The Ramsey Show - App - When Addiction Has You Scared to Death, Go All In (Hour 1)

Episode Date: June 14, 2018

The show about you

Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Dave 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. This is your show as we talk about you and your life. It's a free call at 888-825-5225. Well, me and Rachel Cruz and a bunch of us returned late last night from having been a couple of days

at the Southern Baptist Convention in Dallas, an experience I've never had before. Wow! That was a lot of fun. It's an amazing process that they used to govern and allowed us to speak there and to be on a panel and to do a breakout and a couple of things. And it was very, very interesting. And Vice President Pence spoke yesterday morning, which enabled us to be in the VIP situation where we were able to get to meet him.

And I can report to you that he is exactly what you might think he would be, a very nice guy, just very likable, kind of a cut-up. We had a real good conversation, me and him, and about seven or eight guys standing around, a lot of fun, and just very, very likable, very in tune with, obviously, Southern Babysseys there to speak, but also just with regular folk in that sense. And I've had the pleasure of meeting a lot of people in the spotlight over the years, and a lot of them are who you hope they would be,

whether they're famous musicians or actors or whatever. And some of them are total twerps behind the scenes. You know, they want blue M&Ms in their green room or whatever, and they're special, and everybody needs to know how special they are. But, you know, most of these folk that are uber successful in whatever space they're in got there by being good people and being good to people most of them aren't pre-madonnas but there's a few here or there i'm sure and um but that was very interesting very interesting for a kid like me from antioch tennessee to get to actually meet the vice president i'm just like whoa a little bit starstruck you know not much but a little bit and uh he's a hard guy to be star struck with just because

he's just so affable just likable guy you know um kind of guy you just some guys would hang out with you know and uh yeah there's a there's a big report for you but it's probably what you already knew or what you thought it was or whatever but so no big real insight from me on that kind of stuff and none of that's a political statement although i do agree with his politics um but the um you know i've met people lots of people who i don't agree with their politics are great people they just you know they just got their politics wrong so you know so but this guy's a great guy all right let's start with columbia missouri this hour jessica is with us. Hi, Jessica.

How are you? Hi, Dave. I'm grateful. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? Well, I have been doing Financial Peace University since fall of 2015. Went through all the baby steps to the point that I'm now staring at my home debt in the face,

and it's making me very apprehensive. Okay. Your debt is making you apprehensive? Yeah, it's starting to pay off the home loan. It's a feeling I did not expect to have, but I'm looking at it going, it's freaking me out. I don't really know why. Having your home paid off is scaring you?

Maybe. I mean, it makes sense, obviously, and the program works because I've lived it, right? Yeah. But it's like this step is really the last step before it's done. Well, before you really go into high gear building wealth and high gear with your generosity and other things because you don't have a house payment anymore, I'm confused. What's scaring you about paying off your house? Well, I guess I'm feeling like, you know, putting all this money and just putting it in there and putting it in there. It's not because I've been saving so much, you know.

Do you have an emergency fund? I do. Do you have money emergency fund? I do, yeah. Do you have money, 15% going into retirement? Yes. And how much is in retirement? I've got about $150,000. Okay, how old are you? I'm 43.

Okay, so why do you want a mortgage? I don't want a mortgage. That's what's confusing me. I'm like, why would I feel like this, staring at starting to pay off my home? How much is the balance on the mortgage? It's $50,000. Oh, my gosh. What's the house worth?

About $170,000. Okay. And so you're just putting monthly extra on it, and it's about to pay off. Yeah. Let's try this.'s try this go ahead and finish paying it off and and if it if it ruins your life go get a mortgage right go get more debt i know well i mean you know let's try it right right the worst thing worst thing can happen is it's just awful and you know all these things we've talked about are wrong

and you just it's just i hate this i'm sitting around the paid for house i can't stand it and just go get you a mortgage right true there's always someone willing to give you a mortgage right yeah absolutely so you can get you can you know if it if it causes you a problem you can undo it but i don't think that's where it's going to happen i think you're going to have the reverse you're going to have just this tremendous piece and as long as you're not doing something that's weird in the other part of your finances that we're missing in this conversation that's causing you fear in order to get the house paid off. But if you're putting your 15% away, you got your emergency fund and you're having a reasonably good life and you're knocking off the 50K and you're going to be debt free and heading towards millionaire status. I really can't see how you can mess this up, but I guess you could.

