The Ramsey Show - App - THIS Is the Key to Getting Out of Debt (Hour 2)

Episode Date: December 20, 2023

Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create actual amazing relationships. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host. Ken Coleman, Ramsey personality, number one best selling author of the book Paycheck to Purpose is my host this hour. The phone number is 888-825-5225. Merry Christmas to you, America. We're glad you're here. Kate's in San Antonio, Texas. Hi, Kate. How are you? Hi, how are y'all? Better than we deserve. What's up?

Um, yeah. So basically I kind of like just started, uh, I just got introduced to you. I started binging everything and I'm going to like try to be as fast as possible. Um, but, and so I'm trying to get working on the baby steps. Um, I'm like, yeah. So my problem is income. It's really not that great. And so I'm wanting to increase it. And I found some like courses that I think could really help me increase my income so that I can really like get ahead on this stuff. But unfortunately, like it kind of does involve, I guess, still borrowing money a little bit. And I don't know if that might be a good investment to make or if I should, I don't know, try to figure out something else. Okay. Let's start with some facts. What do you make right now and what are you doing to make

that? What's your income? Oh, yes. Yes, sir. So right now I make like $30,000 with one job. I work, you know, I have a day job. I have a job on the weekends that I make a couple hundred with as well. What are you doing? What kind of work for the $30,000? I work for the state. Okay. Doing what? Yeah. Like clerical work. Okay. What are these classes you're thinking about? So it's a business analytics class and I did a lot of research in my area and the salary for that can be up to, you know, 30 to 30 to 60 or sorry, not 30, 50 to 60,000 entry levels. What's the class cost? The class costs 9,000. You don't need to go in debt for that. Well, I don't have any way to save for it, really, because everything that I'm doing is kind of keeping me at a baseline and paying off the base of my debt right now.

How much debt do you have now? Like $30,000. On what? For student loans, my car, and stuff like that. What's your degree in? Oh, I didn't finish. That was just for one semester. $30,000 for one semester?

Well, not, sorry, for one year, not one semester. Still? Okay, wow. How much is the car of that debt? $10,000. So what are you, 25? Yeah. Okay.

You sound like it. Yes, sir. Sounds like about the – it takes about that long to make a mess this big. Okay. You're okay. Yeah, I'm trying to get out of it. That's why I wanted, like, for example – Here's what we need to do.

We need to back up. Yes, sir. The thing that's motivating you is I need a better job. I need a better career field. That's what's motivating you, and I agree with that motivation. Is that correct? Yes, sir, basically. Yeah, I don't want to be a secretary at the state making 30.

I want to be doing something that makes 60, 80, 90, or 100. That's what was running through your brain. That's what got us here. It wasn't you woke up one morning and go, you know, since I was six, I always wanted to do business analytics. That didn't come up. You just were looking for some more money. Am I right?

Yes, sir. Okay. Yes, sir. So that means you have called on the perfect day because Ken Coleman's goal in life is to help you find the highest paying possible job that you are passionate about and good at and love going to work every day, not just more money. And it's not business analytics for you. So you're on, Ken. Ready? Go. Yeah. Well, I think you've done a lot of thinking about the type of work that you love. You thought about it when you went into college. What do you want to do? And

don't get hung up on job title. What kind of work would you love to do? If you knew you couldn't fail and we got you fast forward into the type of work, what kind of work do you want to do? Yes. So really, I would love to be an educator. And I did work in education. That's kind of also what was helping me, like, with school and stuff. I was like, okay, I can get this job and I can be an educator, but... Teaching who? Teaching those people what? For me, it was typically about middle age to high school kids. Okay, middle school, high school.

Yes, middle school, high school, I'm. Middle school, high school. Yes, sir. Middle school, high school. I'm very passionate about, like, you know, geography, social studies, and world languages. So I would really like to teach them those about those things. So the problem with that is, or it's not a problem, the requirement for that is you've got to have a degree. Yes, sir. And we can't afford school right now.

Right. So as long as we know what the long-term play is, now we begin to back into this and we go, okay, we know what it takes to get out of debt, and we're going to walk you through the baby steps. We can help you there. But we've got to take care of that now so that we position ourselves for the next. So the 35-year-old Kate is in high school teaching geography.

