up, well, we're going to foreclose. I'm like, dude, you're not real smart, are you?

What I just said was, you're not going to be allowed to foreclose. Federal court's going to stop you, or you're going to come to an agreement today. But foreclosure's not going to occur. That's the type of conversation I would have with this attorney, okay? There's not going to be a garnishment. Either I'm going to stop you with a Chapter 7, and you're going to get zero in that case, or you and I work something out. And those type of ultimatum discussions in a negotiation are sometimes the last thing you can do.

And you want to do everything you can do to try to avoid this you fought so hard you've come so close and it would be a bloody shame for this one thing to take you down yeah and practically speaking here whatever the amount is i'm assuming dave that the lawyer has shared what the amount is the garnish would be and so we got a figure so if he's going to get anything it's that number or less that he agrees to and then then you look at, okay, can I keep doing three jobs? And it doesn't sound like she can do three more jobs. I mean, three jobs, much more. Her tank is empty.

Well, her tank's empty because she just keeps getting piled on. Yeah, but if she can push through and manage to make that money, a better second job, a better paying second job, that's that last resort to, okay, if I can settle this with this guy and not go into bankruptcy. I'll give him five grand cash and go borrow it. That's interesting. Yeah. You know, that's what I, because, you know, I'd rather have 25. I'd rather have five grand debt than 25. Yeah, that's true.

But, I mean, we'll settle with you one way or another here. But try some stuff like that, Regina, because sometimes these guys, they just, you have to explain it to them. They're not smart sometimes. I mean, dumb lawyers are everywhere. Lord have mercy. I'm sorry, honey. Hey, hang on. We're going to hook you up with one of our coaches, one of our financial coaches,

see if they can walk you through this. Ken Coleman, Ramsey personality. Open phones at 888-825-5225. John is with us. John is in Atlanta. Hi, John. Welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hey, thank you so much for taking my call. I kind of got a unique tithing question for you.

Okay. So I've listened to your show a lot, and obviously you teach on tithing, which I've done, which anybody out there, if you're not tithing, you're making a huge mistake. But anyway, I'm giving 10% to my local church, but I have, living in Atlanta, I have quite the commute to work and back. So I try to educate myself every morning and listen to different sermons throughout the morning and evening. And I'm finding myself listening to Craig Groeschel, Michael Todd, and I'm getting a lot of information from them and really growing from those two pastors, among other ones. But those are the two major ones that I listen to.

And so now I'm kind of feeling like not only should I be giving a portion of that 10% to my local church, but I'm growing just as much, if not more, listening to those pastors. Should I be supporting those churches also and giving a portion of that 10% to those churches or those pastors? I really love your heart.

I appreciate that. And Mike Todd and Craig Groeschel are both personal friends. Craig's a good friend of mine. And I'm just emailing with him about an hour and a half ago, matter of fact. So I do kind of know what those guys would tell you. And I think it's the same thing I would tell you. And I have Ken chime in here because he's a PK as well. Okay, what is the purpose of the tithe?

Is it for you to buy a ticket to a self-improvement Christian seminar? No. Okay, it's not. The purpose of the tithe is to support the work of your local congregation. It's represented in the Old Testament storehouse. And the storehouse fed the widows and the orphans and paid the priests. And that was the function of the storehouse. And so you gave a tenth of your grain to the storehouse.

The Levites ran it in the Old Testament. And a little bit of biblical history. But the point of it is not to pay them for services rendered to you. The point of the tithe is to get a rhythm of giving in your life and to remind you each week that you don't really own anything. You're just managing it all for God. And there's a lot of grace around the tithe, so you can do whatever you want to do. God's not going to be mad at you for sending Mike Todd and Craig Groeschel or whoever else you watch.

Both of those are wonderful teachers, the way world class um but the uh the local church function is supported by you also by by your giving but that's not even the reason for your giving the reason for your giving is so you learn to be generous not so you purchase a ticket to a self-improvement event and i'm kind of being i'm kind of being a little bit smart i like because you're like well this is all where i'm growing from but this isn't about your growth okay i got you yeah well i was just feeling like like if you know part of the time in my opinion obviously especially for the local church is you're supporting that local church so they can go out and do other things and win souls to Christ.

These two gentlemen are doing a phenomenal job, so I felt like if I'm listening and neither one of them are hurting for money. I understand, yeah. Neither church is in financial trouble. Both churches are in excellent financial condition and are winning plenty of souls to Christ. Okay. John, I would just add, I think most pastors would agree with Dave,

but they would also say this is a preference, not a principle. So the preference is to support the local body, the local church. However, the principle, as Dave says, is to give back what you've been given a portion of to the Lord. So let me say this, though. I think you've got to shift your mindset from I should support those two ministries to I could support them. Yeah, that's good. And I think that's the deal. I think you really love them.

