The Ramsey Show - App - We’re Getting a $2 Million Inheritance – What Do We Do With It? (Hour 3)

Episode Date: October 13, 2021

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Live Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Dollar Car Rental Studios, 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.

Thank you for joining us, America. We are so glad you are here. Open phones at 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225. George Campbell joins me as my co-host today. He is Ramsey personality and host of many of our podcasts on the Ramsey Network, including the new one, The Fine Print, which is extremely popular. Be sure you check it out. A new episode dropped this week on the credit score debacle.

It's a big one. It's a big one. Anytime you can do something where everyone in America thinks they're measuring their money by your score, you've done a big job. It's impressive. It is impressive. I mean, when you were growing up, that was not a thing. People weren't measuring their lives against a number. Yep.

And now they are. Dee is with us. Dee is in Kansas City. Hi, Dee. How are you doing? Hey, Dave. I'm doing great. Thank you for taking my call.

Sure. What's up? Well, it's a little overwhelming. Today I just got a check that we inherited just right under $2 million. How much? And $2 million. $2 million. Wow.

Who left you this? Well, my mom and dad. My dad worked really, really hard and lived very conservatively, and you would have never known it growing up. Wow. Wow. Way, very long ago, really, what the value of it was. How long ago did he pass?

He passed about a little over a year, then my mom just passed just not much, very long ago. Oh, wow. Wow, right together. How long were they married? Yeah. Oh, goodness. 60 plus years. Oh, my goodness. Well, i'm sorry for your loss that leaves a big hole in your life yeah yeah it's just a lot just to take in and we just want

to be wise um it's just a lot all at once um i it is you get all kinds of financial people that try to tell you do this, do that, and my head's spinning, to be honest. We've worked hard. My husband and I, my husband's retired, and he's 62, and I'm 57, and I work part-time. What is your net worth before you got this check? We have about, let's see, $1.4 million. Okay, so you were already millionaires.

Yeah, but this kind of all just happened. My husband retired, and we've just been working towards this day. Let me tell you how you got $1.4 million. Slow and steady. Yes, sir. And you did it without all of these financial sharks that are swimming around you in circles right now, like a Jimmy Buffett song. Yeah.

Okay. Yeah, we just plugged along. So you know how you get rid of those sharks? You shoot at them with a gun, and they swim off. I'm being metaphorical. Okay, I'm not saying don't really shoot somebody okay you you are in kansas it could happen but um yeah no the uh run them off unless they're your financial person that you're already were dealing with run them off okay gotcha yeah they're

they're there for the wrong reasons at the wrong time. They have violated their lack of class disqualifies them. Goodbye. All right. Now then, so rule number one, slow down. Okay. Going fast is bad. Going slow is good. A lot of peace in that, isn't there?

Yeah. Your dad moved slow. I don't know there? Yeah. Your dad moved slow. I don't know what to feel. Your dad moved slow. You got to 1.4 slow. And the way you're going to properly handle 2 million extra is slow. Calm down. Okay.

There's no rush. All right. There's no one in a hurry. A tornado is not coming. You're fine. Okay. Number two, don't put money in anything you don't understand. It's your job to understand it. But guess what?

You are already a millionaire, so you already understand how to manage wealth. You are already managing wealth. But maybe you need to bone up on it just a little bit. Maybe you need to polish up on your skills a little. Nothing wrong with that. Okay. With the extra weight of this extra responsibility. So rule one, slow down.

Two, don't put money in anything you don't understand. Three, do not work with anyone in any field anywhere in the financial world at all, for that matter, anyone anywhere probably, but certainly in the financial field unless they have the heart of a teacher. Okay. And the sharks that are circling right now don't have the heart of a teacher. Get rid of them. All right.

Eighty-five percent of the people in the insurance business, in the investment business, in the real estate business, in the estate planning business are salespeople. 15% of them are teachers. You're looking for one of the 15%. And I made that number up, by the way, but I'm pretty close. All right. So you have the heart of a teacher as your advisor.