Yes, sir. Now, what are the steps to get there? Yes. So we got to get out of debt first, right? We can't go to school. We're not going to get a student loan. I just pulled up a headline. Today, millions of people are not paying their student loan payment right now.

So I don't want you to do what everybody else is doing, because what everybody else is doing is going to make you further broke. Yep. All right. So we've got to get out of debt now and then we've got to cash flow school so that you can come out and make the median income for teachers in the United States right now is about $61,000. But that could be higher depending on where you teach. The next class you take is going to be after you're debt-free, and it's going to be towards becoming a geography teacher in high school. That's right. That's the next class you take.

It's not a business analytics class, and you're going to pay cash for that class when you take it. In the meantime, what are we going to do? Every high-paying side job that you can come up with you don't need to see the inside of a restaurant unless you're working there you don't need to go on vacation you need to go get your life back because right now all this crap owns you you don't own it and so you're about to get in gear i want you working 80 90 hours a week every high paying side hustle i don't want you taking anything cute or fun on the side I want you working 80, 90 hours a week, every high paying side hustle. I don't want you

taking anything cute or fun on the side. I want you to take stuff that makes a lot of money. As long as it's legal and moral and you're not ashamed to do it, I want you to go do it right now. I want you to make as much if you walk dogs or you pick up dog poop. I don't care what it is. I want you to make as much money as you can make in a short period of time. Ready, set, go. Because the faster you get this debt paid off and the faster you have $10,000 in the bank is how fast you take the first class and then the second class and then the third class and then you become a geography teacher. Don't worry about overworking. Just before you die, you will pass out. Don't worry about it.

Have at it. Go for it. Go for it. Go for it. Go for it. Hustle. Grind. Get it. Get it. Get it. Get it. That's how you do it. Hold on. We're going to have Austin pick up and get you signed up for Ken's stuff. We're going to give it all to you free. It's the Get Clear Assessment. You need to take that and make sure you're right on track. And the From Paycheck

to Purpose book. We're going to give them both to you. Now get it. Get it. Here's the deal, Kate. $2,500 a month would knock this debt out in one year. Now get it. Get it. Here's the deal, Kate. $2,500 a month would knock this debt out in one year. It is doable. Doing it the way Dave told you. It's just working really hard and putting every cent towards the debt. Get it. Ken Coleman, Ramsey Personality is my co-host today. Number one bestselling author of the book, Paycheck to Purpose, the book Proximity Principle, both of them number ones. He also did an assessment that we gave that last caller called the Get Clear Assessment.

It is one of the most popular things in the Ramsey store right now. A ton of you come and get that. Ken, what do we charge for it like 30 bucks 30 bucks 30 bucks and it takes you about uh 20-25 minutes to take the thing max oh yeah maybe less yeah and then it spits out the things you are good at the things you love the passions yeah and helps you identify the direction you're going it It's not merely a personality profile. We have the DISC personality profile in our store as well, and a lot of people take that.

I love that. I've used it for almost 40 years now. But this Get Clear assessment is a step, two step, three steps beyond that in that it takes that same kind of information and then says, okay, here's where you'll end up, right? Yeah. Well, it's a self-awareness profile. It lets you know, okay, if I have a lack of confidence, maybe I'm feeling a little imposter syndrome. This is what I'm really good at. In other words, your skills. Think of your skills or talents as power tools. Then the second measurement is passion. In other words, what work do I look forward to and lose

myself in? And then the third element is what motivates me? You ever wondered if you need to go to a conference or read a book to get motivated? The answer is you really don't. Motivation is about understanding what gets you up out of bed because these results fire you up. So the three elements come together. We call it a purpose statement, and it shows you what purpose in work looks like, and it's actually a job description. If I spend most of my day using what I do best to do what I love to produce results that matter to me, guess what? I'm on fire. And you have a famous phrase, you know,

you can't light wet wood. It's the idea of you want to hire people who know what they're supposed to be doing with their life. And that's what this is. It gives you great personal and professional direction. Yeah. I think that probably comes from that guy that came in one day and said, I'm burnt out. And I said, that's impossible. You were never on fire. I love that story. Yeah. And that's an example, right? Like he guy had no idea what seat on the bus or even what bus he belonged on. And here's the key to that, to get clear assessment of why it matters. If you want to increase your income, you'll do it by increasing your impact. And when you are attractive as a candidate, as an actual employee getting promoted, that all leads to a bigger paycheck, which means we get through the baby steps faster. That's the time.

