The Ramsey Show - App - What's Easy Today Is Hard Tomorrow (Hour 1)

Episode Date: January 12, 2021

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live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Dollar Car Rental Studio, this is the Dave Ramsey Show, where America hangs out to have a conversation about your life, your money, your mental health, and even relationships. That's right. My name is Anthony O'Neill. Also joining me today is one of my favorites, Dr. The Dr. John Deloney, both Ramsey personalities here who are passionate about helping you and helping you reach your goals around life, money, mental stuff, you name it. Dr. John Deloney hosts the Dr. John Deloney show. And I am the host of the table with Anthony O'Neill. You can find us on YouTube and podcast. 888-825-5255. 888-825-5255. It's a call-in number.

We're here to accept your phone calls. Dr. John and I, we pretty much talk about anything. Yeah, there's not a lot that goes by that we won't get into, so let's do it, man. We love talking about anything and everything. But before we jump on to the phone calls um we're gonna talk to mike in new jersey uh we're coming right to you there mike um i want to talk about where dave is dave is dave chris hogan rachel cruz um are joining craig rochelle tonight tonight being tuesday night january 12th at 7 p.m. for a free reset live stream event to kick off your money goals for 2021.

They're going to give you the motivation and guidance you need to hit the reset button and say goodbye to the money stress for good. So, America, do me a favor. I want 33789 right now to sign up and take the first step toward lasting financial peace or you can sign up at dayramsey.com forward slash reset and check this out if you're in the oklahoma area and if you want to be a part of the very limited live audience it's very very limited uh go toRamsey.com for stash events, and there may be some tickets available. I'm not sure. Surely they're sold out by now, yeah.

I'm pretty sure they are, but I mean, hey, it doesn't hurt. Maybe one or two became available. But for the rest of us around the world, listen, 2020 was hard. Yep. Okay, I don't want to get to the phone calls, but I want to be real here. 2020 was hard. Yep. And one thing I've've learned every now and then

you have to reset every time every now and then i turn off my cell phone as a matter of fact let me turn it off right now before i produce a kid so i mean uh you know as a matter of fact make sure my computer audio is off yeah so every now and then i have to turn off my phone and reset it so he can just stop and then crank back up and have a fresh breath there fresh whatever and i feel like this is what this event is well anthony i'll one up you on that i did that and then the first three or four days of 2021 were like yeah sunsets yeah it had a beautiful snow here yes this was going to be 2021 yeah and then the dumpster fire turned over and caught the whole state on fire and so this is about money but this is i know chris personally i know rachel

personally i know dave personally i know craig this is going to be a this will be bigger than just your money yes it is this is there was no magic all right everything's okay once the calendar flipped over. Yeah. This was, millions of people are still hurting. Yes. Millions of people are struggling. Millions of people are trying to figure it out. And those who have it all right are still going, what's going on? Oh, absolutely.

And so, we have over 200,000 people have already signed up for this. It's free. Yes. Watch this thing, sit down tonight. You're going to watch some stupid show anyway. Yes. Watch this thing. Sit down tonight. You're going to watch some stupid show anyway. Right. Or you're going to fill your head with whatever nonsense, whatever news platform you watch.

Turn that crap off. Turn it off. Hit reset to 33789. Watch 33789. Get your young kids, your old kids, get your husband, your wife, everybody, your girlfriend, boyfriend, everybody in the room. Yes. Watch this thing tonight.

Listen, if you're on baby step number two, I give you permission tonight to order pizza. Order pizza and get in front of the TV and reset your entire family. And I always tell everybody, don't get your families around a screen. It's going to ruin everybody's brain. Tonight, get around a screen.

Tonight, get around a screen. Not until people eat pizza. I'll even go with the pizza thing. You're all going to have gas tomorrow morning when you wake up, but it's going to be worth it. 33789. Text RESET. Don't miss this event, man. Don't miss it, y'all. As a matter of fact, we're going to help Mike reset.