They are not telling you what to do, and you're expected to do it blindly, because you're going to understand it before you do it, and you're going to slow down. Can you handle one more rule? I sure can. Ask yourself, before you do the investment, before you make the move, is this honoring to my father's memory? Okay. you make the move is this honoring to my father's memory okay and the reason i'm having you do that is your dad was a hero i want you managing money like he did and if you think he's in heaven smiling because you're smart then that's probably because you're smart

and if you're if you invest in's probably because you're smart. And if you invest in something, you go, my dad is up there shaking his head going, uh-uh, uh-uh, uh-uh, that one's stupid. And then you know you're doing the wrong thing, right? That's right, yeah. Because your dad was unassuming and steady and wise. Consequently, Proverbs says a godly man leaves an inheritance to his children's children. That's your dad. Okay.

If you do those four things, kiddo, you're going to be just fine. George, what do you want to add to the fourth one? No, I just want you guys to start dreaming about what this does for you. Because what it does, it gives you freedom, and it gives you options. And so start dreaming about what you want to do to make this a blessing. I don't want it to give you anxiety. I want it to give you that feeling

of what could we do with this money? Do we want to, you know, there's three things you can do. Give, save, spend. Where do we want to give a portion of this? How do we want to spend some of this and enjoy it? And how do we want to save this or put it towards other goals?

Maybe you want to buy investment property or do something absolutely wild you have the freedom to do that now hey d you're more able to handle this than you think you are you already had 1.4 million you're not dumb you know more than half the people that are purporting to give you advice. Trust your instincts. You have good instincts. This is the Ramsey Show. People all over the country are discovering a faith-based and budget-friendly way of meeting health care costs through Christian Health Care Ministries. Christian Health Care Ministries, or CHM, is a nonprofit organization that helps members carry one another's burdens with health care expenses, and they have successfully shared each other's medical bills for nearly 40 years. See if CHM is right for you by visiting chministries.org. CHM is a proud sponsor

of Dave Ramsey Live Events. George Campbell Ramsey personality is my co-host today. This is the Ramsey Show. If you've ever wondered if an online will is right for you, if you need a trust, do you need a mirror image will, what kind of powers of attorney do you need? Well, you hear me say everyone needs a will, but I get a lot of questions asking if a simple online will is right for someone's specific situation.

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Check it out for yourself. If an online solution works for your situation, we'll send you a promo code for 20% off your will with our Ramsey-trusted provider. Text QUIZ to 33789. QUIZ to 33789. QUIZ to 33789. Our question of the day comes from Blinds.com. They have a 100% satisfaction guarantee.

That means even if you mismeasure or you pick the wrong color, they'll remake your window blinds for free. You get free samples, free shipping, and with the new promos they run every month, you'll save even more. Use the promo code RAMSY to get the best possible deal. Today's question comes from Chris in Tennessee. With COVID cases ramping up again, I'm wondering how to prepare in case we have lockdowns again.

My profession isn't one where I can work from home. What steps can I take now to protect my family in case I'm not able to work for several weeks? Interesting. Well, I don't like people work for several weeks. Interesting. Well, I don't like people going into paranoia about what could and what ifs, but several weeks sounds like something that could be easily covered with an emergency fund, where if you for some reason got laid off, fired, you'd be taken care of for three to six months. But it sounds like there's more behind this question than just a financial question.

Yeah, he's afraid, and rightly so, because we've all had our world turned upside down and shaken like a freaking snow globe. So, you know, we don't know what's going to happen next and it's not even the disease you worry about all the time it's whether the government loses its mind or not um and well that's not even in question anymore but the um uh it's just a matter on from state to state locality to locality how much crap you're going to get so he's in tennessee so he's safer than most, he's probably very safe in that regards. The thing about the stuff we teach, George,

while we get criticized for it to be overly simplified or one size fits all or primitive or not for people with money, it's only for broke people or whatever, we get all these critics on this stuff. And the reason they're wrong is not because we're smarter or something like that. The things we teach are common sense, biblically-based financial principles. And the interesting thing about these principles is they work during times of crisis, and they work during times of prosperity.

