The Ramsey Show - App - Walmart, NFTs, the Metaverse, & Virtual Pigs (Hour 1)

Episode Date: January 17, 2022

Home Selling, Debt, Insurance, Home Buying, Career As heard on this episode: Sign Up for a FREE trial of Ramsey+ TODAY: https://bit.ly/3rZTUAx Tools to get you started:  Debt Calculator: https://bit.ly/2Q64HME Insurance Coverage Checkup: https://bit.ly/3sXwUn5 Complete Guide to Budgeting: https://bit.ly/3utmVXi Check out more Ramsey Network podcasts: https://bit.ly/3fHhbVE

I'm out. 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. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host, Dr. John Deloney, host of the Dr. John Deloney Show, and best-selling author is my co-host today as we talk about your relationships, your career, your work, your money, and your life.

And we're going to do it all right in front of you. It's a free call at 888-825-5225. Tyler is going to start us off in Atlanta. Hey, Tyler, welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hey, Dave, thanks for taking my call. Appreciate your time. Sure, what's up? So, Kate, I got a situation.

We just recently sold a property. After the mortgage paid off, netted a million dollars. Oh, I hate it when that happens. Oh, what a bummer, man. It's awful. You all okay? You're going to be okay? You going to be all right? I'm above ground, so I think I'm going to be all a bummer, man. Are you all okay? You're going to be okay? You're going to be all right?

I'm above ground, so I think I'm going to be all right. Congratulations, man. That's awesome. But what I'm trying to figure out is do I invest? We've got another property that's got a mortgage on it

with a great interest rate. I've considered rebuilding the house that we just sold, and I think it's going to be appreciated right out of the gate, but I just try to look for some direction on what you would recommend. Were you living in this house? It was our primary residence, yes.

Okay. Where are you going to live? We have a second home, too. Is that where you're going to live? That's where we're living now, yeah. Is that what you're going to live for five years or whatever i mean what's this building thing well it was a lake property you know you own lake properties and stuff but the market where it came from is just through the roof and it's cheaper to build one right now than to buy one in this area another

like another lake property. Correct. Okay. All right. I mean, if you're going to use the money for that, that's fine. You got rid of one lake property, you're going to build another one and net out some bucks, it sounds like, right? Well, I would have a paid-off lake house. Yeah, yeah.

I would have no mortgage on it. I still have a mortgage on the home that we're in now. And what do you owe on that? But we've been $300,000. Okay. Well, what are you going to spend on the home that we're in now. And what do you owe on that? We've been $300,000. Okay. Well, what are you going to spend on the lake house? Probably a million. Okay. What do you make? Combined

between my wife and I is $150,000. Okay. Well, you've done really well. Congratulations. My temptation would be to go and get my house paid off and then back into the lake house maybe a year later or something and maybe do a million, maybe do an 800 or something. I don't know. But it sure would be cool if out of all this surplus that you've ended up with here,

when you took your chips off the table, if you ended up completely debt-free when the smoke cleared, wouldn't it? Yes, that would be very nice. And I think that's probably my goal if I'm in your shoes, and I think that's what you're asking. But you've got a lot of options on the table. You can do whatever you want to do. You've done really well. Congratulations.

I'm always going to move towards 100% debt freedom as fast as i can within reason in your in a case like yours there's no reason to panic uh but if you're going to go buy a build a lake house a second home a toy while you still have a mortgage on your residence i'm i'm not doing that i'm gonna get rid of my mortgage and be debt free and then i'm going to start talking about buying toys um but i do have to keep in mind that the money just came from the last lake house deal. So you've got to, you know, there's nothing on fire here, no panic here, but if I reverse engineer this, would I borrow on my home to build a lake house, not in a million years?

And if effectively that's what you're ending up doing, I wouldn't do that. Yeah, I think I'd be debt-free before the day's over. Yeah, I'd check the day, pay off the house, then we'll figure out what we're doing from there. If you're going to do another lake house, that'd be great. And as you know, I'm a big fan of lake houses, because I have one. It's one of my favorite places on the planet, anyway. Thanks for the call. Hyman's with us in Philadelphia. Hi, Hyman. How are you? Hey, Dave.

Nice to get to you. Thank you for taking my call. Sure. I have a question. I recently stormed out of Philadelphia, Chester County area, and the federal government that came in and said for folks that had damages, you can apply for some kind of support. I did fill out the application. A lot of folks got grants. And for me, they gave me a loan. Oh, no. Why'd you do that?