Mike, what's going on, man? How can Dr. D and I help? How are you guys? Happy New Year. Happy New Year to you, man. How can we serve? I'm 34. I am single, not married, no kids. I make a good salary. What's a good salary?

My question is, that's $125, $130. That's a great salary, Mike. Okay, Mike. You may not be single too long after this call. I own a townhouse. I've been here for about four years. I don't know how long I'm going to stay here. So my question is, is it worth paying down the debt if you don't plan on staying here or fully fund more retirement?

I have deferred comp in my job, and I have a fully funded law. Being as with my age, is it worth doing baby steps four and six at the same time or do a little maybe more of the left? I mean, I have a lot of buddies floating around. I don't really know. Should I do more retirement funding? Like I said, because of my age. Are you doing 15% right now? Yeah, just about 15.

Maybe just here. Yeah. Well, I would definitely go ahead and max out the full 15. Okay, bottom line. Just go ahead and just start investing 15%. And then baby steps four, five, six, and seven, we do all at the same time. And so let's say for an example, if you know you're going to be moving in the next two years,

then yeah, you don't really have to focus on paying down a house like that. No, not at all. But let's say if you know you're going to be there for a while and you want to be in that house, then absolutely. Especially if you want to keep the house, as far as in renting out down the road to create an extra general, an extra stream of income. So I think right now that the general question on you is, where are you going in your future and how does this house play a role in your future?

So if you want to pay it off early, please do. If you're saying, hey, I may only be here for two years, I'm not going to tell you to stress paying off this house early if you know you're going to be moving in the next year, two years, three years. So step back and ask yourself, where am I going? What am I doing? But I would definitely make sure that you are maxing out your 15%. You are a young man.

You're younger than me. You're single. You're making $125,000, $130,000 a year owning a home? Yeah. Yeah. Well, here's my other question. I'm going to be phasing out of the Roth soon. Should I start a traditional IRA or do the backdoor?

I'd like to get something else going. Because of the income, you're going to have – Yeah, because of the income, I would definitely recommend sitting down with a smart investor pro because we definitely have to go through the backdoor Roth. But there are a lot of different things you can do, which I would definitely recommend sitting out with a smart Vesta Pro who can teach you how to properly do these things legally

so that way your money is covered. But I have to use the backdoor because of my income as well. So that's what I highly, highly recommend, man. But you're doing amazing stuff, Mike. I mean, there's not too many 34-year-old brothers. That's right. You know what I'm saying? Single, no debt, got money, investing,

own a home. You know, ladies. What did they say? I think his DMs are open. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. You know, but... To Mike's point, I hear these two things more common than any other thing. Hey, guys, we just bought our

forever home. This one came out of my mouth. This is our forever home. Yeah. We're going to live here forever. Yeah. Three years we were out. Yeah. And I don't know how long I'm going to be here.

I'm just, you know, and then you blink, and then it's 15 years you've been living in that house, and you should have paid it off, right? Right. And so either have a plan. Absolutely. I got two years, and here's what I'm going to do. Yeah.

Oh man, crush that house. Crush it. You're going to snap your fingers. It's going to be five years. Crush it. But then you're going to have a paid off house. Listen, if you want motivation on how to crush your financial goals, I want you to text RESET R-E-S-E-T to 33789

because tonight we have some amazing people who are going to teach you how to do it. We'll be right back. day. Imagine the day you submit the last payment on your debt and you finally have extra money to spend and save how you want. For some of you, that day feels like it will never come. But it doesn't have to be that way. It's a new year. And it's time for a new way of thinking. You have to believe you can get rid of debt and take control of your money. Because you can.

And it won't take nearly as long as you think. With Ramsey Plus, you'll learn practical ways to get small, quick wins that add up to big results fast. We'll help you put more money back in your bank account so you can get where you want to be faster, debt-free and spending your money without worry. This year, you can make more progress on your debt and savings than you ever thought possible, and you can start today. Get Ramsey Plus so you can get started living the life you want faster. To start your free the Dave Ramsey Show

and I'm joined by the one and only Dr. John Deloney. My name is Anthony O'Neill. Ramsey Personalities and we are excited to talk to you about your life, your money, your relationship. So please do give us a phone call and we'll talk about anything.