They're the only set of principles that work during both times. And so if you're out of debt, principle number one, you have money in savings for an emergency, principle number two. You're living on a plan, principle number one you have money in savings for an emergency principle number two you're living on a plan principle number three you are not self-centered so that you're generous principle number four you're surrounding yourself with like-minded people principle number five you're diversified spread your portions to seven to eight, for you do not know when disaster may come upon the land. Ecclesiastes says in the Bible, diversification is a biblical concept.

It's also a financial concept. But, you know, we're going to live on less than we make. We're not in debt. We're not cosigning debt. Debt's off the table. We're investing wisely uh what you are then is you have gone the slower route and you have built the brick house like the third pig and so my answer to chris is be the third pig you remember the three little pigs right

first two little pigs got their house blown down by the big bad wolf called pandemic and then he came over to the other little pig who had a lot of money in the bank and no debt. And they blew and he huffed and he puffed and he went to somebody else's house. And they said, no bacon here, buddy. And so, you know, that's the story. We all remember it, right? So be the third pig. We're going to print up T-shirts.

Be the third pig, right? And so if you're the third pig, you so if you're the third pig you are prospering during wonderful times and you're prospering during the pandemic and it has a tendency when you're not broke to help you avoid paranoia because this one sounds a little bit paranoid yeah and i think a lot of this is fear and we dealt with this you know during the pandemic we realized we were in a position to go, we need to help people not just with money, but with fear. And what was the antidote you found to fear in the last 18 months? We were quoting Dr. John Deloney the whole time. Facts are your friends when you're in the middle of a crisis.

Facts are your friends, not feelings. So we need to go to reality here and so you know the truth is chris if you're in tennessee if you get out of your house and walk around you're not going to see a society that is shut down by covid uh even though there was a slight spike in cases which now are back down but um you're not going to see facts before your eyes that match your words on this paper. The facts are your friends. Feelings are not your friends. And worry is a feeling.

Paranoia is a feeling. Concern over observable craziness and stupidity is a fact. And that's okay to be that. I'm that. I don't know what's gonna happen next you know who knows what their people are gonna do and i truly am more concerned about an out-of-control government than i am the disease um both are scary uh one of them though is not um well anyway it's just yeah so you just you if you'll get out of your house and walk around, sir, and get out in the sunshine and exercise, you need some vitamin D, and walk around, see human beings interacting that are not freaked out,

they're not scared, I think you're going to have a different conclusion to your situation. But to answer your question about worrying, be the third pig, because these principles work in good times and they work in bad times. George, I remember 2008 when the housing bubble burst, when the hedge funds had securitized subprime mortgages, and stupidity had run amok, and Wall Street brought the American real estate market to its knees, with it the stock market, the stock market dropped in half, Bush is transitioning into Obama, neither one of them could find their butt with both hands at the time. And it was a disaster.

I mean, it was scary. And I remember distinctly, I was on Fox News. I was in New York. And I finished Cavuto's show. Cavuto and I have been friends for years. And Cavuto is very, very smart. Neil's a very bright man. We've known each other 20 years probably.

And we're between breaks. And the octaves in his voice had changed. He was scared because we're watching that red ticker tape go across the dadgum thing, you know, six feet tall across the side of the New York building, and the stock market's going down, gold prices are going up, all these volatility signs are not good. And he said, you think we're going to be okay? And I said, I know we're going to be okay.

