The Ramsey Show - App - The Intellectual Dishonesty Around the Student Loan Crisis (Hour 3)

Episode Date: January 27, 2022

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🎵 Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, this is The Ramsey Show, where America hangs out to have a conversation about your life, your relationships, your mental health, your money, anything and everything. We're here for you. I'm John Deloney, joined by my good friend george camel we are taking your calls on pretty much anything at 888-825-5225 give us a buzz and we will help you out the best we can the call is free and that's about what the advice is worth so let's go to kayla in indianapolis indiana what's up kayla how are you doing

hi guys how are you great what's? So hopefully you guys don't shred me too hard for this. Oh, we're your friend. I know. So we did the right thing. We sold our car that we were making payments on. We sold it to Carvana and they gave us about 8,200. And then we put that towards another used car, a beater, as they would call it. So we ended up spending about $5,800 out the door on this Nissan Armada. It looked great on the outside. We had test driven it, and it was doing all right, except the check engine light was on. My husband asked about it, and the guy said it was a battery, and he could get it off.

So I drove it home. It drove a little, you know, like a used car. And so we called about it the next morning, and it wouldn't even start. So we called the guy. He said, take it to a mechanic, and he would work out a deal with us on getting it fixed. That sounded fishy to me, but my husband was like, okay. So we took it to the mechanic. Turns out the subframe is completely ruined.

There's a hole in the exhaust pipe that's leaking water onto the subframe is completely ruined. There's a hole in the exhaust pipe that's leaking water onto the subframe, making it even worse, just terrible to drive, unsafe. And he's just told us it's completely toast. So my husband went into the dealership today, talked to them, and he laughed him out of the dealership, basically. Do we have any room to sue them? I mean, what can we do? Like, I'm putting my trust in god fully and i i know it's going to be all right but i'm i'm a little furious and i want to see if we have any room to do anything about this okay so there's no way we're going to shred you over this okay this this stinks i'm sorry yeah we're out about 5800 bucks the guy told us he inspected it then he told us he didn't my husband recorded him saying he did get an inspected but he couldn't find the

inspection report somehow so you can go to small claims court you can sue them and i can't give you legal advice but you can contact the lawyer and your local area and go down that road if you'd like to. I would recommend adding up or getting some really clear written, right? You've learned the importance of that. Clear written, a written contract about what legal advice is going to cost, what going to small claims court would look like, what settling would look like. I don't know what the recording laws are in Indianapolis. Is it a one-party state or a two-party state? It is a one-party state. Okay, okay.

So all that to say is you can go down that road. It's not – maybe he gets a letter, a demand letter from an attorney, and he writes you a check and gives you your money back. Maybe that's what happens. Probably not. That's what I've read usually would happen if he were found to be in the wrong. Probably not. Okay.

Let me just say, if I'm you, yes. I've got buddies who are attorneys. I worked at law school for years, so I would have somebody write a letter. And I'd pay them, and they would write a letter and see what happens there. Okay. I also would be prepared, both spiritually and psychologically and emotionally, for this to be a painful $5,800 lesson. Yeah. That you knew driving that car off the lot that something wasn't right in it.

Right, right. It was a big car, our models are cool, and they're big, and we got a good deal on it, and now you know I'm never driving a car off the lot with a check engine light on.

I'm never driving a car off the lot without an inspection in my hand. I'm never, right? So you've learned all these things, and if you look on the arc of your life, how old are you? I'm going to be So you've learned all these things. And if you look on the arc of your life, how old are you? I'm going to be 30 in September. Okay.

In 10 years, 15 years, 20 years, $5,800 for the lesson you've learned here. Because this is going to impact how you buy a house. It's going to impact how your kids go to college. It's going to impact everything because you learned a hard lesson here. And everyone I know has made them. Dave's made them with millions, right? You've made one with $5,800. This will be a lesson that pays for itself over and over and over again.