We don't run away from the hard stuff. We actually run to them. I love having hard conversations. Jordan is in Raleigh, North Carolina. Jordan, good afternoon. How can Dr. D and I help? Hey, thanks for taking my call guys.

Thanks, man. Can you hear me? Yeah, go ahead. What's up my call, guys. Oh, thanks, man. Can you hear me? Yeah, go ahead. What's up? Okay, sorry. So basically, I have a vehicle that I have leased. I'm about halfway through it. I've looked into getting rid of it. The dealership said that I could turn it in, and they'd give me $40,000,

but I would still be responsible for another $6,000 on top of that. I was wondering, I had the $6,000 to pay the difference, but I have not had the time to save up more money to buy a vehicle with cash to kind of get me through and get out of debt quicker. So I was wondering what should I do? Should I continue to make the payment, set aside more money to save, and then at the end of the lease just walk away from it, and then I would have that money that I saved up to buy a new vehicle for cash, or should I just turn it in, eat the $6,000, and I don't know, get a loan for a smaller

payment vehicle. I don't know. I'm kind of lost. Okay, so walk me through this process again. How much longer do you have on the lease? I have two years. 24 months. 24 months, alright. And

how much are you paying a month for the lease right now? $560. $60. Okay. We got 24 months, $560. What other kind of debt do you have, Jordan? I stupidly bought some solar systems for my house as well. So I think that's right around $24,000. $24K in the roof. All right. All right. Cool beans. And then explain to me the $6,000. You're going to go over on your mouse? Is that what I'm guessing and hearing correctly? No, no, no. So basically

they're saying if I was to go and turn in my vehicle today, they would only give me $40 for it. But they're saying I owe about $46 on it. Okay. Alright, gotcha. If you did turn in this vehicle today,

would you have another vehicle to drive? No. Do you have any cash? I do, yes. How much cash do you have? I have $10,000. Alright, so you can do that. Then you have $24,000 in debt on your roof. Now, is that $24,000 rolled into right. So you can do that. Then you have 24K in debt on your roof. Now, is that 24K rolled into your mortgage payment or are you paying that outside of your mortgage payment?

I'm paying outside of my mortgage payment. Okay, cool. And you have no other debt outside of this and that lease, correct? Correct. Yeah. I'm going to turn in a lease. Okay. And so here's what I would recommend.

Not recommend. I would suggest. You suggest. Okay. And so here's what I would recommend. Not recommend. I would suggest you suggest she has two options. You can turn in at least, and I don't have a problem with you. Maybe taking out a personal loan for $6,000. You can go down cheaper. Okay. So your debt is going to go down to $6,000 on the car.

And that's, that's fine. Or you can take that $10,000 and going ahead and just pay off that 6,000. And you have10,000 and going ahead and just pay off that 6,000 and you have 4,000, you keep 1,000 in your emergency fund and put the $3,000 towards that 24K on your roof. All right. So if I was you, I'm going that way. I'm taking that 10,000.

I'm going to leave 1,000 in there. I'm going to take six of that 10,000 and put it inside of the payoff, my lease. And then I'm going to take $3,000. Actually, you're going to need a vehicle. Go buy a chump car. And I'll take $3,000 and go buy a cash car. And then start attacking the $24,000 on your roof. Because the lease, man, you're wasting money. And you're throwing away money.