And I went and sat down. There's a steakhouse right across the street from there and sharon and i left the fox green room went across sat down ordered a steak and i'm looking at that dadgum ticker tape and i suddenly that chill went down my spine and i thought i wonder if we're going to be okay and sharon and i were talking about it that night at dinner and we said why are we not scared because everybody else at that point was in freak-out mode. I mean, we had congressmen that were, like, crying on the television because they couldn't get the stimulus package passed. You remember the stimulus package? You know, that kind of crap.

They were going crazy. And it was just like this panic. Literally, their voice octaves were changing. And I said, why are we not freaked out? She said, it could be our faith. And I said, well, sometimes Christians get afraid. I mean, you're not Christian. I mean, you don't get afraid. And she said, well, it could be we've got several million dollars in the bank and no debt. Oh, well, that could be. That might have something to do with it. Be the third pig, Chris. Be the third pig. This be the third pig this is the ramsey show George Campbell, Ramsey personality, is my co-host today in the lobby of Ramsey Solutions on the Debt Free Stage.

Joy is with us from San Diego, California. Hi, Joy. How are you? I'm doing good. How are you? Welcome to Tennessee. So good to have you. How much debt have you paid off? About $106, Joy. How are you? I'm doing good. How are you? Welcome to Tennessee. So good to have you. How much debt have you paid off? About $106,000. How long did that take? About 45 months. Good for you. And your range of income during that time? About 59 to 85. Good for you. What do you do for a living? By day, I am a buyer. I work in supply chain, and I do a lot of other things on the side. Okay.

Whatever it takes. Good for you. Well done. What kind of debt was the $106,000 that you eliminated? I had student loans. There was a car, some school loans from family members. I had a $9 library fine that I didn't know about and a handful of credit cards. I can't believe you had a $9 library fine.

That's just awful. Straight to the top of the dead snow. I thought, you know, and I thought Joy was going to be one of the good ones, and then I find out she had a $9 library fine. Was it one book? Can you tell us, was it worth it? It was one book, and it was four years old, and they never even told me I had a fine. Oh, there you go.

See, that's how they do you. Oh, we're at the library. They're that way. Joy, good for you. Well done. You've been at this a while. Almost four years you've been hustling and grinding to get through this. Congratulations. That is quite, sticking with anything that long is a great task, but you've been at it. So what started this Ramsey journey of you getting out of debt? So I was already wanting to get out of debt because I'm an ordained pastor, and I can't do that job as my full-time job with a $900 student loan payment.

Oh, there's that. There's that. And so I was working a plan, and it was not working. My plan was no good. And I started following somebody's budget workbook and I decided to do it on my blog because nobody knew, like people knew I had student loans, but nobody, including me, knew how bad it was. And so I did the first page of the workbook and it was to total up all your assets and all your

debts. And I wrote a blog post about it. And a friend of mine saw the post and sent me the link to her debt-free scream. And said, this might be motivating for you if you listen to this podcast. And so I listened and my first debt-free scream that I heard, I was sold. And a few weeks later, that other workbook kind of went out the window and the credit are gone, and everything's gone from there. Yeah. Wow. Good for you. Good for you. Wow, that's fun! I love a good friend that says, this might be encouraging to you. That's different than, yeah, listen to this, you're stupid!

I got both kinds of friends, but this might be encouraging to you. That's nice. Yeah, that's really nice. Well done!. Well done. Very well done. So, Joy, tell me this. What were the sacrifices that you made? You said you were doing a lot of stuff on the side to bring in some extra income. What were the sacrifices that caused you to pay off six figures in under four years?

Well, I worked a lot of Saturdays doing websites and eBay and not going hiking and not doing things with family and friends. I did some things, did some free things, but I said no to a lot of things in that process. A lot of really interesting dinners. Very creative. What was the worst interesting dinner? I don't know that any of them were were bad, but people would give me food. People were really supportive and would give me food, and so I'd have to go find how many lentil recipes do you know?