And in the hiring and firing sections in Entrez Leadership, when we're teaching businesses and leaders about proper hiring and firing, one of the things I tell people to look for, one of the 12 hiring principles, is hire people whose eyes light up when they talk about doing that job. So good. You know, their body language changes, their octave changes, their eyes sparkle when they talk about the opportunity to do that job. That's the kind of thing you need to be aiming at with your life, and Get Clear helps you do that. That's the kind of thing you need to be aiming at with your life. And Get Clear helps you do that.

That's why I'm so proud of this material. It does really well, Ken. It's wonderful stuff. Thank you. All right. Daryl's in Roanoke, Virginia. Hi, Daryl. Welcome to the Ramsey Show.

Hey, Dave and Ken. Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas, sir. How can we help? Thanks for taking my call. For my question to make sense i'm gonna lead in with a couple quick points um i'm getting ready to turn 53 i'm already retired uh my wife is scheduled to receive my pension um if i pass away before her we just paid off our house we are

otherwise debt free and i'm 30 years into a term life policy and I really want to let go of it before it gets expensive so I was just calling to see if that would be the good thing for me to do. How much have you got in investments? How much do I have in investments? Yes sir. I have my pension from my former employer. That's a pay stream to your wife if you die. I'm talking about investments. I have very little because we were kind of a low-income family, and I didn't really have much to put away.

30-year term is out there, but 30-year term is unusual. You sure you have term insurance? You sure it's not whole life or universal life? No, I've already been paying it because when I was in the military and I was 23, I started it. Yeah, that doesn't mean it's term insurance necessarily. I'm asking, it's unusual to have a 30-year term insurance policy. You mean it's been a level term for 30 years. You've never had an increase in pay in the premium?

No, no, the premium's increased. I'm just saying I'm 30 years into it. So every year it's increased? It started out at $5 a month. How often did it increase? About every five years. I'm up to $40 a month now. Okay. And for how much insurance? $100,000. Okay. All right. Well, the way we answer your question is, it sounds like you did buy a

renewable term, and it's just your age is catching up with you because, of course, statistically, the older you are, the more likely you are to die no kidding and they charge more for it that's how that works right so um the way we answer the question is if you died a day without a hundred thousand dollars in term insurance with a paid for house the kids are grown and gone or no kids um we have one left in home but he's an adult and he'll probably be out in the next couple years. Okay. Well, he might be out tomorrow if you died today, because I'm not sure your wife can afford him without $100,000,

because all she's got to live on is your pension, right? I have a 457 of about $35,000. She is a teacher's aide, a teaching assistant with the local schools, and she has a retirement with the state's pension. Okay. So if you die, can she be okay without the hundred thousand mathematically not emotionally uh that's that's why yeah without any um professional advice i feel like she would but that's well i mean it's pretty much math i mean mean, her pension, your pension, and no bills except insurance on the house

and taxes on the house because there's no debt. She's not going to be supporting a grown person. He's going to be gone. And with your pension, her pension, and whether or not she works the little teacher's aid job or not, can she pay her bills? That's the question. You know that.

You don't need professional help for that. You can do a budget and look at that yeah well we right now we um with my pension and her pay and my va disability where your va disability goes away when you do right yeah she wouldn't have that 50 sticks right now she wouldn't have that so can she pay her bills on your pension which she gets if you die right to my calculation she could okay and talk to her about that right before you drop this because if forty dollars forty dollars means your wife is taken care of you keep the policy but if it doesn't but if your wife's taken care of without it and the two of you agree that you know we're paying for something we don't need then you can release it because basically the

rule works like this the way you think about it is this if the kids are because if you got to feed kids if they're little we got to pay debt if we have debt but if the kids are grown and gone everything's paid off house and everything and we have a pile of money and you die, mathematically, she isn't going to notice. You don't have a pile of money, but you got a pension. So mathematically, that's when you become self-insured with financial planning. So you have, you know, for the rest of you out there, you know, you're 56, the kids are grown and gone, the house is paid off, everything everything's paid off and you got $700,000 and a 401k and you die I think she can probably make it you've become self-insured by investing

and getting out of debt and your need for insurance raising the kids and kicking them out that that's that's what does it okay but if you buy you know if you keep the mortgage keep the kids and keep the debt, you're going to need to keep insurance. So financial planning, working the steps that we talk about, puts you in a position that you're self-insured. I think you may be. You're right on the bubble.