And then if you go over your miles, you're going to end up paying more than the $6,000 today. So that's what I would recommend. And there's something that will be beautiful in your soul about driving a $2,000 1997 Corolla up to your house that's got $25,000 worth of solar panels on it. I'm a huge solar fan. Don't get me wrong. But there's something that's going to be in your soul that's going to remind you every day,

don't ever, ever do this again. Right? Right. Yeah. Yeah, that's kind of what the point. It's going to remind you every day, don't ever, ever do this again. Right? Right. Yeah. Yeah, that's kind of what the point. That's where I'm at now. I guess maybe I should also mention, it's my wife's vehicle. I have a vehicle.

However, she can't. I mean, like, my vehicle is a 2002 Jeep Grand Cherokee, and it's too big, and we have another kid on the way. So, a $2 thousand dollar vehicle for her to drive i'm just a bit weary with with that but i mean i wouldn't put more stress on her and i and our relationship so what's what's what's more stress racking up a bunch of debt and paying a lot of money or getting a quality used vehicle temporarily while you save up cash to buy another one i think that's something you got to ask yourself. And, man, you gave yourself, Anthony says this a lot,

you've got to have a hardcore driving why. You've got one, man. You've got another kid on the way. Work like crazy. Pick up a second and a third and a fourth and a ninth and a tenth job. Your goal now is to get your wife into a safe, safe, good used car, ASAP. No excuses, no stopping, no pausing. Get that done, man.

Get that done and make it happen. That's a why if I've ever heard one. Yeah, absolutely. Cody is in Kentucky. Good afternoon, Cody. How can Dr. D and I serve? Hey, guys. How are you doing today?

Doing well, man. How about yourself? Doing well. I saw y'all on YouTube, O'Ramsey, about two weeks ago. I've been watching a lot of the YouTube videos, and I am 31 years old. Cody, we're the best looking of the bunch. Is that fair? Yeah, that's fair enough. Excellent. I like where we're headed. All right, go ahead. I'm 31, and my dad's been in a – he owns his own business.

He's a bricklayer by trade. He's been doing it for 45 years. So I've been helping him the last nine years of it. So the money is pretty good there. My question is I'm kind of tight on my money, and I've got a little bit saved up, but I'm in a little debt situation as well. I love cars. I love bikes. So, um, that got me in a little bit of trouble. I have a Hellcat, um, Oh, 41,000 on it. And I have a little bit of trouble, Cody. That's a big lot of trouble.

Yeah. And I've got a, and I've got a Harleyley davidson that i owe um 12 000 on and then the only other debt because i tackled all my credit card debts um two months ago tackled those off and the only one i owe is i owe a load for my washer and dryer of fifteen hundred dollars um now what i was going to say is the dilemma that i have here is that my dad and I, in the wintertime as we're outside, you know, when it's a little cold, sometimes we can't work. But as far as money-wise, I usually average around $4,000 in income a month is what I get. So what am I trying to say here? With tackling, should I just go with a debt snowball or how would I do that? Because I've been watching about the debt snowball,

and usually you tackle the least to the highest. As far as money situation, I'm not really struggling. The part is I have $20,000 saved up right now in my bank account, but I don't know what to do with it. I'm nervous when it gets down to that low part. Like when it goes, it makes me all nervous. So with me just making the payments, it kind of makes me feel safe because I got that money there, but I know that's not going to help me in the long run.

Great. So yeah. So that's what I was trying to figure out what I should do. And let me tell you this, Cody, nothing extraordinary happens within size people's comfort zone so i get it you're comfortable making the monthly payments but i truly believe our dreams and our goals die within our comfort zone i need you to step outside of that i need you to take the twenty thousand dollars pay that only fifty four thousand five hundred dollars that's going to take you down to thirty four thousand five hundred you're making 4k a month so i mean i'll go ahead and start attacking it don't cheat

the system okay that's what i tell new people all the time do not cheat the system line up all your debt from smallest all the way over to largest and then you just attack it that way now try to figure out how you can get a little bit more money coming in. How can you turn that four into six K so you can start attacking your debt a lot more? But I understand. Yeah, it's easy. It's easy to make the small minimum payments because you have this money in the account. But you know what? What is easy today is hard tomorrow.