I don't want you to beat yourself up over this, okay? Yeah. I'm kind of – I know you are. I've, you know, cried out today because this sucks. We only have $2,200 in our savings because we're in financial peace right now. Yes. And you and your husband, y'all are good people.

You would never do this to somebody. And you just ran into a scumbag, an absolute cheater scumbag who ripped off a young family. And it hurts because you don't even know people like that. And often when you run into someone who's just a scumbag like this, and you've heard me say this probably before, you lose trust in other people, but more importantly and more damaging, you lose trust in that beautiful, brilliant person

that you see in the mirror every morning. Okay? Yeah. And it's a $5,800 lesson, and it sucks, and it hurts, and hopefully you can find a lawyer, you got somebody at your church that'll write you a letter and maybe this person coughs up your money and it's all over and you learn that lesson too. But I don't want you to lose trust in yourself. This hurts and this is hard, but you will work through this. And I know y'all are busting it so hard.

Ah, this stings, man. Kayla, I'm so sorry you're going through this. It makes me mad. Yeah, I'm pissed for you. And I would definitely push on this dealership to make this thing right and do all the things that John said. That was really, really well said. But a lot of this stuff is going to be, well, the contract says as is. And when we sign that thing, this is what we got. And so like John said, we're not here to beat you up. We love you. And I just want to help you move forward and make sure that you guys have a car to drive. Are you in a situation where you don't have a car now? So my husband has a car, but we have a toddler and an infant. I'm on maternity leave right now.

I have to get my toddler to school at 9. My husband has to be at work. He's a general manager of a Hilton. So he has to be there to open the doors or to manage all his employees early in the morning. Then he would have to come back home, get my son, take him to school, then go back to work. And it just interferes with a bunch of things. So we were trying to get another car. You guys have a church community right now? We do. Yeah. We're in a wonderful church.

I would get plugged in with them. I would talk to one of the, you know, pastoral care folks over there and say, hey, here's our situation. Is there someone who would just let us borrow a car while we get on our feet or would sell us one for $1,000 a beater to get us around just to get through the situation? That's one of those things where having a community like that can be so, so powerful to walk with you through this journey. And I know that's humbling and that's hard and that's annoying. And you did this thing right, Kayla. You did it right. You sold your car.

You were going to pay off some debt. I know. And that's what sucks is Kayla. You did it right. You sold your car. You were going to pay off some debt. I know, and that's what sucks is I know I did it right, and I got taken advantage of. You did. Y'all got burned, and you didn't listen to yourself. Are you ever going to make this mistake again? You know, I told my husband, I said, I don't like that that is in my phone,

and I don't like how he answered that question. And he's like, well, we said it could either be 50-50 chance. So, I mean, I should have just trusted my gut. Always, always trust your gut. Always. Trust Kayla. Kayla is trustworthy. Kayla is trustworthy. This scumbag used car

salesman selling cars being like, no, bro, it's cool, is not. Trust your gut. And don't trust check engine lights ever, ever. for a lot of you last year was another year of just trying to survive but you don't have to live like that. You can have confidence in your money and your future. So if you're tired of being stressed out all the time, you can decide to make a change. You can follow a plan that works. For almost 30 years, Financial Peace University has helped millions of people take control of their money you'll learn our proven plan to save money pay off debt build wealth and give generously watch fpu on demand or get plugged

into a class for encouragement and support from other people you don't have to face another year of stress and worry you can have confidence in your money fpu is only available with a ramsey plus membership start for free by visiting ramsey solutions.com slash fpu that's ramsey solutions.com slash fpu 888-825-5225. Let's go to Jamie in Springfield, Illinois. What is up, Jamie? Hey, how are you? Good, how are you? Good.