I guess you could. So if you hate it, you can just go get you another mortgage. Go ahead and knock it out. Justin's with us. Justin's in Jacksonville, Florida. Hi, Justin. How are you? Hey, Dave.

Pleasure to be on. Sure. What's up? So I reached out. I am in some serious financial despair. Between my wife and I, we have a ton of debt, credit cards. We have two Lexus payments. We lease them.

We own a house. We have a mortgage. We have good equity there, so I'm not too concerned with that. But, you know, no savings. Both of us make a good living, and I've been blowing a lot of money gambling. We've got nothing to show for it. And I figured you'd be the person to help.

Scary to be out of control, isn't it? It's the worst feeling ever, man. And, you know, the funny thing is I'm very aware of it, and I still just, you know, continue to do it. Yeah. Well, that's what addiction is. So you can know it and know it's wrong and still just get drawn back into it. It's a moth to a flame thing, right?

Yep. Yeah, you wake up with a financial hangover in the back of your mouth, and you still go back again. So what's your household income? You know, it's tough to give you an exact number. Oh, roughly. Roughly, what do you make of your... I would say about $200. Okay.

About $200. So you're making plenty of money, and that's part of the problem, actually. It makes it feel like you can clean up any level of mess, like you can out-earn your addiction, your stupidity, right? Yep. And I also, you know, I'm in the real estate business, so I get chunks at a time. You know, I don't make $1,000 a week or $2,000 a week. What kind of gambling are you doing? You know, blackjack is really tough for me.

You know, I play poker. Poker is not really bad. I've made a living playing poker in my younger age. Online or on purpose? Online or in person? Online lately. Yeah. Tell you what, hang through this break and I'll work with you here for a second.

We'll see if we can come up with some ideas together, brother. I know how scared you are. This is The Dave Ramsey Show. Identity theft has become an epidemic. Data breaches are being reported every day, and hundreds of millions of people have had their identities stolen, sometimes multiple times. That's crazy. Now, I've seen firsthand when people are stressed and freaked out when they become an identity theft victim.

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Is that a fair summary of what you told me? Pretty much, yeah. Okay. And how old are you? 29. 29. Cool. Okay.

I'll be 30 this month. Here's what I know, and you've got to make some decisions. Okay. We work with people with financial trouble and have for 30 years and we do a lot of one-on-one coaching as a part of that um what we have found is a guy named larry burkett used to teach this stuff decades ago and he used to say financial problems including when i went broke justin financial problems are almost never the problem they're really the symptom of something else going on sometimes it's something as simple as immaturity sometimes it's greed

in my case it was way too much ambition and so i grew too fast i bought a whole bunch of real estate nothing down i had four million dollars worth of real estate three million three million dollars worth of debt and the bank called our notes and we went broke when i was your age and i hit bottom so i did stupid with zeros on the end, in other words. And so that started this whole thing of us teaching people how to handle money, God's and Grandma's ways. Now, having done coaching for 30 years around here, here's what we've discovered. The fastest-growing addiction in North America today is online pornography.

And it is destroying thousands and thousands of households a day. Because guys get in that and it just, it starts eating money. The second fastest growing addiction is online gambling. Faster than cocaine. I thought that would be first. Yeah, well, pornography has a larger revenue base than all professional sports put together now. Larger than all. It's an unbelievable evil industry.

And, but the, anyway, the point is, is that you're dealing with a monster that a lot of other people are dealing with, and online accessibility versus having to get in your car and drive to the casino is making it worse. Would you agree? 100%. And on top of that, I work from home, so it's really right there. You have the disadvantage of isolation. Yeah. That you can sneak off in secret, so to speak, even though it's not really that secret. But, I mean, you don't have anybody looking over your shoulder going, what are you doing?