I think you may have to sell that Hellcat, brother. Yes. Yeah. I didn't want to say that. 48 grand against a $45,000 payment. Brother, Hellcats goes today. Goodbye. I'm selling that Joker yesterday.

That doesn't even make sense. This is The Dave Ramsey Show. Over the years, I've heard countless horror stories from listeners about being harassed by debt collectors, receiving calls at work on their cell phones, and some even getting yelled at and threatened. That is not okay. There are laws against this, and there are people, attorneys, that can help make this stop if they are in fact breaking the law. Go to collectionbully.com to learn more. Fill out a quick questionnaire that will identify if you are a victim of this type of illegal harassment January 12th at 7 p.m. for our free reset live stream event to kickstart your money goals for 2021.

My mentor and boss man, Dave Ramsey will be joined by Chris Hogan, Rachel Cruz, and one of my favorite communicators and preachers in the world, Craig Rochelle. They'll give you the motivation and guidance you need to hit the reset button and say goodbye to money stress for good. Do me a favor.

Not me a favor. Do yourself a favor. Do your family a favor. Do your grandchildren a favor do your grandchildren a favor oh you have legacy on them absolutely text the word reset r-e-s-e-t to three three seven eight nine uh right now to sign up and to take the first step towards lasting financial peace or you can sign up at dayramsey.com forward slash reset. Now, if you're in the Oklahoma area tonight and you wanna join the live and in-person audience,

which I don't know if there's too many seats available, but it's on my piece of paper to say it, it's only $20, go to DaveRamsey.com forward slash events and see if there are some tickets available. But I'm going to tell you right now, I am going to be in front of my computer tonight learning from the best, my mentor, Rachel Cruz, and our family. So text the word RESET, R-E-S-E-T, to 33789 to sign up and take the first step towards lasting financial peace. Can we be real for a second? Sure. If you are listening to this, you're not doing anything

tonight. You're not. You're going to go home if you're even allowed to leave your house. You're going to go home. You're going to talk to your spouse. You're going to pet your dog if you're by yourself. You're going to look at your fish just swimming laps.

And then you're going to text a buddy and be like, hey, what episodes are we binging? Or you're going to get your controllers and your cool little headset out. And by cool, I mean not cool headset out. And you're going to play video games with your buddies from college because y'all can't let it go. Or partridge in a pear tree. You're going to play video games with your buddies from college because y'all can't let it go, or partridge in a pear tree. You're going to not be doing anything. Why? How do I know that? Because the whole world is still shut down.

And so I don't like people sitting around as a family in front of screens. Tonight's the night. I don't like people eating pizza and nachos. Tonight's the night. It's free. And you can start with your kids. You can start with you. You can get restarted.

You can re-inject your life with some hope. Re-inject your life with some positivity. And not just kumbaya. Look at this, everybody. The sun's going to come up tomorrow. Not that. That, but also a plan for how to get on the same page with your spouse, your boyfriend, your girlfriend, your job, your money.

Get it done. Reset 33789. It would be stupid not to is all I'm saying. A couple hundred thousand people have already signed up for it. It's knucklehead to not do it. Do it. Do it. Do it.

Man, Andrew's with us in Texas. Texas, actually. Houston, Texas. Houston! What's up andrew how y'all doing doing well man about yourself how can we help all right so i am 21 years old i just graduated from texas a&m university and i am starting my career um with texas dps um with hopes of being a texas state. And so, and fortunately, I graduated with $30,000 in student loans. And, but fortunately, I do have a unique situation of having

six months of basically no expenses while I'm at this academy, because you live there, they feed you, and they also pay you. And so, I wondering, do I throw basically all of that money towards my loans and try to graduate this academy debt-free or close to debt-free, or do I need to set aside some money so that when I move, I'm probably most likely going to get stationed somewhere out of Houston. And so I'm just not sure if I need to basically try to pay off all my loans right now or set aside some money when I have to move as well. So we're in an interesting situation.