Wow. That's some good friends. Oh, that's wonderful. They would just donate you food. Yes. When we were getting out of debt and we were broke, Sharon would make tuna fish sandwiches, and I would put them in the refrigerator at the office,

and by the time I got them out of the refrigerator at lunch, they'd be soggy. When I smell tuna fish to this day, it makes my net worth go down. It's broke people food for me. And you get a smell off of something that's broke people food that you equate with this time, you'll never be able to eat it again it ruins it it just ruins it so it's not it's not diet food it's broke people food so it's just like oh man that's cool that's

fun good for you what do you tell people the key to getting out of debt is you did an incredible job by the way so i have three one is the budget but really actually looking at the budget like week to week because my tendency would be to have a budget and then do my spending and then come back to the end of the month and go what happened like it didn't i didn't follow it right and so or you get sloppy you lose you didn't you forgot you spent money there yeah and so for me like i have to try to touch it every week and look at it make sure my receipts are entered and keep track of things week to week because if i don't touch it i get sloppy perfect the second one is that sharing takes away the shame i heard somebody say that once that's good but if i hadn't

shared on a blog post four years ago like i wouldn't be here because i wouldn't even know yeah right but then there's this whole other piece of it's not something that i have to be afraid about somebody finding out that i've got this mountain of debt because everybody knows i'm destroying this mountain of debt i am a girl who pays off debt and so um i am joy who pays off debt it's like you know you kind of pop the balloon and then there's no longer something for somebody to find out that's like this bad thing. It's just, it has no power over you anymore. Yeah. And the third one is you really have to cut up the credit cards.

I paid off all my credit cards in 2012 and then I paid off all my credit cards in 2018. See what happened here. I see a trend. So I know a lot of people who tell me they want to do the points thing or whatever, and they're adults and they can make their own decisions. But for me, I was not going to do that a third time. It was done. There's a YouTube video with evidence.

They're all gone. Had to put an end to that. That's good. That's very smart. It's very wise. There's something that happens when you burn the ships. You can't go back, Cortez, right? That's it.

And so, yeah, it changes the whole thing. And you go, okay, I'm really going to do this. I'm going to have to live on a budget because I don't have a plastic crutch anymore. And I'm going to have to have my emergency fund because I don't have a plastic crutch anymore right and i'm gonna have to i'm gonna have to have my emergency fund because i don't have a plastic crutch anymore and um it forces you to to finish up and get rid of any ish that you were doing so no ramsey ish you're gonna be pure down the line and that that when you do all that you're exactly right that's that's when you see the results. Do I trust God or do I trust a credit card to get me out of an emergency? Who's your provider? Who's your provider?

Master card? Who named that anyway? Yeah. Or God. There you go. That's very good. Powerful. Powerful.

Well done, Joy. Good job. Who were your biggest cheerleaders? Sounds like you had a bunch of them. I had a bunch of them. Now, there were some people that thought I was insane when they saw the video of me cutting up my credit cards. Yeah, that's good. That was nuts.

When broke people are making fun of your financial plan, you are right on track. But my family has been amazing. I'm part of a writer's group, the ACFW in Orange County. And I have two churches that I've been part of during this season, Coast City Church in Oceanside and Citywide Mosaic in Temecula. And these people cheered me on and wouldn't let me pay for food and gave me hand-me-down clothes and gave me massive amounts of things to sell on eBay. I didn't go and buy things to sell in my eBay store. People just kept giving me, it just kept coming. When I was done, I had to clear it all out of my house because there was still so much stuff yeah so mosaic erwin mcmanus uh no

it's citywide mosaic and temecula okay so it's different than mcmanus yes okay all right because he's got his is called mosaic there too all right cool very cool good for you well done well done well done well done man she's impressive very I don't think there's any stopping Joy. No. She's going to cut up anything that comes her way. I'm not kidding. Don't come near me with scissors, Joy. That'll work.