You know, and that kind of a thing. And that's really, really dangerous. So what I'm telling you from an intellectual standpoint, you're dealing with an emotional issue with an addiction. But from an intellectual standpoint, it will help you fight it, is you're dealing with a very large and powerful monster, and it is not to be toyed with. 100% of the people who have addictive behaviors that we work with either correct the addictive behaviors by getting some help, or they go broke. There is no in between it will eat your life

and you will depending on how extreme it gets you'll lose family you'll lose everything i mean so i'm trying to scare you because you got to do something with this dude um for your sake so here's what we would tell pete you if you came into our office we don't treat addictions here but we work obviously with a lot of people who are facing addictive behaviors or full-on addictions, and I don't know where you are in that spectrum. It doesn't matter. Right now, these are just two guys talking. I'm not a therapist anyway.

But if I woke up in your shoes and was scared about that, what I would do would be I would hit it from – it's kind of like getting cancer. I would hit it from about three or four different fronts. I want to have the tumor removed, and I want to have every possible treatment, and I want everybody praying for me. I want to hit it from every possible angle, right? And so the first thing I do is find a Gambler's Anonymous group. It has the highest success rate of anything in addiction to get people out,

are the 12 steps, and plug into it. I know you don't probably feel like you're at that point, and I don't know if you are or not, but go over there. I've been there years ago. Yeah, well, go back. Many times. Okay, go back. And you know what you're in for then.

You're in for people who love you and people who will speak truth brutally because they love you. And the second thing I would do is, have you guys ever been involved in a church? No. Okay. No, we're not very religious, honestly. Yeah. I understand. I understand.

Well, what happens is with addictions, there's several different elements. Obviously, emotions, emotional and mental is part of it, but spiritual is part of it as well. And when I was your age, I was somewhat like you about this same subject. So I would recommend you visit and talk with a local pastor and begin to attend some worship services, even if you don't totally buy in. That's cool. I'm okay with that. But just let's attack this cancer from every possible angle.

Let's get GA involved. Let's get spiritual walk involved. I also would look up and find a one-on-one therapist, a one-on-one counselor that deals with this and meet one on one. I mean, you got to be really, really sure that you that you're coming completely clean with your wife on all of this and that she knows exactly where you are because it's your only shot at keeping her around. She's going to get really tired of the lying very fast. Am I wrong?

You know, luckily I do have a great relationship with her. We just got married three months ago. And, you know, she's aware. She's aware. I don't make lies. Good. That means you're not too far. Yeah, you haven't been sucked in too far yet then.

Because a really bad addict, the one thing I do know about them is they lie all the time. I was there. I was there years ago. I lied. I stole. I did whatever I had to do, you know, at that time. At this point where I am now, you know, the money's just coming. You know, I close the deal. I get a large sum. And if I lose it, I tell myself, oh, well, I got another deal closing next week. You know, I'll be able to pay the bills with that.

And then next thing you know, I go in the hole. And then that next check is paying off debt. You know what I mean? Yeah, you're getting a vicious circle, dog chasing its tail. Exactly. And I find myself living deal to deal. dead you know what i mean yeah yeah you get in a vicious circle dog chasing his tail yeah exactly and i'm living i find myself living deal to deal i'm i you know i've closed deals where i've made 70 000 and i'm living deal to deal yeah and i think i hear you saying you're afraid you're going to go all the way back down that rabbit hole to where you used to be and you're not there yet

not there yet i don't want to be there but you know how to get there um sure and you're on the And you're on that road. That's the road you're driving on. Sure am. Yeah, that's why you called me. I'm just a guy, man. I'm not a counselor. I don't know what I'm doing.