I mean, if you told me you had $300,000 in a mutual fund in your 401K, I'd feel a whole lot better, but you don't. In your case, I think she's okay, but I want her to be okay with being okay. This is The Ramsey Show. Hey, you guys. Health insurance costs are only moving one way, and that way isn't down. And if higher costs aren't enough, the wait times to see your doctor are longer, and it's harder than ever to get anything approved through the bureaucracy. So if you feel like the system is working against you, try a biblically-based alternative to health insurance, Christian Healthcare Ministries. CHM is a health cost-sharing ministry that's helped hundreds of thousands of families like yours take care of over

$11 billion in medical bills since 1981. And CHM has also helped them stay true to their values and avoid miles of red tape. And CHM support goes far beyond meeting financial needs. They'll also help meet spiritual needs. Members become part of a family who will pray with them and for them when they experience a medical event. So listen, y'all, there's no better way to take care of health care costs. CHM programs start as low as $98 a month. So learn more today and join at chministries.org slash budget. That's chministries dot org slash budgets ken coleman ramsey personality is my co-host today in the lobby of ramsey solutions on the

debt-free stage joel is with us hi joel how are you man better than i deserve very cool merry christmas to you good christmas to you where Where do you live? Lancaster, Pennsylvania. Lancaster. Awesome. Welcome. Good to have you, brother. And how much debt have you paid off? $65,437.01. Love it. How long did this take?

33 months. Good for you. And your range of income during that time? $42,000 to $106,500. I like that. In a little under three years, you triple your income. Almost triple your income. What in the world? What do you do for a living? IT. And were you in that field before? I was in the field during, and I did take a side job for about three weeks at McDonald's. And during that time, people from town went through the drive-through and they were asking

me, what are you doing there? And I said, I got pay there you go so i had a few people ask me if i could help them with it problems networks and long story short i helped a lot of local businesses wire up computer networks and do wi-fi for large buildings yeah good for you and they made some good that's some great side money yeah good side hustle using your uh using your your uh skills excellent job what kind of debt was the 65 000 yeah so i had two credit cards and a lot of health care debt and a bunch of uh stuff pop up from a divorce so i just had a lot of surprises along the way and during my debt free process um i had a lot of health issues so i had a lot ongoing expenses so the majority of my debt

was actually paid off in the last six months wow okay how you doing now health-wise much better good i'm glad getting all debt was probably the best medicine it is good medicine uh your your body doesn't have to carry around that stress yeah and it's heavy very heavy yeah so that's very cool very cool and you get the health behind you that you end up with more money because that's expensive. Yeah. Yeah. I'm sorry you went through that, but I'm glad you're here now. Well done.

Well done. So what started this whole process 33 months ago with the Ramsey process? That's a good question. It actually started with a really low point in my life. Woke up one day and I was separated. So I was scared. It was the first day of the lockdown um so one of the first things i did is i actually emailed the show someone reached

out and responded and said they would hook me up with a uh ramsey coach your wife leaves on the first day of the lockdown yeah her timing sucks yep wow so i actually it was a four-year process but the first year i had to get i had to move on from that um but regards it started with that financial coach and she really calmed me down and got one of the ramsey coaches yeah okay and um you know she pointed out that i didn't have to pay all the expensive money for a divorce so i found a lawyer that did it pro bono. Oh, wow. Yeah. Okay. So from there, and the secret I found to get out of debt is I had to surround myself with people. So whether it was support groups, going biking with the guys, just finding more work, getting to know people, gotten involved with the church, I had just found myself surrounded. And the most important people were my parents. My father's actually here with me. And to be honest honest i think a big part of the reason why i got out that's because my parents brought