So I have an issue that I wanted an external opinion on. I've got a bunch of them. So we are external. You go first. Um, so I have, I live in a rental and I've lived here for right at the end of my year lease. Um, my landlord told me Sunday that she needs to move back in here. Um, I have until March to find somewhere. Um, the problem is I've exhausted every possible rental option within like an hour of my workplace and there is nothing. So there is nothing, nothing. Like I've asked everybody I know, they have asked everybody they know. I have looked everywhere on the internet. There is nothing. It's a very rural area that I'm in. And so options are limited anyways. And I also have two dogs,

so it makes it really hard to find anything. And top that off I'm like right at the beginning of baby step two so buying isn't an option so I have two options um my boyfriend has offered for me to move in there but I feel like he's not really ready and I think he offered because he feels kind of obligated um every time I try to talk to him about it he doesn't really want to talk about it like I try to figure out the logistics and he doesn't really want to talk about it. Like I try to figure out the logistics and he doesn't really want to talk about it. Um, my other option is I moved six hours South to where my parents and my grandma are. Um, they are really want me to do that. They're more than happy to help me get on my feet on the ground there. And what do you do for a living? So I work, um, for a hog production company, which is the other thing.

I make really good money right now. Better than I'll probably make anywhere down there. You make hogs? So I'd be leaving. Uh, I, we, I work for a pork production company. So I, uh, basically, yeah, we make hogs. Wow. Making the bacon. I knew it. Pretty much. That was the worst joke ever. Sorry. I'm not even a dad. I'm a dog dad. I would be leaving a really good paying job and probably my boyfriend to move down there.

So I'm kind of scared. Okay, let's address these in order, okay? And George, please hop in any moment. Number one, did you just hear the last call? I did not. Okay. Thanks for listening and paying attention to the show. I'm just kidding.

All right, so here's the deal. Here the deal she's working john the call ended with us telling a woman who's about to be 30 how old are you i am 24 okay 24 y'all are same age ish she did not trust her gut and she bought a car that she she knew ah, there's something not right about this. And her husband was like, nah, it's cool. And the used car salesman was like, nah, it's cool. She didn't trust her gut. You know that moving in with your boyfriend is stupid. You know that, right?

Yeah. Yes. Okay. So for the sake of your relationship, for your mental health, for any sort of downstream trauma that's going to come from this, let's take that off the table for just a second. You know that that – I understand getting desperate and trying to figure things out. Let's fast forward. I get that. Let's take it off the table for a second.

Do you like where you live right now? I mean, not really. I'm not really attached to where I live, and I don't really I'm not really attached where I live and I don't enjoy my job like the money I make is awesome but I'm not really like attached to anything here except for my boyfriend what and he's not really attached to you by the way yeah so I know what's six hours away so my parents live in southern Missouri like right on the Arkansas border my parents my grandma are all down there, and my niece. Your voice changes when you talk about moving there. It's subtle, but there's something about, what is it about there that lights you up a little bit?

I guess my family. So I don't see a way around this, what I'm about to say. Either, any way you slice this, you have a couple of hard decisions to make. Is it time at 24 to go live with family for a season? Is it time to just keep plowing away at a job that I hate, that I'm going to look up and be 48 and be like, what did I do? I just made a bunch of hogs. I don't even know how you do that, by the way.

Are you going to keep running around with a boyfriend that is not nearly as into you as you are into him? Or there's no way to not have a hard decision to make here. So anytime I'm faced with a series of not great options and I got to make some hard calls, I'm always going to go back to my values. Who am I and what am I about? And what do I actually want to do with my one tiny precious little life? And what I'm hearing in a three-minute phone call is that you want to go be around your family and we'll figure out the job, we'll figure out the housing, we'll figure that stuff out.

And that you know the situation with your boyfriend is rough, you know you're making hogs and making good money, but you don't like it. You get what I'm saying? Yeah. Jamie, how much money do you make? I make like $39,000 a year. God almighty on a stick, Jamie.

I thought you made $500,000. You can make $30,000. That's what I was getting at. You can make that and live closer to your parents. You can switch careers. It's not too late. You're 24 years old. You could work for another 40 years.