Yeah, everybody else got grants, but they offered me a loan. Yeah, no, I'll pay. That's okay. I don't need a loan. Yeah, with my income. So that's what I was calling. I kind of knew the answer there you were going to ask. So I have about $45,000 in an emergency fund money market,

and I have about $44,000 in a saving account. My basement is destroyed. The kids can't play in it, and I warned the assistant if I should. What will they take to fix the basement? They said it's about $20,000, $23,000. Who's they? Contractors and also the federal government. So you can fix it for $20,000 and you have $80,000. I got $44,000, yes.

I thought you said you had $44,000 and you had $40,000 and something else. In a money market account, yeah. So you have $80,000. You have $80,000. I thought you said you had 44 and you had 40 and something else. In a money market account, yeah. So you have 80. You have 80,000. Don't do this. Don't get connected. Don't take a loan from the government. All of that.

You know that. You know that. You have the money. Fix the basement. Don't go in debt to the government. God help us. Yeah, I just paid off, you know you know sixty thousand dollars in debt so and the only thing we have is our mortgage nothing that's awesome i'm glad you did that but that doesn't

have anything to do with you taking a loan from the government and worse don't go back into debt you just got out of this man can i sneak another question i know you're open time i don't know don't know. Are you going to borrow money from the government or not? If it's about borrowing money from the government, just hang up. Are you going to borrow money? No, I'm not going to borrow it. I know the answer on that one. Okay, good.

My daughter. Then you can ask another question. Yeah, my daughter is 14. She's about to go to college. Like I said, I just paid off $6,000 in debt, no car payment. The only car payment, only debt i have is mortgage um should we should i be paying extra on my mortgage or putting more money toward her college fund she got about four more years you need to have a plan for her to go to school debt free and uh and beyond that you put money towards your mortgage

but you need to have a plan you need to map out where she's going to go what it's going to cost and how much she's going to work and how much she's going to go get the scholarships and um how her grades are doing and all of that kind of stuff and then we go okay this is what it's going to cost and here's the money and we're going to set our goals now five years out and And then based on that, you can tell if you have any money left over to pay extra on the mortgage. But baby step five is kids' college. Six is pay extra on the mortgage. We've got a book out that was a bestseller called Debt-Free Degree.

It's how to go to college debt-free. I'll send you a copy of that, and you guys can unpack that together and make out a plan. I actually want you to get four colleges two one or two that she thinks she wants to go to one that's in your area and then a what i would call a fallback like a like a here's a good place we can go to college it's going to be an economical choice and run those numbers that david's talking about on all of them and you can spread them across and see what your options are and what you're thinking about yeah and then you can save and you can ask yourself yeah is that degree over there really worth more than that same degree over here exactly you can ask yourself that question

and you'll probably say nope but it's a good idea to lay it out it's a great exercise this is the Ramsey Show Most people know me as the guy who did stupid with a lot of zeros on the end. I made my first million dollars in my 20s the wrong way and then went bankrupt. That's when I set out to learn God's ways of managing money and developed the Ramsey Baby Steps. By following these steps, I became a millionaire again, and this time the right way. After three decades of guiding millions of others through the plan, the evidence is undeniable. If you follow the Baby baby steps, you will become a millionaire and get to live and give like no one else. My new book, Baby Steps Millionaires,

is now available for purchase. When you order my new book, you'll learn how ordinary people built extraordinary wealth and how you can do it too. I'll walk you through how to invest, build wealth, and bust through the barriers preventing you from becoming a millionaire. Baby step your way to becoming a millionaire. Get your copy today at RamseySolutions.com. That's Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today as we talk about your life and your money. Parker is in Phoenix, Arizona. Hey, Parker, what's up? Hey, how are you guys?

Better than I deserve, sir. How can we help? Thank you for everything you do. My wife and I have been married for two years, and we're just sorting out our life insurance. We have a friend that works for one of the big life insurance companies, and instead of a traditional term life insurance plan, they offered us a decreasing term life insurance plan. And we're trying to grapple with

what that means and if that's a good option for us. So for roughly the same cost as a 20-year, $1 million traditional term plan, it would start out at $1.7 million, and then after six years, it would drop $600,000 to $1.1 million, and then after 10 more years, it would drop another $400,000, and then it would stay at $700,000 for the last few years. For roughly the same cost as what? As a million-dollar traditional. Oh, a million-dollar level with that company. Correct.