I think you are seriously benefited. But that becomes an offering above the tithe. That is above and beyond tithes and offerings there's another ministry over here that does good work for god that's a good work for orphans a good work for whoever a good work for the unborn a good work for you know and i want to support that ministry that's an offering over and above the tithe the tithe does a different set of principles but now having given you all this nicky-nacky detail stuff i also want to back way up and just say there's a tremendous amount of grace over this whole thing.

The whole principle is God wants to make us over in his image. He's a giver. He gave his only son. He's the ultimate in generosity. And so he's trying to make us in his image. And the principle is to build the giving muscle, the generosity muscle, and always be building your generosity muscle. You hear me say that all the time anyway, but this is a uniquely Christian discussion

we're having here for those of you that are not people of faith. But that's the technical answer from an evangelical Christian perspective, and what has been taught for hundreds of years is that the tithe is modeled after the old testament storehouse and that's why it goes to the local church that's where the model came from uh and uh you know there but you know i'll bring all your tithes to the storehouse and that's an old testament Testament direct quote. So, but, you know, and, you know, then we can have all kinds of other discussions. But I don't think you're going to hell if you don't tithe,

but I do, I can tell you this. There's a high correlation between people that are generous and people who win at life and money. It's very unusual to find someone getting a divorce who's been tithing for the entire time they've been married. Because generous tends to make you less selfish. And it's very unusual. If you've got the two of you as a couple have made a decision to have a steady rhythm of giving

and you're in agreement on where that steady rhythm of giving is going, called the tithe in this case, it's also very unusual that you're not in agreement on most of the things. And it's an indication of the health of the relationship in your marriage. And so I had an old pastor tell me one time, he goes, I've been pastoring for 45 years, never had a couple in my church get a divorce that were tithers. And he was saying that as if the tithe somehow is magical but i think the tithe in and of itself is not it's the it's the the principle as you said behind the process and the principle is generosity and a steady rhythm of generosity it's a wonderful question thank you john yeah very thoughtful letting us get back on

something that actually matters that's really good that's a great great question yeah so we'll back up one more step and because i'll just take a second more on this and can because i loved what you said there i want to recap that uh because you do want to pan back from these things i in my early uh i became a christian as an adult in my early days i became very pharisaical very detailed about stuff like where the tithe goes, what counts on the tithe, how do you calculate it and all that. And I finally went, oh, wait a minute. God doesn't really need my money. As if I was somehow singularly supporting the kingdom.

That's hilarious. You know, the arrogance of that is unbelievable. But Pharisees are arrogant. And I was a young Pharisee. But what I got to later was that tithe is not for God. He doesn't need my money. If he wanted me to take it, and I'd be a greasy spot. It's all his.

God, he don't need my money. And really, that church, Craig and Mike Todd, they're doing fine. They don't need your money. But if you want to support the work that they're doing, because it's incredible work, and they're not your local church, then that would be called an offering. Yes. And I think that there's something beautiful there, too, as you're talking about generosity, that if you feel that you're receiving a blessing and you want to return some of that blessing, that is also generosity as well to say, you know what? I'm blessed by this.

I've felt some impact. You know what? I want to give the widow's might, you know, if you look at that parable. Well, it's like leaving a tip. That's exactly right. In a sense. It's an act of appreciation. You blessed me tonight in the way you took care of our table, and I'm going to be a blessing back to you.

That's right. It's called class. That's right. You know? Oh, my gosh. Selfish dadgum people out there. I love John's question because he's anything but selfish. That's right. You know? Oh my gosh. Selfish dadgum people out there. I love John's question because he's anything but selfish. He's just... That's right.

And one other final thing on this, John. God's not up there with a clipboard looking at where you're giving and how much. It's the attitude. It's the heart condition. And so you're in good shape there. Don't worry about that. Just give. You're a wonderful young man. Very cool. Good stuff. Good stuff. You're a wonderful young man. Very cool. Good stuff.

Good stuff. Ken Coleman, Ramsey Personality, my co-host this hour. Thanks to Austin, Ben, Zach, Andrew, and Kelly in the booth. I am Dave Ramsey, your host, and we'll be back. Dave here. You can find all of our shows with the Ramsey Network app on your smartphone. It's the only place to listen to the entire back catalog of episodes. Download the Ramsey Network app in your favorite app store today.