You could have 17 different careers. I've had 17 different careers. Inside this building. Inside the building. So, Jamie, I feel like you've backed yourself into this corner that isn't really a corner. But in your mind, you're stuck with no options. Either I move six hours away or I live with the pigs, right? Like there's more options than that.

And it feels like you've exhausted it because you're tired and you don't want to be in the situation and you want things to be better. But truthfully, if you found another place to live, your life still wouldn't be great. So can I reframe this for you jamie yes there's some remarkable research out about stress and mindset around stress um andrew huberman's put out some some great stuff recently on this idea of stress and the way we approach it. And there is some significant benefit to receiving a stressful situation, like your landlord coming home, or coming and saying, hey, I'm giving you your 30-day notice,

I need my place back. If you look at that as an opportunity as a 24-year-old, hardworking, resilient, brilliant young woman to say, oh, awesome, I didn't like this job anyway. I don't even like where I live. I get to go have an adventure now. Or you look at the stress of that 30-day notice as my life is trapped.

There is a physiological consequence to that. It stresses your body out. But there's something bigger than that. There's opportunity cost one way and opportunity lost on the other. I want you to spend some time with you and nothing else, but you in a journal. Okay. And I want you to write down what an adventure could look like. What would my life look like? I want you to begin to see this in pictures, not just words. I want you to see them in pictures and write this stuff down, draw it out. I'm get super nerdy. Like we're middle schoolers again words. I want you to see them in pictures and write this stuff down, draw it out. I'm getting super nerdy like we're middle schoolers again. And I want you to imagine

life in Missouri and say, does this bring me peace? Can I start a career there? Can I get plugged back in with my family? Can I find things that I want to do? Maybe go back to school and learn a new thing. I've done my years with the hogs. Now it's time to go. I want you to spend some time saying, what do I actually want? And that's going to frame whether you have to have a hard conversation with your boyfriend or whether you double down your search because, no, I'm staying with the hogs. I love my community. I'm going to stay here.

Do you get where I'm headed? Yeah. And my gut tells me this is way, way more about boyfriend than housing. Am I right? I guess. I mean, there really isn't anything to rent, but that was more the issue, I guess boyfriend than housing am i right i guess i mean there really isn't anything to rent but that was more the issue i guess than housing yeah housing sounds annoying that boyfriend sounds existential how long have y'all been dating a year okay yeah that's hard man because you kind of made plans didn't you you had some plans yeah yeah that's so hard i'm so sorry that's hard hard hard we are 100

in your corner jamie don't don't don't quit your job before you got a place to live and don't don't race off and do anything rash i want you to spend some time thinking this out for me for the folks i work with writing this stuff down getting out of your head whether it's in a journal or on a word document i don't care notes app on your phone i don't care get it out of your head, whether it's in a journal or on a Word document, I don't care, a notes app on your phone, I don't care. Get it out of your head and look at it and begin to ask yourself, what do I want to do? Yeah. All right, let's go to Alex in St. Petersburg, Florida.

Are we going to run up against the clock? Yeah, we're running up against the clock. I don't want to do that. That's good, John, self-awareness. I'm learning here. James is very happy. There we go. Hey, it's time to put 2021 behind us.

Oh, no, we're even coming up on the music. One day. Hey, listen, listeners. You can't catch a break, John. No, I can. I just need to get better at this. This is all. I'm working on it.

I'm going to get there. I'm here for you. All right, so we get back. We're going to take more calls, and I'm going to read this all in the same segment. I believe in you. Thank you. Teamwork. Somebody does.

Somebody does. We'll be right back on the Ramsey Show. so so it's time to put 2021 behind us last year left a lot of people feeling burned out and sluggish eeyore was their spirit animal but 2022 is a fresh start and this is your wake-up call if you're ready to own this year and actually accomplish your goals with money, your career, your life, we have the plan to get you there. You can make 2022 your best year yet. We're running our New Year's sale right now so you can get up to 73% off our best-selling books, assessments, and envelopes. That includes my brand-new book, or Dave's brand-new book, Baby Steps Millionaires, that will show you the the quickest right way to become a millionaire.