I know the goal with term life insurance is to self-insure over the period of the term. Exactly. But it also seems like with inflation and with raises over that time, the payout at the end, if we ever needed it, would seem quite a bit smaller. So I'm just trying to grapple with those two principles. Well, as you get out of debt and as your wealth increases and as your children age, your need decreases. So decreasing term actually follows your life, technically speaking,

meaning that as your net worth increases, because you've got more and more and more in your 401K, so instead of having $50,000 in your 401K, you've got a half million in your 401K, that lowers your need for insurance, agreed? And if you paid off all your debt, your half-million-dollar house during that time, that lowers your need during that time.

If your kids are 16 years old they're going to be at home three or four more years if you died versus if they're six months old they're going to be there 20 years if you died that lowers your need for math and lowers your need for money does that make sense so decreasing term technically does follow the idea of becoming self-insured gradually. However, having said that, the products typically aren't that great. Typically, the level term insurance when you shop it will beat the decreasing term substantially. And I'm going to guess the reason it's not is the company you're talking to has structured their products poorly. So I'll bet if you shop that term insurance company you're talking to has structured their products poorly so i'll bet if you shop that term insurance you're probably going to find a much better deal on level term insurance 15 to

20 year level term the difference in that and decreasing term across the whole market is not substantial and it doesn't decrease so i've always bought level with the idea that I was just going to let it go when I needed to. So who's the company? New York Life, I believe. Yeah. Not a term company, a whole life company. Their term products suck and are too expensive. So my theory is proven right.

So what you need to do is go to zanderinsurance.com and shop level term and it will whip new york life's butt on price bad i mean like embarrassingly bad and so all of a sudden you're going to be able to buy 1.7 in level term for what those goobers are trying to sell you the decreasing term policy for that's what i'm going to think you'll find i might be wrong but i don't think i am i've done this a while and i pissed off new york new york life before so wouldn't be my first time but no i wouldn't i wouldn't buy uh no i wouldn't do business with them um period so uh yeah go to zander and zander's an independent broker they They're not, New York's captive.

They only sell for one company, New York Life. That's all they sell for. And so, your friend's sweet but he's not got very good products and his company's not sweet.

I love it when you're ambiguous with your answers. You know, when people don't know what I'm thinking. I just, yeah, I wonder when there's

a company out there and I just don't notice. They've loved them or not loved them? Subtle. Yeah, subtle. Go to Zander Insurance and let them shop up a zillion different companies and get you a good deal, dude.

Really. You're going to see a completely different world than you've already seen on insurance. But it's a good question because we get to discuss these products that are out own and recommend 15 to 20 year level term insurance instead of decreasing term when actually what i teach is your need is decreasing the reason i do is the price is not enough differential to take the decreased coverage you don't get enough for the decreased coverage if the decreased coverage was like way cheaper and let the decreasing term go down, I'd do it. Do it in a heartbeat because it matches up with what we teach. But the actual products, they disincentivize you from buying them.

Very few people are – and term insurance is just so stinking cheap anyway. Level term insurance is cheap anyway. I'm surprised there's not more companies that offer a product like that at a discounted rate. Well, they used to, and then what's happened is term insurance has just gotten so expensive. It's gotten so inexpensive. It's just the cost of a pizza. I mean, you can buy it for nothing. It's just 20-year level term insurance on a 30-year-old is the cost of a pizza.

And so it stopped being – when it was super expensive, then every little thing mattered because it changed the numbers. But it's just not that much money when the smoke clears on it versus what he's going to find. There will be a lot of money difference there. Elizabeth is in Baltimore. Hi, Elizabeth. Welcome to the Ramsey Show.

Hi, Dave. Thanks so much. How's it going? Better than I deserve. How can we help? So, I am about 22 years old. I'll be 23 this coming June. So, I, right now, I have a pretty good job. I work in the city. I live on my own in my own apartment. And I consider myself debt-free only because my mom, I'm lucky enough that my mom pays in my own apartment. And I consider myself debt free only because my mom,

I'm lucky enough that my mom pays off my student loans. That's how I'm building credit though right now. I don't have a credit card. I'm kind of trying to figure out how to start building my credit in the best way. And I also hope to, in like the next maybe five to seven years, start look at maybe building a house somewhere, but inflation is kind of scaring me recently. So I'm trying to figure out what is my best way to set myself up for success

since I'm at a kind of, I guess, good point in my life where I don't have so much debt. You are so cool. You're on the ball for 22. Well done. Thank you. Very cool. And you're new to us. How'd you find us?