me up right yeah yeah well i mean you you your life has been completely turned upside down and transformed and in the middle of that you said i am not carrying this debt wow i mean you're facing health issues a divorce a pandemic uh pandemic. I mean, God almighty, you get the Fauci quarantine and a dadgum separation and divorce all in the same lick, and that had to mess up your income simultaneously. And was your health bad about the same time? Quite bad. I mean, you got like a perfect storm crap going on there. That's amazing. Wow. So I want to follow up there because I think there are a lot of people

that are watching and listening to your story right now. And they got a lot of other factors going on in their life that are bad and maybe causing the money issues. And they look at getting out of debt and it seems insurmountable. I'm just curious with everything that Dave just laid out that you shared that you were going through, how much did the focus on the baby steps, the focus to get out of baby step two, how much did that help you overcome all that other garbage that you were dealing with? Did it play a factor? A huge factor, to be honest. How so? I was in the first and second step going in and out. There were some months where I would deplete that thousand dollar emergency fund. And again, going back to people and surround myself,

there were some months that were tough, so people from the church would feed me. Mom would feed me, stuff like that. And God showed up in amazing ways. I should have actually owed more debt, but I even had a local church step up and help me pay off some of my medical bills. So God was behind every corner of it.

That's powerful. Wow, look at you. Well done, sir, I'm proud of it. That's powerful. Wow. Look at you. Well done, sir. I'm proud of you. You're a hero. You fought through some pretty serious stuff there. It's amazing.

I mean, and now you're the other side of all of it. Wow. Yeah. And a funny fact, actually, when I first started off with my debt-free journey, I didn't have any feeling behind it. Like, it was like, why get out of debt? There was just no emotion behind it at the time. So one of the things i said to myself well if i get out debt i'm gonna do that free screen so here i am today oh so that's like your motivation on that stage

yeah so we have to mark this puppy gonna have some reason to be excited about this right we're going to nashville load up the truck and head to beverly i love it man good for you well done well done i like that that's fun well you gotta have something to aim at it's one of the reasons we do this people have this as a milestone the main reason we do it is all the people listening they're going to be inspired because there's somebody out there right now that's facing a job loss a health problem and maybe even a relationship problem all at the same time and they probably have 65 000 in debt and look at that and they then you're sitting up here going you can do it just your life says they can do it the way you've lived your life so well well done proud of you

very well done um you did most of it in the last six months yes so like half of it just about half so you've been you been, but your income came up from 42 to 106. So you had a great income. You had your health back. You could see the end of the finish line. There's a light at the end of the tunnel. It's not a train. And so you're just running hard the last six months. Yeah. It actually got a little easier because I figured out how to do my side work more or actually work less and get more done. So it, it, it was really neat. It was a great learning experience. I got probably the best part of the debt-free process was finding out what

I am made of and who I am. That's awesome. I was going to ask, what's the emotional kickback now that you're done with this? You're about ready to do the scream, so we're not at the finish line yet because I know that matters to you. But emotionally, as you look forward in life, relationally, professionally, how do you feel about yourself yeah um for the first time i'm hopeful happy and um i i can truly say that i'm resilient you are you are you are so the ramsey coaches that's one of the things about the ramsey coaches there's several thousand of them that we've trained around some of watching right now some of our best and brightest some of our best coaches right here right now came down to watch this from inside our building but we've got them all over

the nation that have been trained by us and one of the things they do when i occasionally get someone intersect my life that's at the very very very bottom where you were when all that stuff happened and then you don't have the strength to carry yourself right then they just pick you up and carry you through that so true they get the first few steps under you and just hold you up and then once your feet start touching the ground again you can they'll let you go let you run but uh but somebody sometimes you just gotta have somebody walk with you and you had a coach step in and do that exact thing with you i'm so proud of you guys well done sir you and those guys the coach that helped you well done very very very well done what do you tell people the key to getting out of debt is? Do the baby steps one at a time.

In order. In order. There's a reason that one is before two is before three. Yep. And if the next one doesn't make sense, focus on the current one. Yeah, I like that. That's good. Four is after three for a reason.