It's just two guys here talking, but that's what you're telling me. I know that. That's what I heard. If I were you, I would put some people in my life, like GA, a one-on-one coach, a church, my wife, and if you've got to throw the computer in the backyard or you've got to buy some kind of filter system that doesn't allow you to go, some of these blocking systems or whatever, I don't even know how you do it anymore. There used to be a whole filter thing that keeps you from going to a gambling site,

keeps you from going to a porn site, keeps you from going to anything, because you don't want to transfer one addiction for another either. That happens a lot um and so uh but get you know what you're telling me is is you know the danger signs because you've been there before and you're seeing them and you're saying what do i do so i'm telling you get like six different points of contact around this to kill it let's kill this beast forever and ever uh and you know ga one-on-one coaching one-on-one counseling a good church friends family wife everybody gets some practical tactical measures where you just don't do that uh you may want to um quit working from home

you may want to find a way to work out of an office somewhere. Looked into that. We had an office for a while. Didn't work out. I have a business partner. We live about an hour away from each other, so it's hard to find a place. I don't care. You're right. This is a $200,000 a year problem, dude. If it takes that for you to get well so you can get on with your life,

because if you get this monkey off your back, you're a guy who produces. You're making serious bucks, and you're broke. You don't need to be broke making this kind of money. So we've got to get this monkey off your back so you have a life. So that's what I would do. Call me back and tell me how it turns out. I want to hear the rest of the story. I want to hear what rest of the story.

I want to hear what you really did. I hope you're going to do this. If you don't do it, man, there is no middle ground for people facing what you're facing. It's all in one way or the other. All in for the healing or all in for the hell. Which one are you going to sign up for? Are high health care costs getting you down? Are you confused trying to navigate your options? Do you wish you could find an affordable, biblical solution to your health care costs? Based on New Testament principles, Christian Health Care Ministries, or CHM,

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That's chministries.org. Christian Healthcare Ministries is a proud sponsor of Dave Ramsey Live Events. chministries.org Christian Healthcare Ministries is a proud sponsor of Dave Ramsey Live Events. chministries.org In the lobby of Ramsey Solutions, Tony and Brianna are with us. Hey, guys, how are you? Hi, good. Hey, Dave. Welcome, welcome.

So where do you guys live? Eastvale, California. Welcome. Good to have you guys. So how much debt have you paid off? So we paid off a total of $49,626. Say it again. $49,600 and some change.

Okay, gotcha. And how long did this take? It took us about 10 months, but our story goes back a little further than that. Okay. And what was your household income range during that 10 months? Well, it started while I was on disability, and we were bringing in about $55,000. And once I got back to work, we were going up to about $80,000. Oh, wow. Okay, cool. All right. And what kind of debt was the $50,000?

Our debt was wedding debt, student loans, credit cards, personal loan, loan and some business debt okay and so how long have you been married uh we've started about four years ago but i mean i kind of like to say you know it broke it up into two parts because the the half that we were married half the time we were married we're kind of like living together but not really acting like we're married we yeah we had our expenses and everything separate okay all right and so you you ran two separate accounts and then you got married and then you attacked it together yeah okay cool so what started you getting out of debt 10 months ago well it goes back about two years ago. I had a pretty bad bicycle accident. I was going downhill and lost control of the bike and I ended up breaking both my forearms at the same time. And so, you know, that kind of changed my perspective on things and it kind of changed

how I look at my life. You know, the EMTs during the accident, they reminded me that a week before that on the same spot, somebody lost their life. And, you know, I was two feet away from the spot where the guy hit his head. Whoa. And so, you know, it kind of just, it sort of woke me up that, you know, we're really one accident away from total financial problems. And leaving her behind with all these bills and debts that we had. So it was kind of a changing point for me where I realized we've got to make a change and do something to put us in a better position.

That does wake you up, man. That's amazing. Wow. So what did you do to get out of debt? Well, we did just about everything. So after I went back to work, I started working overtime. We picked up side jobs. I was doing Lyft.

We both did some food deliveries. I started selling on eBay, Amazon, yard sales, just about anything, you name it, just to attack the debt as hard and as fast as we could. Wow, way to go. Good for you. Very cool. So what do you tell people the key to getting out of debt is? Being on the same page and just making sure that all of your finances together if you're married. And then if you're not married, then having an accountability partner really helps a lot. Yeah.

So what was the big debt that the last one that you paid off? Well, I think the very last debt we paid off was one of the medical bills I had, the ambulance bill, actually. Oh, yeah. But, yeah, you know, our medical bills, luckily, we have insurance. So we covered most of that. Otherwise, we would have been about $250,000 from all the surgeries. And I've had about four surgeries all through the process.