So actually, since I've been so into home builds and all that stuff recently, there was a girl on TikTok. I can't remember her name, but she talked about how she paid off, I think, $350,000 of debt. So you jumped over and found us where? So I found you guys on Spotify, and she told me I was going to listen to you. Cool, very cool. And so I was like, I've got to go take a listen. Elizabeth, what we teach folks is the shortest distance between where you are and wealth is to get out of debt and stay out of debt because your most powerful wealth-building tool is your income. Mm-hmm.

Okay. because your most powerful wealth-building tool is your income. Okay, now you need to have that framework for me to answer this question because what that would mean is that I don't want you going in debt. That's what it means. Right. And so what that means is you're not going to go in debt to build your credit so that you can go into debt to build your credit so that you can go into debt to build your credit so that you can go into debt to build your credit,

which is what people do with the fico score the fico score does not mean anything a high fico score all it means is you've been playing kissy face with the bank it does not mean you have money it does not mean you have money yeah it means you paid the bank your money that's all all it means. It's a false measure of winning. It's a lie. And you're not winning if you have a high FICO score. If you have an 800 FICO score, I'm sorry for you. You paid probably $100,000 in interest to build that.

You built somebody else a nice building. And it's kind of like playing those video games where you buy stuff for your video game. It's not real. Right. Yeah, so don't do it. Don't go build your credit. Elizabeth, you know what my credit score is? I have no idea. That's what it is. It's not real. Right. Yeah. So don't do it. Don't go build your credit. Elizabeth, you know what my credit score is? I have no idea. That's what it is. I don't know.

We don't have one. Good care less. We quit borrowing money and we don't have a credit score. How do you get a mortgage? You do manual underwriting. Remember that phrase when you get ready to build, Elizabeth. Manual underwriting. But the fastest way that you get ready to outdo inflation and get to build your house is stay out of debt.

Don't go into debt so you can have the opportunity to go into debt so that you can build your score so that you can have the opportunity to go into debt so that you can build your score so that you can have the opportunity to go into debt. Don't get caught up in the rat chasing its wheel and keep these banks' furniture bought for them. Buy your own furniture. Furniture. Well, 2021 was crazy. Left a lot of people feeling burned. 2022 is your fresh start, your wake-up call. 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, and that includes a brand new book,

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including the Total money makeover, including a whole bunch of our other things. And the brand-new book is for sale, but not for $10. Baby Steps Millionaires. It's on sale at RamseySolutions.com as well. Check out the store. So a couple things in the news we need to comment on, John. Like last week, we talked about the government,

basically state states attorneys general several of them banded together and sued navient for what it may be one of the largest settlements in u.s history navient being required to settle for 1.83 billion dollars and 995 million of that was uh in restitution 1.7 billion dollars was in student loans that had to be forgiven because they were fraudulently made or fraudulently managed. And we made a lot of fun with that and had a lot of fun with that because it's absolutely a bizarre thing that Navient just got. They got clocked. I mean, they got their clock cleaned one of the largest billions and billions and billions naviance forgiveness is now more than the federal government's forgiveness of student loans

but they didn't do anything wrong that's but they didn't admit anything wrong now here's what's ridiculous though okay here's how people here's how the media and i swear some of you people, so you would think that the headline would read, Navient is a fraudulent scumbag company that ripped people off and the government took them down. Instead, CNN says more than 400,000 student loan borrowers will get debt relief from Navient. What a gift. Like, navient is just a charitable organization thank you cnn for your misleading headline oh now when you read down in the cnn article it actually does say that they were sued yeah but you know the but the headline

is like navient is a charitable organization oh you know we just thought we wanted to help because we're just those kind of people nbc navient plans to cancel some student loan borrowers loan debt i wonder who qualifies thanks that's awesome navi isn't that great they're just they're just the best people you're losing your mind out there america why would nbc and cnn do that you would think they would take the side of the consumer and go crooks caught on tape your loan might be forgiven because they were sued into oblivion you know instead it's like Navient is going to help you it's like jeez man come on guys you finally get a real bad guy yeah and you don't even know what to do with him. Yeah, exactly.