You know, you're graduating. You got to pretty soon. You got to start paying this $30,000. But right now you're going to police school and you got to cash flow that. How much is your police school going to pay? No, they pay him. They're going to pay him.

So he's saying, I have no bills for six months. When you go to DPS school, they house you, they take you to Austin, they pay for everything, and they give you a salary. So he could be dumping this off, be debt-free. How much are they going to pay you? About $4,800 a month during the academy, and then it goes up to

$5,000 for the next six months. Okay. All right. And that's all you have is the $30,000? Yes, sir. All right. And that's all you have is the $30,000? Yes, sir. All right. And they're going to stick you. You're going to be in El Paso for a year, right? Are they going to stick you in Amarillo for a year before you start applying to other places?

Yeah. And then will they make sure that you stay within Texas? Yeah. Yeah. Okay, cool. So then great. Yeah. Man, put that towards your dad.

Because here's why I would also say that. You're not going to buy a house in El Paso. Right. More than likely, right? Yeah. You're not going to buy a house in El Paso, more than likely, right? You're not going to buy a house in Amarillo. Yeah. And so you're going to just get an apartment there anyway, so you don't need to have a big pile of cash to put down on a house. I agree.

I would rather you graduate this program 100% debt-free with only $1,000 in your bank account. That $1,000 will help you get to wherever they put you at. You really only need a – and here's the truth. Let's say if you get down towards the last two months and let's say you know exactly where you're going, you may need a first and a last deposit for your apartment. I don't have a problem with you pausing, going hard, hard on your student loan debt

to go in ahead and get your living situation up and going. But right now, put everything you possibly can to get out of that. And then the last two months of you in that program and you know where you're going, okay, slow down, make sure that your living situation is, is good. Then after that, once you get back and you need to complete paying off your debt, which I don't think you will need to, uh, then aggressively go back after it. But man, I'm happy for you right here, man. This is a great opportunity to take advantage of it. Make the wise decision. All right man, I'm happy for you right here, man. This is a great opportunity. Take advantage of it.

Make the wise decision. All right, Andrew? Absolutely. Thank you all so much. Hey, congratulations on getting Academy. That's a hard thing to do. Absolutely. Go do good work and do good in the world, man.

Absolutely. Aaron's with us in Fresno, California. Good afternoon, Aaron. How can Dr. D and I help? Okay, we lost Aaron. Going out to Tampa. We'll come back to her when Kellylly puts it back on um there she is let me go back to aaron okay pause all right so uh let's go ahead and talk to anthony anthony good afternoon i like your name brother you're in tampa florida uh how can

dr d and i help man uh yes sir uh my. My question is kind of a little bit of backstory. Thanks to COVID, I nearly doubled my income, which is the good part of things. Went from selling insurance on a pro-sale basis to doing like Uber Eats and a couple of other things that ended up turning into a full-time income for us. Way to go, Anthony. My problem is... Way to go, man. Yeah. Anthony, we know how to get a job done.

Went from about $34 a year to probably going to be pushing over $60 next year. Wow. Hold on, hold on, hold on. Don't just blow by that. With Uber Eats and what else? And like DoorDash and Grubhub and stuff like that, doing that full-time instead of just full-time.

So you just straight woke up and got after it? Pretty much. Listen, Anthony, I'm interrupting you, and the question you're going to have is for Anthony O'Neill. But listen, quote-unquote, you didn't double your income because COVID. You doubled your income because you ground it out and you worked your butt off.

Okay? Right. I want you to look in the mirror at some point and say, all right, that's pretty good. I did a good job. I'm proud of you for just seeing an opportunity and for seeing a struggle and then saying not me not today i'm going after it i'm gonna make it happen make it happen make it happen good for you man all right get to your question i'm sorry for interrupting you but not really uh no big uh so the the question that i have is uh in 2019 i ended up

getting a new vehicle got the loan stupid me um now that I have this job that I am driving a ton of miles every day on, I am going to be upside down in my vehicle pretty soon. The question is, is that with tax season coming up and everything, I think that I probably saved a little bit more than what I'm actually going to be owing the IRS for taxes. Yeah. Hey, Anthony. Hold on, hold on.