Yeah, that's good. I like that. Very good. All right, we've got the live and give box for you, the Baby Steps Millionaires book, which that's the next chapter in your story. The Total Money Makeover book to give to someone that's struggling and hurting. Financial Peace University membership. All of that is for you to enjoy or give away. And our way of saying thanks for coming down from Lancaster, Pennsylvania to do your debt-free scream.

Joe, you're amazing. Yeah. You're amazing, dude. You're a hero 65 000 paid off in 33 months making 42 to 106 while life happened count it down let's hear a debt-free scream three two one i'm debt-free there it is that's the reason he's been punching him for that moment. Boom! Boom! This is the Ramsey Show.

Ken Coleman, Ramsey personality, is my co-host today. We're glad you're with us. Merry Christmas, America. Eric is in Indianapolis. Eric, welcome to the Ramsey Show. Gentlemen, thank you for taking my call. It's an honor to speak with us. Merry Christmas, America. Eric is in Indianapolis. Eric, welcome to the Ramsey Show. Gentlemen, thank you for taking my call. It's an honor to speak with you. Honor to speak with you.

What's up? My question is, about a month ago, my wife and I decided that we were going to take the final amount of our mortgage, which was about $49,000, and pay it off. Good. Because we wanted to be debt-free, and we didn't want it just sitting in our bank account. My concern is since that's occurred, I've not received anything from the bank saying that I paid it off. When I look on my account online, it's all zeros.

That's good. But I don't have any sort of documentation other than that. What kind of mortgage did you have, a traditional mortgage or a bank loan or what? It was a VA home loan. Okay, with who? It was through Chase. Okay, all right. Chase is roughly the size of the federal government and about as efficient. Okay? So not to panic. Number one, you've got zeros on your account, so that's a good sign. I think you have paid it off. There's not a question they think you've paid it off. You think you've paid it off, right?

Correct. So technically what needs to occur is they will file a lien release, a mortgage payoff at a release of deed, a release of the deed of trust, a release of note at your federal, at your local county seat courthouse. If you live in Indy, it's Indy. Okay. Whatever, whatever county you live in, the courthouse records the deeds and they also record the mortgage release that is the important thing because that clears your title typically they will send that to the deed when they finally get around to doing it it might take them three months okay i wouldn't worry

about it but they'll typically send it to the register of deeds, the mortgage release. The register will file it, stamp it, send it back to them, and they'll send it to you. If you are worried about it at some point and maybe they never sent it to you, you don't have to have the receipt. The only person that has to have the receipt is the courthouse. It needs to be recorded as being paid off, a lien release, a mortgage payoff release, okay, form at the courthouse. So, you know, that's what you want to verify has been done if you want to be nerdy about it.

You want to call the courthouse or go down there and say, hey, look up my mortgage. I paid it off. I want to see if they have released the lien yet. I want to see if theythouse or go down there and say hey look up my mortgage i paid it off i want to see if they have released the lien yet i want to see if they've released the mortgage and it's a one-page thing you're going to get a little little bit of it looks like a little uh legal document that's one page long it'll be folded up have a couple of red stamps on it from being filed at the courthouse it'll be in your mailbox they'll send it to you it's like the final paid receipt kind of thing but all they're doing is giving you a copy of what was filed at the courthouse you can lose that and it won't matter what matters is that the register of deeds at the courthouse doesn't lose it that matters

follow me understood okay so check check courthouse in uh end of january if you hadn't heard anything and start calling chase and go dude y'all need to release this mortgage what the crap it's been it's been 90 days get off your butt you know and and you know start jacking on them a little bit because they're they truly are i mean it's like working with a dmv i mean they're just they're awful it's just they're they're horrible these mega banks are just the worst um but they will get around to it they do have a system but they are in no hurry to them it's one of you're one of 80 bazillion people that that they're doing this with yeah i love that quote you said they're bigger than the federal government it's really true the amount of

people they're not going to move quickly for you because the honestly they have to be in a state of shock that someone actually paid their house off that That's part of it. No, they get, I mean, it's just, but it's, you think about how many mortgages Chase owns. Yeah, it's a lot. I mean, how many credit cards Chase, I mean, how many towers full of people that work for them and don't do their work most days because they hate their job. And, you know, oh my God, it's just pitiful. So that's what you're dealing with. Yeah.