You finally get a bad guy that you didn't make up. You got a real one, and then we let it just roll off. And then this is just... So there was a little kids game on the Internet, an app, or I don't even know what it was. I think it was called Animal Farm. Okay. And you would build your little farm. Is that right, James? Is it called Animal Farm?

You remember what I'm talking about? Animal Crossing is what we're hearing here. Animal Crossing or something like that. It was like this empire thing or something. But you built your farm. And you tilled the farm. And, you know, you eventually, you know, and you made, like, pretend internet money that didn't exist.

Farmville. That's what it is. Farmville. Farmville. That's what it was called. And then it got to where you could actually go on the site and give real money to get pretend money to buy a pretend pig. I make my kids go outside and work a real garden with their real hands. But this is like a virtual pig. It's not a pig. Okay. It's a virtual pig. It's a pretend pig i make my kids go outside and work a real garden with but this is like this is

like a virtual pig it's not a pig okay it's a virtual pig it's a pretend pig it doesn't really exist it exists only on the internet it's not there's no no oinking no bacon gonna happen okay just a just a it's a virtual pig it's not real and you could build your whole farm out with this and it was all pretend, and it was all virtual, and it was a kid's game. And so I run into this guy at an Entree Leadership event, and I'm like, it's him. The guy that created the game?

No. The kid's 19 years old, and his dad's with him, and his older brother who's 26 is there, and I'm like, so what kind of a business y'all got? Well, we build apps for Farmville. And I'm like, you mean like add-on like you don't own farmville no but we we help people do better at their farm their pretend farm that's not really there and i'm like really and so how much do you make he goes i made six million dollars last year on this app my dad works for me and so is my older brother he's 19 and i'm going crazy i

thought it was the neatest thing that this young entrepreneur could figure out a way to sell an app on pigs that aren't really there and get real money and got real money and kids are paying them serious money to get stuff that's not really there. Well, then it started occurring to me that we now have an entire, probably two generations that are raised up with a screen in front of their face. And to them, what's on that screen is as real as the real thing. When you say virtual to someone my age, it means not real. It's a projection. It's sort of.

It's virtual. It's not. If I virtually projection it's sort of it's virtual it's not if i virtually made it i didn't make it okay if i if you know i didn't get there you know what i'm saying it's that's the literal definition we have a million dollars no you don't it means you don't and so um and so that that's uh that means you have maybe a little bit less but not quite you know you're not right it's not real. You're not there. And so when you say virtual now to this entire two generations, to them it's very real because they've lived their entire life in it. And so when Meta hits, and now we're selling NFTs, and now Walmart and Nike and Under Armour are selling NFTs, and now you can, Walmart's setting up now for you to have your pretend house that's not really there.

It's only on the Internet, like your little Farmville. And if you want to buy pretend drapes to go in your pretend house, because that's what virtual means. It means pretend. Not real. It's not really there. There's nothing there. It's not real.

It's not really there. There's nothing there. It's not real. It's virtual. But now Walmart is setting up, appears to be venturing into the metaverse with plans to create its own cryptocurrency and collection of NFTs. The big box retailer filed several new trademarks last month that indicates its intent to make and sell virtual goods. Well, let me help you with this. Virtual goods is an actual oxymoron if it's a good it's not virtual and if it's virtual it's not a good a good this little coffee cup right here is an actual coffee cup it actually exists here's some of the goods including virtual electronics virtual home decorations virtual toys toys, virtual sporting goods.

And so what we've got is the kids that grew up playing Farmville are now going to virtually furnish their virtual house at Walmart. Oh, my gosh. While they didn't pay off their student loans. They don't even live in the real world. They virtually live. Because it's safer in there inside that little box than it is out here with the with the crazy but humans with real drapes that fall off real windows well and try hanging real drapes that'll help you get a divorce but yeah just i mean but these drapes virtually hang themselves

this is yeah i yeah unless you have to hire dr deloney is there not a psychological disorder at play here dude we we have i'm telling you, it's escape, man. It's escape into a fantasy world. We are actually checking out of the challenges of our real world. And going to a place where we can control the variables because we cannot do it in our real life. That's exactly right. And now we're spending money to do it. Real, real dollars. Real money for things that aren't really there.