Or if you're looking for a better way to manage your cash, especially in categories that always blow up your budget, like food, pick up our popular essential cash envelope systems. Maybe you're having a hard time bouncing back from the last two wild years. You should start 2022 with my bestselling quick read, redefining anxiety to learn what anxiety is, what it's not, and how to get your life back. And here's the deal. It's only $10. So visit the online store at RamseySolutions.com backslash store

to get serious and make real progress. But hurry, the sale ends soon. Good stuff, John. So before we go to some calls here, our most excellent producer, James Childs, sent us this article that is fascinating from Forbes. Here's the title. If there's no student loan cancellation, student debt strikes could be next. Awesome. This is juicy stuff. So Senator Elizabeth Warren has obviously been pushing for this student loan cancellation, wide scale. But what if they don't? What if it doesn't work? Are student debt strikes next?

That is the question posed here in this article. I don't know what the strike would look like. Is everyone just going to stop paying and see what happens? Is that the goal here? I guess the idea is if enough people just say we're not paying, then we're just going to stop paying. We'll show you. It's an interesting idea. And it continues on to say, well, should you stop paying your student loans? Well, remember, your student loans are tied to a promissory note, which is a financial obligation to repay student loans. If you choose to not repay your loans, your credit score could be damaged, your wages could be garnished, and you may be impacted financially. They go on with some alternative options of repayment plans, repayment options,

applying for forgiveness, considering bankruptcy, pursuing public service loan forgiveness. I don't love these options, John. Right. There is not a lot of great options right now. Yeah. My concern with this, George, and tell me what you think about it, is I've worked in colleges for my whole career. I know about student loans intimately. I've had my own six figures worth of loans to pay back. The challenge is any sort of resolution we have, whether we say forget you guys. We've got to pay this all back. Whether we say, hey, we're going to result.

We're going to, as a country, we're just going to say, hey, this was a bad deal. We're're going to result as a country we're just going to say hey this was a bad deal we're going to wipe 10,000 we're going to wipe 50,000 whatever the number is the problem as I see it is so deep because we don't have a solution for college next semester what are we going to if Biden came out today and just said no more loans

the kids signing up for summer school are right back on the machine again, right? And so until you solve that problem, I'd struggle with the solution, right? It's like, I don't know. I've only got three tires on my car and I'm like, we gotta get a fourth tire. And then stop driving first. And then let's,

you know what I mean? Like, let's put this tire on. So that may be the worst analogy ever in the history of analogies. It was a good visual. Thank you for that. That's my problem is that we are trying to solve this thing out of order. Yeah. We explored this issue in the borrowed future documentary, which you were featured in. You had some great things to say. Dave was featured in it, of course. And it really just points back to this idea that we're not anti-forgiveness and relief. We're not here to keep people hurting. But if we don't stop the source of the hurt, then we're not really helping a lot of people. Yeah, one of the foundations of my counselor education was as a counselor, you are constantly helping people out of the stream every day who have fallen in.

At some point, you have an ethical responsibility to go upstream and find out who keeps shoving people in. Why do people keep falling in up here, right? Yeah. I think that's where we are, is we're sitting downstream, and we've got almost $2 trillion worth of people drowning in student loan debt. We've got to go up river and stop the problem up here and then we can be about solving these downstream challenges yeah we got to turn off the faucet first because right now we're just got a bucket and we're trying to shovel out all the water while it's still just pouring down and so that's that's a better analogy than your tires that's an

infinitely but but we talk about this in barred future of how this whole thing came to be and how sally may was actually part of a government entity and how it all got out of control. And it's so fascinating that at the end of the day, the government needs to stop making the loans if we're going to talk about forgiveness. And I read a flyby statistic the other day that said just the student loan pause cost the federal government $100 billion last year. $100 billion. And who's paying for that, John? All of us are. Right?