We're coming up to the clock here, so I want you to hold on. Okay. We're going to put you back on hold, and we'll come back to you after the break, all right? Okay. All right, man. Hey, this is The Dave Ramsey Show.

We'll be right back. 888-825-5225 This is the Dave Ramsey Show. Dr. John Deloney and myself, Anthony O'Neill, Ramsey Personalities, sitting in and having a conversation with you, America, about your life, your money, your relationships, your mental health and before going to break we had um one of the best brothers i've ever met on the radio show because his name is anthony as well uh was giving us a comment was talking to us about his current situation as far as and should he sell his car what's going on so update us again man as far as in where you currently are and how we can help. Yeah.

So in 2019, before COVID and everything, before switching jobs, I got a car, got a loan, stupid me. So now that I am putting a ton of miles on my vehicle pretty much every day, I am now slightly upside down in my car. Right now, I owe about $16,000 on the vehicle, and I have about another $9,000 in credit card debt. Two options that I'm kind of contemplating between, and if there's a third, please let me have it, but the two options that I'm looking at right now with the money that I've saved, that I've saved over and above what I'm probably going to be owing the IRS tax season this year, is to sell my vehicle, which right now, looking on my Facebook marketplace and what have you, I can probably get about $13,000, $14,000 for it, and then pay the additional $2,000 to $14,000 for it and then pay the additional

$2,000 to $3,000 out of pocket on it and then get like a $5,000 cheap car for cash and get out from underneath the car payment. Or should I go ahead and just throw the extra money that I get towards the credit card and get that paid off as quickly as possible and then work on the car knowing that I'm going to be upside down. Okay. So you're making 60K a year right now. All right. The only kind of debt you have is 9K on the credit card, 16K on this vehicle, and the

vehicle is worth $14,000. How much cash do you have? You said you had some cash right now. Um, it, it, it depends. Cause I mean, this is my first year being a sole prop. So I think that I, I think that throughout the year I've been saving a little bit more than what I'm actually going to be on the IRS. Um, so I'm not entirely certain how much I'm going to have saved once everything is said and done with that. Okay. Okay.

All right. So here's what I do. Two questions for you. Answer this one. If you did the debt snowball method, paid off the 9K on the credit card, then jumped over to the car, how long do you think it would take you to pay off all of your debt, both items? If you just stuck to that method? How long would it take you? Theoretically thinking, I'm thinking maybe three, four years. Three, four years.

All right. And if you sold the car today and you went out there and bought a cash car and then you just had a $9,000, how long would it take you to pay off the $9,000? I can probably get that paid off pretty quickly, probably a year and a half, two years. So which one do you want? A year and a half? Two years? Or four years? The two years sounds like

the way I would like to go because it's a much shorter time frame. My only problem is that I know that what I have is reliable and whatever I get, a cash car would basically be a crapshoot since I'm using it every day and putting a lot of miles on it. That's kind of my dilemma in getting a cash car. Great. So let's talk about that. I agree. You're driving this car every single day. I like the two year method. How in the world can you take,

all right, how do we get your income up maybe $5,000 more, get on a very strict budget, and then how do we turn your four years into maybe two and a half years to pay this car off quicker and then pay your $9,000 off quicker? I think that's the question that you should ask yourself. All right, if I do this,

I can be debt-free within two years. So how can I keep the car and maybe be debt-free within two years, two and a half years, so you can have a reliable car? My method is to help you become debt-free quickly. That's why I'm here. And so I think if you're worried about that, cool. How do we get this thing paid off within two and a half years? Can you do it?

Yes. I think I could. If I can knock the credit card out, I think paying down the car should be a piece of cake. Absolutely. Because you're okay. You have a $16,000 car right now that's worth $16,000. You're making $60,000. I'm not upset with the math there.