Well, I mean, once you set your face towards something, and, you know, there's something about the power of confession, it takes away, you know, nothing has has secrets have power over you but when you when there aren't secrets there's no power and so you know i've often said uh you know once i went broke i got over worrying about what you people think and so my failures are my biggest part of my brand so i just kind of relish in them because it's kind of who we are i've got a phd in dumb and if you don't like that shut up. You're wrong. Joy, way to go. $106,000

paid off 45 months. Make it $59,000 to $85,000. We've got a copy of the Legacy Journey and Total Money Makeover for you. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Three, two, one. I'm debt-free! This is how it's done.

45 months coming to that moment. Woo! That is true joy. Yeah. Literally and figuratively. This is the Ramsey Show. Our Scripture of the Day, Philippians 127, Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ. Then whether I come and see you or only hear about you in my absence,

I will know that you stand firm in the one spirit, striving together as one for the faith of the gospel. Babe Ruth said, never let the fear of striking out keep you from playing the game george camel ramsey personality is my co-host today open phones at 888-825-5225 hayden is with us in oklahoma city hi hayden welcome to the ramsey show thank you how are you dave better than i deserve what's up so i'm 25 my wife and i just got done paying off some student loans great don't quite have our emergency fund set up yet you know where it should be yet uh but you know i'm a planner so we're sitting talking with um

you know the companies we work for and then some financial advisors in the area about that number 401K and IRA and stuff. So my company, so the question I have is my company only matches up to half a percent. So I'm wondering how much I then take out for that side and how much I go to my financial advisor with just a regular IRA. So in the baby steps, you said you almost have that emergency fund ready to go. Once you're at baby step four, then we're going to put 15%. And you're wondering, how do I do that and what order because of this half percent match?

And we like match the best. So match is going to beat pretty much everything out there because it's free money. We're going to follow that up by going to that Roth IRA that you mentioned, and you can max that out, followed by going back to the 401k. And you said you and your wife are looking into what options she has, and it won't make a difference as far as 15% is going to be across your household income. And so as long as you're doing that total across it uh i don't know if she does she have a match as well yes she does and hers is um it's like up to three percent and then after three percent it um every other percent and then it maxes out five okay so you want to do all matches first so let me let me back up you kind of have to back into this what george said is exactly right

match beats roth beats traditional so that's your order of attack is match to roth for traditional and roth can be roth 401k or roth ira either one okay but a roth without a match does not keep up with a traditional with a match or a Roth with a match, either one. So match is best. Now, so just take your whole household income times.15. That's the number we're trying to get to. Okay? Then you do your half percent match, and that gives you a number.

What's the number as compared to you deduct that from the 15%? Not the percentage points, but you say, let's just use a round number. Let's say you made $100,000, so your number is $15,000 you're trying to get to. If your half a percent is $1,000, now we've still got to do $14,000. If her 3% and then every other 1% adds up to, by the time we do all that to get all that matched, that adds up to, out of your pocket, another $4,000. Well, now we're down to $10,000, okay, out of that $15,000. And so you start spending off of your $15,000 or your 15% number, first by match, then by Roth, and then by traditional. George is exactly right.

That's exactly how you approach this this and that's going to get you there but sometimes people it's a little bit confusing because it's like what it's a percentage of her income on hers and a half percent of your income on yours and you're trying to how's that equate to the 15 well you can't mix it up because you've got percentage of two different numbers so uh you just go with an actual hard, actual dollar amount, the nominal figure, the real number, and then use that number

to chunk out of until you get all the way down to zero. Yeah, and it works the same way if he goes, I'm going to do 15% out of my income, she does 15% out of hers. That simplifies it numbers-wise and gets you to the same place.

Yeah, but we might not do that because she might have a better match and we might end up doing a bunch of it over on her side yeah so you use the whole household number because if you if you split it up and you do 15 of her income and she runs down through that same formula match versus roth versus traditional uh you might miss out on he might have a better match or she might have a better match. If there's a big match there. Exactly. If one or the other has a match, the other one doesn't.