In case anyone's forgotten, we're in not real money to the tune of, what, $20, $25 trillion? Yeah, well, there's that, too. I guess it's gotten so virtual that we're just moving to none of the true anymore. Well, your generation did that. Well, that's true. My generation did do that. I mean, the last 10 years, we've doubled the 10-year look-back thing that's going around. Yeah, you doubled the debt at the government level.

That's another discussion. But, oh, my God. This is so... This is... I rarely speak to Steve. I'm not saying it's not okay to play video games. And if you want to spend some money on your video games or whatever, that's fine. But when you psychologically escape to another world to the point that you don't own real grapes, but you bought grapes in your pretend house, you got issues, darling.

From an electronic Walmart. Darling, it ain't real. Sounds like my aunt. I don't even know what... What do you say to this? It's virtual. It's virtually... It's not real!

But it's so interesting because the kid made so much money. I'm so enthralled with it. But it's scary by what it means about this generation. Dr. John Deloney Ramsey personality is my co-host today you can be sure and check him out on the Dr. John Deloney show as he discussed relationships mental health boundaries all kinds of uh wild and crazy things that people get into it It's very entertaining and informative and inspiring. Dr. John Deloney Show, one of the many Ramsey Network podcasts that we have out these days. It's absolutely doing great work. Nabil is with us.

Nabil is in Atlanta. Hi, Nabil. How are you? Hi, Dave. Thank you for having me on the show. Sure. What's up? So I'm a 23-year- about $80,000, $85,000 saved. I've got

about 25 K in my Roth IRA and 401k and about 60 K in investments in index funds, which with, I'm looking to purchase my first home. Wow. Where'd you get all that? So I work at a job. I've just been following your principles since I graduated college and I've kind of every stimulus, every piece of extra money that I've gotten, I've kind of just put away and tried to save. So not counting your Roth, you've got like $145,000. No, no, no. So it's a total of about $85,000.

It's about $60,000. Oh, the whole game is that. Okay. Yes. Okay. Got it. So basically I make about $120,000 at a job that I relocated to about six months ago. And because I'm already traveling, I just moved back in with my parents.

So I'm looking to buy a home, which I would use as both a primary residence and also simultaneously rent part of it out to make up for the costs of me not being there because of my work travel. What do you do? I'm now a good, so essentially I'm a project manager setting up new warehouses across the country. Man, you're killing it. Good job, dude. You're killing it.

Thank you. Do you like the job? Do you like traveling? Yeah, I do. I do. I'm only, it kind of complicates the housing because I'm only in my home city for about four days a month. I'm kind of just on the go in hotels. So that's why I'm trying to see whether now is kind of a good time for me to buy a townhouse

or a small house in the $250,000 to $300,000 range. I wouldn't. For this purpose, and how do I kind of find a good deal? I wouldn't either. I wouldn't. I wouldn't either. You're not there enough to manage it. Got you.

Pops, freeze, and bust. The whole thing will melt before you get back. Okay. So how would you kind of recommend that someone like myself in the coming years, say I were to stay in the shop, how would you recommend I pursue home ownership? I would later, but right now I think you're being very wise. Listen, here's the thing. Owning a home, crap breaks whether you're there or not.

And it's just, it adds, you have a very simple, very clean, very efficient life. And I would let someone else manage the domicile rather than you having a... Let's say you had a roommate that decided they wanted to sell all your furniture on eBay while you were gone. That could happen. It's happened before.

And so when you get back, the roommate's gone, all your stuff's gone, and you file a police report. I've got a relatively new house, and I just got a report last week. I've got to replace an air conditioner. The whole unit, the whole thing. I don't know why you want to do all that right now. I think there's plenty of time, as young as you are, to own a piece of real estate.

I would wait at least 12 months, maybe 24 months. And if you're home four days a month, Rent the Ritz. Yeah, I didn't think about that. Go to the nicest hotel in Atlanta. Just live there. Yeah, go to the Ritz Buckhead. It's a nice property. I've stayed there.

And just for four nights, your life will be so much better. People will, like, bring food to your door and stuff. And they'll even come in your room and set it up. And you don't have to go buy food. They'll wash your towels. your room and set it up and you don't have to go buy food wash your towels it's called room service and you don't have to change the beds i mean it's an amazing that's what i would do and just have a really nice efficient life and let my energy be spent my spiritual emotional physical energy be spent on something other than home ownership for four days a month okay that makes a lot of sense thank you but i'm okay now long term i do want you to buy so let's let's set a goal 25 years old you buy because i think your

life will change i don't think you want to do this indefinitely this gypsy thing yes that makes sense yeah it's gonna be i mean that like this is not conducive to family life right no definitely not it's very much you're living like a nomadic life. Yeah, and it's kind of cool. You're getting to see a lot of stuff. You're a young guy. It's kind of a little, like you said, nomadic. That's all cool.