And so we only had to pay co-pays on that. And we also had a lot of, you know i had like 15 credit cards and we were just moving money from here to there to just you know i don't know what we were doing playing some kind of credit card shuffle yeah we took on a personal loan to try to consolidate everything which we realized wasn't really a great decision well yeah you moved it around didn't you yeah yeah it's still there though yeah the pea's still under the shell. Yeah. Wow.

Well, good for you guys. What was the hardest part for you? Well, I think for me, it's just, you know, trying to stay intense and stay focused for as long as I could. You know, when most people are out partying, I was working. When people would be sleeping, I was working. When people would be sleeping, I was working. Just, you know, giving up as much as I could at the time to just stay focused and intense. You know, I mean, I know it wasn't going to be forever, so I could just push through it. Yeah. So was he gone all the time, Brianna? Yeah, he was actually. I'd go to bed and he'd go out at night because that's

when the surge rates were for Lyft and Uber. He would do that and then um me after work i would go do postmates and deliver food and anything that we could to pick up just a few extra dollars what out of all the extra jobs you did what paid the best our full-time jobs probably no not extra jobs your extra extra jobs um i just took up Postmates, which was pretty good. I would say Amazon. Selling on Amazon was pretty good. It was just a lot of work. But, yeah, you could make a big amount of money on that if you really got serious.

So using it like eBay. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. All right. Way to go, you guys. Congratulations. Hustle and grind, baby.

Get her done. Well done. Well done. Well done. Well, we got a copy of Chris Hogan's retire-inspired book for you. We want that to be the next chapter in your story, that you're millionaires and outrageously generous along the way. You're on your way, aren't you? Yeah, we are, definitely.

Well done. I'm proud of you. You're heroes. Very well done. Tony and Brianna, Los Angeles, $50,000 paid off in 10 months, making $55,000 to $80,000. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Three, two, one.

We're debt-free! Yeah! Well done, well done. Man, that's amazing. That's fun. That is fun. Hey, listen, if you are a business owner or an HR professional, you're working in human resources for someone, the month of June is National Employee Well-Being Month.

Yeah, that's a thing, really. But, hey, for real, National Employee Well-Being Month. While some people may be thinking about their summer vacations, if you're a business owner or an HR professional, not you. You're looking ahead at the benefits you're going to offer your employees at this time of the year. Because you're thinking about what's going to be presented to them in the fall so that next calendar year yeah the benefits package is in place the most common way your employees learn about retirement is from you their employer and by the way you are the place they have the best chance with a 401k plus or minus a match to retire millionaires we see a lot of the millionaires in our studies show up from employers

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not as a way to survive, they work differently. When they're at work worried about MasterCard or DiscoverCard or VisaCard calling them or their car payment calling them because they're behind, they're not thinking about work. It's a productivity issue. It changes the way you work. And those of you that are self-employed and you're just deciding, you know, I'm going to get control of my money. Well, what ends up happening is it ends up affecting your income.

Because when you don't have to focus on all this stuff chasing you from behind, you have a different outlook on your career choice, a different outlook on how you earn money and how much money you earn. So check us out, smartdollar.com slash blueprint. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. For years, I refused to endorse any company that claimed to get people out of timeshares. I told my listeners it's a horrible product and that, unfortunately, they didn't have a lot of options. Then a few years ago, I sat down with Brandon Reed, the owner of Timeshare Exit Team.

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Yes, you will write them a check, but they stand behind their guarantee. They will get you out or they'll give you a full refund. Call 844-999-EXIT. Online at timeshareexitteam.com. Nick is with us in Asheville, North Carolina. Hi, Nick. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hi, Nick.

Hi, Dave. God bless you. Thank you, sir. Thank you for having me on. Sure. My question would be very simple. Would it ever be a good idea, and I know your stance on loans and I respect it, would it ever be a good idea to take on a student loan if and only if your employer promised to pay it off for you after 10 years of service? No.