Ding, ding, ding. All of us. So we're basically saying, hey, let's relieve the burden off of us and put it onto our children and our children's children, and they'll figure it out. They'll figure it out. But we want relief now. And so I understand the pain and the anger towards the student loan system

and your own personal student loans. We've both been there. Yeah, we both have student loans. Oh, man. I get it. But here's what I found. A better way to live your life is to realize that you are in the driver's seat. You can take control.

You can pay them off. And then you don't have to hope that a student debt strike works. You don't have to hope that the next president solves all of your problems. And that is the biggest game changer to me is realizing that and putting yourself in the driver's seat instead of the backseat going, well, we're going wherever the driver takes us. And I also am sympathetic to, good grief, a young family just trying to figure out life and they just look at their budget and they were both making a pretty good salary for a starting wage

and they can't make the ends meet. Like my heart is broken because I've been there. I've paced my house at night when my wife was asleep wondering, I don't know what bill we're not going to pay. I don't know how this works because I was young and I had a lot of student loan debt. So I've been there too. The whole thing's a mess.

And anytime there's a mess in my world, you flip the lights on and you stop the music and you say, all right, let's take inventory. What's going on in this party? And then we'll start figuring out who's got to leave. And I think we've got to start there. We've got to flip all the lights on and say, we've got let's take inventory. What's going on in this party? And then we'll start figuring out who's got to leave, right? And I think we've got to start there. We've got to flip all the lights on and say we've got to solve the problem way upstairs. Or you just burn it down for the insurance money.

Don't do that. Don't do that on that positive note. I'm joking. We'll go to Alex in St. Petersburg, Florida. What's up, Alex? Hey, how are you guys doing today? Great. How are you, brother?

Good, good. I got a situation. We're looking for advice so i have a three-year-old and a one-year-old and we have our third on the way and actually my brother-in-law just came over who's going to be listening so i just want to say surprise we're having our third baby hey hold on a little bit you have a three-year-old, a one-year-old, and another one on the way? Correct, yes. Brother.

Listen, you're going to sleep again one day. It's going to be years from now, but you're going to sleep, and it's going to be great. Congratulations, man. Congratulations. Thank you. All right, so what's up? So my wife is a travel nurse now. She just started, and I've been home with the boys.

So obviously with her being pregnant, we're trying to decide you know should we buy a house here because we need to get a bigger house uh we have about 60k in debt but it's only student loans and our two cars so with us traveling what she's going to be making per week we can pay it off in no problem so we're just more we want a home base for us um you know for us to come back to in florida because we we plan on traveling you know maybe across the country even with the little guys and everything so i know it's going to be a lot of money we understand life changing now and rewarding later alex hold on hold the phone. You just flew by the fact that you had $60,000 in student loan debt and two car loans? No, no, no.

That's student loan debt and including the two cars, yeah. Oh, $60,000 total? Yeah. Okay. It was just very nonchalant. You were just like, yeah, I mean, all we got is just $60,000 in debt, but other than that, we're fine. We're going to go ahead and buy it. And so I just want to pause here and tell you that

you're not in a position right now to buy a house do you have any money saved uh we're just the emergency fund i mean we've been we've been killing it so she with the travel assignment she recently started she's making about four thousand a week so we're awesome no we're gonna we're gonna kill it in a short period of time so that's what leaves me with us traveling you know once we finish because there's an end date to the contract, do we come back to, you know, the house that we purchased or do we worry about that once we get home? I think you need to pause, man. If you need to get rid of this debt before you got the emergency fund, but you still got a pile of debt. We're doing things out of order here. Get rid of the

debt, fully fund the emergency fund, be investing, save up for the house and do it when you're financially ready. I know that's hard to hear. You've got three kids, man, but that's a tough situation. And I'm not buying a house while we're on the road. Nope. I'm just not. Thank you. today's scripture is from romans 15 2 our goal must be to empower others to do what is right and good for them and to bring them to spiritual maturity. John Maxwell says,