All that's kind of fun. I would do it. I'd definitely do it if I was your age and single. I think it's kind of cool. All day long, yeah. You get to see a lot of cities. America's got some wonderful cities. You get to see some cities that aren't wonderful that are out there, but if you do this for two years you're gonna blink you're in you could have

two hundred and fifty thousand dollars in cash yeah just sitting there just keep piling up some money and then just go buy you a house but i not for four days a month no i wouldn't i like real estate but it is not it is the un the thing that nobody talks about with rental real estate or personal residences either one is they break. Yeah. And you have to have people come over and fix crap, you know, or fix it yourself with your little YouTube video or whatever it is you're doing. But, oh, my gosh.

And there's entire portions of my life have been used up on broken stuff around real estate, you know, that you don't have to have on the short term if you're in his situation. So I like to have all my life back, my bandwidth back to do, like, fun stuff or whatever. Or the four days you're home, just relax. Yeah, and just have no hassle. Have some peace. No hassle, no hassle, no hassle, no hassle. That's fun.

That's fun. It's fun to have no hassle. Caleb is with us in Louis, no hassle, no hassle, no hassle. That's fun. That's fun. It's fun to have no hassle. Caleb is with us in Louisville, Kentucky. Hi, Caleb. How are you? Better than I deserve, Dave. Thank you for taking my call. Sure.

What's up? So I'm 17. I'm going to be 18 a week from today. I'm going to pursue a degree in computer science to be a software developer. I'm hoping to kind of save some cash and cash flow as much as I possibly can. So to do that, I'm going to be transitioning out of my current job at a fast food restaurant and going to start doing DoorDash food delivery. But I know that is structured as an independent contractor kind of thing,

and taxes aren't withholded automatically. Correct. So I'm just wondering, as somebody that's new to all this, what are some resources? And I'm estimating between 15% and 20% tax, and just for your recommendations with that. I would set aside 25% of everything you make for taxes, and you're supposed to file quarterly estimates because you have your income tax and you also have both sides of Social Security, which amounts to 15.3% on its own.

Okay. They call it self-employed tax but all it is is double your social security because small business people are supposed to be supported by the government you know you know how that works right so but it's double right it's double yeah i pay double and so uh because your employer pays the other half when you're a wage earner but when you're self-employed you get to pay both sides and you pay the income tax on top of that. You may not have any income tax, but you'll have at least the 15.3% of FICA and the self-employment tax. And you have to pay it quarterly. So if you set aside a fourth of everything, and you'll have the money.

Okay, so it'll be paid quarterly and not like every spring, like normal taxes? Well, your taxes have to be filed filed but you're supposed to file and pay quarterly estimates on your taxes like you're withholding on yourself kind of a thing and it's it's a one-page thing it's not complicated math it's easy to do you put in there what you made and what your expenses were and what therefore what your profit was times your tax rate and you send them a you send them a check. That's just through the IRS? Yes, it's to the IRS, and it's very easy to do. And if you need some help with it, just get in touch with one of our tax-endorsed local providers.

They can either help you with it over the phone, or they'll just tell you how to do it. Or you can pay them a little bit, and they'll do it for you. But you may have some business deductions. You may be able to deduct your mileage or your fuel or something. If you're door dashing, you should be able to do something with the car, I suspect. Yeah, can you deduct your mileage and your depreciation and all that? Yeah, but you've just got to be real careful with it, and you've got to log it properly and all that kind of stuff.

But the bottom line is, yeah, you'll make a lot more money, but you're going to have a lot more taxes as a self-employed person, and you'll be fine. You'll be fine. You should do this. And I'm going to send you a copy of the book, Debt-Free Degree, because I don't want you to hope you can go to school debt-free. I want you to do it.

I want you to do it for sure. Don't borrow a dime. Don't borrow a dime. This is the ramsey shot Have a friend or family member that needs a daily dose of Ramsey advice in their life? Let them know about the Ramsey Call of the Day podcast. It's a quick hit of advice about life and money in under 10 minutes. Check out the Ramsey Call of the Day podcast wherever you listen to podcasts.