And you're not drowning in debt with a whole bunch of other stuff. I think you can get that $9,000 really knocked out within the next four months and then just aggressively go after that car. I am so fine with that. So I would say if you're concerned about a reliable car, do that, but you've got to get aggressive, and you should be able to be debt-free within two years, honestly. Okay, very cool.

All right. No problem, Anthony. Sounds like a plan. Yeah. Keep up the hard work, man. So Erin is back with us. She was gone earlier, but she's back with us today, Erin, in California, Fresno, California. Good afternoon.

How can Dr. D and I help? Hi. Thanks for taking my call guys um so i have a life insurance question as to whether or not my husband and i actually need to get it so we became totally debt free in october okay um so we paid off about 170 grand in student loans and now we're done way to go yes yeah let me you, the dance was real afterward. So now we're in baby step three. We should have our six month emergency fund by May. Together we make one hundred seventy K before benefit and we have about one hundred K in our retirement. OK, we don't have any kids and we make within two thousand dollars of each other. Do we actually need life insurance? Yes. Okay. Yeah. And here's why. I mean, I didn't

really hear, you only have $100,000 in retirement right now, right? And let's just say, so who's the breadwinner as far as it is? Are y'all pretty much about $2,000 apart, $2,000 apart, right? Yeah. Yeah. I'm 86. He's 84. So it's really, yeah. You're crushing him, baby. I love it. It's not a competition, but I'm from Texas. So, you know, I had a girl, I had a girl, Aaron, you went to California guy, California guy, and you show him, I appreciate that. Yeah. Yeah. Well, so, so your lifestyle is your lifestyle based off of $170,000 income or is your lifestyle based off of $80,000 a year? It's based off. We live on $55,000.

Atta girl. So you live on $55,000. Okay, cool. So here's the truth. We recommend in between 10 to 12 years on a term life insurance policy. With you all being 100% debt free, you're already living off of $55,000 a year. I would still say yes, get some insurance. Now, will you need 10 to 12?

You know, will you need about, you know, will you need two, $3 million? Probably not. No, I say, sit down, have a conversation and just honestly see, okay, what do I need? If you were to pass husband, if you were to pass wife, what is a comfortable situation? And then go from there.

I would say I would guess maybe right around like maybe six years, you know, six, seven years, maybe not a full 10, 12. But I would definitely say you need some, but just not all of it. And Aaron, the temptation here. How old are you? I'm 32. He's 34. OK, so the temptation for someone in their young two young folks like you guys is you're doing a math problem here. And I sat in a room looking a wife in the eye when her husband has passed away in the next room.

I've done this multiple times. And they're trying to do the math on I got to go to work on Monday. Right. Or I'm going to have to go to work in the next week. And what I want you guys to not focus. So there is a math component to this, no question, but there is a psychological component to this too. And so in my house, my wife's got a PhD. She's brilliant. She can go make money tomorrow, right? I want her and she wants me to be able to grieve properly, to not have to think, oh gosh, how am I going to eat next month?

We're able to pause for a second. And so that's a situation you can't really wrap your head around until you've sat in it, right? And so I'm a big fan of life insurance. It's worth that money to me. It may not make sense mathematically. It's worth it psychologically. It's worth it emotionally and spiritually.

It's worth it for those moments of grief when they show up. And they do just show up. Okay? And so that's why I'm a big fan of it. Oh, man. But great call. Yeah. Thank you so much, Aaron, for giving us a call.

And, man, you're doing amazing. Love exactly where you are. I love what you're doing. Man, Dr. D, one hour to happen. It's been fun. It's really been fun. Reset 33789. Get the event tonight.

Tonight, tonight, tonight. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. This episode is over, but if you heard about an event, product, or service and didn't have a chance to write it down, don't worry. We list everything you've heard about during this episode in the podcast show notes or head to DaveRamsey.com. Thanks for listening.