Power really is a test of character. In the hands of a person of integrity, it is of tremendous benefit. In the hands of a tyrant, it causes terrible destruction. Wow, I want to read that again. Because George is important. Because power can be, if you're the assistant director of the mail room

and you've got four people working with you, or if you're the president, or if you're elite, if you're in your home, power is important. Power really is a test of character. In the hands of a person of integrity, it is of tremendous benefit. In the hands of a tyrant, it causes terrible destruction. You know what you could swap that word with? Huh? Money. Yes. Oh, yeah. I like that. You like that? I swap that word with? Money. Yes.

Oh, yeah. I like that. You like that? I like that. All right, let's go to Edie in Tulsa, Oklahoma. What's up, Edie? Uh-oh. Couldn't hear you.

I can hear you. What's up? So can America. What's up, Edie? Uh-oh. I have a question for you, and I hope I word it correctly. Um, like, so it's understandable. Um, I have a 22 year old son who has wanted to start a business for a long time and he wants to take out a loan for $3,000 to start this business. He has never asked me for

money. Um, he wants to take out a loan or use a credit card because he feels like he'll get his money back very quickly. I don't think it's a good idea to be in debt. Obviously, you guys don't either. At 22 years old, I was not in debt and I feel like it causes anxiety and he already has that. So would it be smart for me to loan him the $3,000, or should I just say, no, it's not a good idea? What's your advice? Well, I've got my opinions, and that is you should not loan him money, and he should not go into debt, and you can't really tell him what to do. So here's the predicament.

Exactly. No, I agree. If I'm you and you want to support your son, you could gift him $3,000, and knowing he may never make that money back and this business could fail because he's 22 years old and he thinks he has it all figured out and this business is going to crush. And so therein lies the problem is there's a lot of assumptions on his part that this business is going to be great. What kind of business is it?

It's a clothing line. So he's in music production and he networks all over the United States. He's on the phone. He's on Twitter. He's just on every social media avenue. Well, I wouldn't say that. Not in the negative connotation. He works really hard is what George is saying.

He's a networker. Oh, so he doesn't do anything. He just connects. Okay, gotcha. Okay. Yeah, he's a networker. Oh, so he doesn't do anything. He just connects. Okay, gotcha. Okay. Yeah, he's a networker, but for growing up introverted, that's pretty awesome, I think. Great, great. So he's a great networker, and he feels like he has built this base of people that he talks to that are interested in the types of things that he wants to create. T-shirts, hats, different things that promote not only what he does,

so it's his name of the business. He already has an LLC that he went and got last year. But I just, you know, I think especially if you have anxiety, you're having panic attacks, you don't need to add money problems to that, and that's what I told him. So one of the cornerstones of helping with anxiety is connection. Somebody sees you, and they're walking alongside you. Here's what I would do if I was you.

And you can take this and just use it for two-ply. It's just a dude sitting in Tennessee. This is what I would do if my kid came to me with this plan. I would sit down and say, I want to be your number one investor, your chief one and only investor, and I'm going to give you startup seed money. I want to see a business plan, and I want a 24-month guarantee that you will not borrow money.

And so he's going to be able to get $3,000 risk-free from somebody he trusts. And this is you telling him, I believe in you. I believe in your business. You've shown over the last year you've got ILC, you're networking. Now we're going to see if this thing pays off, but I want to see a business plan because another thing anxiety, it's anxiety inducing is feeling untethered. I don't really know where I'm going or how I'm going to get there. And it kind of just builds and builds and builds and just starts rattling. A business plan gives somebody steps. It gives them some lanes to stay in,