Eva is in Brooklyn. Hi, Eva. Welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hi, Dave and Ken. Thank you for having me. Sure. What's up? So I currently have credit card debt at a 0% interest rate, which will begin

accruing interest in May. This was before I was a listener. And I'm contemplating whether I should use stocks or mutual funds to pay it off. Alternatively, I could become Morgan Sell intense about paying it off over the next five months. How much credit card debt do you have? $18,000. What do you make a year? Now I make $150,000. Good for you.

What do you do for a living? I work in the architecture field. You're amazing. Well done. How much have you do for a living? I work in the architecture field. You're amazing. Well done. How much have you got in a single stock? So I have $30K in stocks, and that would be considered short-term gains. And then I have $160K in mutual funds, which would be long-term, and then $40K in retirement. Good for you.

Well done. I'd pull enough out of the mutual funds today, pay it off today. Okay. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter it doesn't matter why are you kidding me you're playing footsie with this stuff it's just a it's you got a mosquito in your house you know just shoot the thing okay and i won't be charged more taxes or fees you'll be paid you'll be charged taxes on whatever you cash out in those mutual funds you said it's long-term gain so it'll be a 15 gain on the gain if there is any gain and i don't know when you put the mutual funds in what your basis is but we know a hundred percent of it's not a gain so let's say there's a two thousand dollar gain on what you pull out uh you might have three hundred dollars

in taxes but i don't give a crap get rid of this credit card debt cut up those stupid cards too get out of that business i already have yeah you're too smart for that business get away from those people they're not good for you okay we'll do thank you yeah the percentage interest doesn't matter the idea of being free matters what's you know it's just it's We have completely, and I guess it's because we got trained by these ripoff industries with this debt products. Sure. But to be normalized. It's normal to have a credit card. Everybody has a car payment.

Everybody has a mortgage. Everybody. Oh, shut up. Everybody's broke and dumb, too. i don't want to do that that won't be everybody that's crazy but we get so normalized with this stuff that they have tricked us into only analyzing our personal situation through the lens of math yeah we are leaving out the emotional relational spiritual bandwidth that is being taken up now let's just talk about this for a great seriously this woman makes 150 000 a year she is smart yeah she's a brilliant

accomplished okay and the amount of bandwidth she had to make a phone call to a national radio show because eighteen thousand dollars at zero percent has taken up bandwidth when she's got $100,000 laying in a mutual fund. Correct. Because the 0% we've been taught, you're exactly right. This is the matrix. No, she didn't want to feel dumb. Right.

She didn't want to feel wrong. Yeah. She wanted somebody that's an expert. Yeah. You know, somebody with a briefcase 20 miles from home to tell her what to do, right? Right. And I'm not picking on her it's just the state of our psyche is my point is to consider this whole debt issue only through the lens of math is extremely naive

there are so many more layers to slavery than the simple math slaves don't have choices slaves lay awake at night worrying about where they're going to eat. Slaves aren't generous. Slaves have a different personality style. Slaves keep a job that they don't want to keep because they've got to pay the bills. Slaves are not even as nice to their own spouses. The borrower is slave to the lender. There are elements, there are layers in our lives that are much bigger than

the 0% interest, and yet we've been taught that, oh, well, I mean, you could borrow money at 0% and put it in a mutual fund. The psychological weight, the anxiety of that is not even brought up. That's right. This is really about freedom, and everybody longs to be free to make a choice to do what they want to do when they want to do it. And you can't do that when you're shackled to debt. That's the big takeaway. And she's not shackled in a way that's limiting her. No. But it's just interesting.

But it changes the way she thinks. In a brain as smart as hers. Yeah. And she's just an example. I mean, I think she's awesome. Oh, yeah. I'm not picking on her. Yeah.

But in a brain as smart as hers, this 18,000 at 0% was taking up way more space than she realized it was. That's exactly right. In her brain. That is not 0%. That's correct. That's a very good point. That's the matrix, though. They've trained us to think, well, the number's good, so put up with it.

Because it's a good number. Yeah. I'm smart because I got 0%. Yeah. It's their money. I mean, this couch I'm sitting on, zero percent. 90 days, same as cash. It rooms there, they went.

Oh, my gosh. This is the Ramsey Show.