You want to be sure you're chunking out the whole thing. Look at it holistically. Viswas is with us in Cincinnati. Hi, Viswas. How are you? Hi, Ms. Dave. It's a great honor to speak to you. Thank you so much for taking the call.

Sure. What's up? I'm a legal immigrant from India. I make about $53,000 to $50,000 a year. I have $8,000 in debt. That is $7,000 in credit card and $1,000 remaining in my personal loan that I took a couple of years ago. Due to my visa restrictions, it's a single household income. I'm the only person allowed to work right now. I listened to your shows, and I was trying to try and see if there's any possibility I could take up some additional work and kind of reduce my debt.

I have already scrapped off all my credit cards. I've just kept one just in case I need it because I do not have much of an emergency cash. I have like close to $500, $600 just to be on the safer side and expenses. It's a two-part question. Do you have any suggestions? Unless otherwise I take a different job or go back to my country, I don't see any other ways I could tackle my expenses to become debt snowball and reduce the debt. Do you have any suggestions for that? And the main reason is that I'm also planning for a house because my family

got bigger. I have $35,000 at my home country, which I could probably get it over here for my down payment. But even though I'm going to be staying here only for two years because of these restrictions, I'm not sure if it's an economically viable option to purchase the house because my family is getting bigger. What's the probability of your visa renewal? It's a work visa, I assume. Yes, sir, it is. So I would say it's probably close to 50% because it's a different extension.

It might be a different scenario. So it's close to 50%-ish. And you would have to at least go back to India for a period of time, right? That's right. What I see, like my wife and me, we just became new parents, so the mental mindset is that if we head out of this country, it would be for good, and she does not want to even come back here. Okay, so she's Indian as well? Yes yeah okay all right cool all right no i would not buy a house okay it sounds like you're leaving and not going to come back

okay and two years is not enough time to turn a house and make a profit on it uh yes i would pull some of your money from your home country just pay off your debt be debt free okay okay and then let's go ahead and pile up cash for your future in india and follow your baby steps in india at that point because that's where you know basically you got a two-year stopover here is what you're telling me and a 50 50 chance of renewal um and if that does not if that renewal does not occur if it does does occur, how long is it extended for? So that's the catchy part. If it does occur, it will be extension of every three years. So then it would be another three years after that.

What does the pathway to citizenship look like? That's a very long process, sir. It's like this process I'm talking about is a green card. So I'm applying for the green card, and it's due to it's a work visa-related green card. The backlog for Indian citizens is close to 10 to 12 years, easily. So I would still be able to extend every three years and stay in this country, but the green card I would get only after like probably 20, 32 or 30, 35, something like that. Wow.

Okay. I don't have much knowledge of that world, just enough to ask a semi-intelligent question was all. So that's shocking to me. I'm sorry. Wow. Well, here's the thing. You still work the financial principles. They work.

The only thing is you're probably going to step back from buying a house in this case it's not going to make sense yeah you said based on your income you felt like you couldn't pay this off and i just want to challenge you and tell you that you can and people make a lot less and pay off a lot more so you absolutely can do this and you've got the money sitting over there in india so if you can use that to at least pay off this debt and create an emergency fund of three to six months that's going to put you in a really good spot as you at least finish out this visa. Yeah. Wow.

Hey, thank you for the call, sir. It's an honor to talk with you. George Campbell, Ramsey Personality, my co-host today. Good show, George. Thank you. Always a good time. Nice job, James and Kelly in the booth as always. I am Dave Ramsey, your host.

This is Common Sense for your dollars and cents. We'll be back with you before you know it. In the meantime, remember, there's ultimately only one way to financial peace, and that's to walk daily with the Prince of Peace, Christ Jesus. Hey, it's Kelly, associate producer and phone screener for The Ramsey Show. If you would like to do your debt-free scream live on the show, make sure you visit theramseyshow.com and register. We would love for you to come to Nashville and tell Dave your story.