right? And it feels restrictive, but it actually is a gift for somebody struggling with anxiety. And so if you walk and say, I'll help you, I'll help you design a business plan. But the only stipulation of my investment money, my seed money, my gift to you, and I guess investment, you're going to expect to be paid back. So this is seed money. This is a gift. I like that. Is you're going to sign this contract that you will not take out debt for 24 months. And again, George is right. He's 22 years old. He can do whatever he wants to. And if you're a mom that's going to sue him over it, I mean, it's kind of awesome,

but you're probably not going to do that. I love the idea of you being on the operating board and you're a shareholder in this thing. And then he may actually come to you for advice because you're supportive. That's right. There's not this weird tension of mom doesn't want me to do this and she's not on board but i would also say you don't need three thousand dollars to start a clothing line no it's 2022 you can do on-demand uh you know drop shipping where they order the shirt and then the shirt is made and you didn't pay for stock and inventory that that was his original plan, and I don't know why he went away from that.

That was the original plan of all. He may have gotten a little starry-eyed and found some equipment, some gear, some things that he wants to do that he doesn't have the money for. So here's my thing. If you're going to be a successful business owner, you better know how to make money. And so I would try to prove that concept first before digging three grand into this business. But if you are going to do it to support him, I love John's idea of making it seed money and supporting him along the way and making sure that he doesn't go into a pile

of debt for a business that very well could fail. All right, let's take one more call. We got to get right to it. Sally in New York City. Let's get right to your question before we run out of time. What's up? Yes. Hi, guys. I need your opinion on my current situation. I'm relocating from New York to Raleigh, North Carolina. And Raleigh is the third most in-demand market in the United States right now. The prices are just completely outrageous. I have been looking for a home for the past 30 days. The homes are overpriced by $100,000. People are offering $15,000, $20,000 over the asking price just to get their home. And the homes are staying on the market maybe a day or two, long enough to get the bids and take the highest bid. So I can hear your anger. Sally, I can hear your anger.

What's your question? I am so angry. You know, I'm trying to get out of here, and there's no end in sight with this housing market in Raleigh, and there's just no end. So I want your opinion on should I go ahead and proceed, buy a house, move to Raleigh, or should I wait until the market? How much money do you have? I'm sorry? How much money do you have

to buy this house? I'm probably going to pay, get about a $350,000 house between $350,000 and $400,000. Are you going to pay cash or are you going to take out a mortgage? No, I'm going to take out a mortgage but I'm going to put down about 50% because I want my mortgage payments to be very low. And so Sally, what I hear is that you have backed yourself into a corner. Either I move to only this place

and only buy a house or I'm stuck here in hell and I just got to ride this out until the end of time. And whenever we box ourselves into corners like this, we end up making rash decisions or anger fueled decisions. So what about exhaling and then saying, what if I moved to Raleigh and I just rent and the rent is overpriced, but maybe that adjusts in a year. And my down payment on my house is 40% instead of 50% because I rented for a year. I found out where I want to live. I waited until this market cooled off or I got some pretty key

indicators. It ain't cooling off anywhere. Or I stay in New York and I start to look at places that might be a little bit different than Raleigh, North Carolina. They might look the same, be in the same region, but I'm not going to go to that city because it's just too expensive for my budget and the life I want to live. Don't box yourself up into a corner. Took the words right out of my mouth, John. Oh, my gosh. We're getting better at this. We're connected.

I love it. Hey, thanks for your time, George. Good times, John. Awesome. Great show. Thank you to Ben Hill. Thank you to Jenna Sears. And, of course, Kelly Daniel in the corner. Producer, thanks for your time, George. Good time, John. Awesome. Great show. Thank you to Ben Hill. Thank you to Jenna Sears. And, of course, Kelly Daniel in the corner, producer James Childs.

Thank you all so much for listening to the show. We'll see you soon. Be kind to one another. This is The Ramsey Show. Did you know The Ramsey Show is one of the most popular podcasts in the world? Subscribe or follow today wherever you listen to podcasts. We'll see you next time.