Okay. Because you could go to work for that employer and find out they're unethical and be gone in three months. I see. You could go to work for that employer and then get an offer to work someplace else for double the months. I see. You could go to that work, work for that employer, and then get an offer to work someplace else for double the money. I see. You could go to work for that employer, and how many times do I have to fill out the possible negative scenarios in this story? Yes, sir.

You follow me? Yes, sir. Ten years is a long time being dead, Nick. The average person today has 14 jobs from the time they graduate from college until they retire and four careers. Holy cow. That's the average. And so 10 years on the job is highly unusual. Now, some people do.

That's cool. There's nothing wrong with it. It's not to indict either direction, but that's not a strategy with those data points that you would want to entail. Hey, thanks for the call. Daniel is with us in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Hi, Daniel. How are you? I'm doing great.

Thanks, Dave. So my question for you is, me and my wife, we have our house paid for. We're saving 15% toward retirement. Same for kids' college. We've been on your plan for several years, and we're seeing the benefits of that already. But at some point as I look in the future here, most of my money that I've set aside is all in retirement accounts. And when I look at possible investments I'm going to do in the future,

whether it be real estate or something else, I can't use my retirement money. And so when, if ever, is a good time to begin saving some of my money outside of retirement accounts so that I can use that before retirement age. Gotcha. That's a good plan. It's called a gap plan. The gap between the time you actually retire, quote-unquote, and 59 1⁄2, you know, before you can get to stuff. So how old are you? 33. Okay.

Did you say your house was paid for? Yes. Way to go, man. Good for you. What's your household income? About $75,000. Well done. Okay.

And how much is in retirement now? Somewhere between $150,000 and $200,000. I don't know, I've got a bunch in there for my kids too. Yeah, you're killing it. Well done. Very well done at 33. Congratulations. Well, so, yeah, we say at baby step four, you're at seven.

But at baby step four, you're putting 15% of your income for retirement. Now, really, what retirement means when I say that is wealth. We're trying to build wealth so that we leave an inheritance to our children's children, so we put ourselves in a position to be outrageously generous. We're managing God's money for him. We're trying to build wealth, and that's what we're doing. So it doesn't matter to me really where it is. It just becomes a strategy of how much of it we want to keep the government's hands off of.

So I'm certainly going to max out Roth IRAs because that's going to grow tax-free. Is your 401K at work, Roth? Yes, it is. Okay. And I'd probably want to max that out, but maybe not. I mean, it's up to you. If you want to back down a little bit on it at some point and say, I'm going to put some money over here in something simple, like maybe just an index fund,

maybe an S&P 500 no load. Okay. Nothing wrong with that. And I'm going to park enough money there. And now that I already, you know, I'm already putting 15% away with my Roths and other stuff, but I want to crank it up a little more. I'm going to put a little more in, and I'm not going to put that in a retirement account. And instead, it's just going to build up in that index fund,

and I'll pay cash for a rental house later with it or something like that. If that becomes your game plan, then, you know, that makes sense to me. There's no problem with that. Would I divert half of your retirement savings that direction? No, I would not. No. But some, yeah, I think you would put some there because, you know, if you're already where you are at 33, at age 50, you're going to be in a different position.

I don't predict that you will quit producing an income early, but you will be in a position where you don't have to produce an income. There's a difference. Sure. Sure. You know, I've seen whether it's a vacation home or a rental property or whatever it is that I can't get because the funds are all different. But I guess my point is that let's say that you didn't want to do what you're doing now at age 45,

and you had enough money set aside to live off of the money. You see, that's what we're worried about here. Do you want to get there? Yeah, but that doesn't mean you're going to just quit and do nothing. You'll probably also create an income. As a matter of fact, you'll probably create the greatest income of your life at that point. But, you know, it doesn't always happen that way, but it often does. So the point of planning for retirement really is to build wealth.

It's not necessarily to never create an income again. I haven't had a need, a financial need, to create an income for many, many years. But I continue to do it because I enjoy what I do, number one um and it's having an impact number two i i do it because it enables me to give more generously with bigger zero zone uh and so i work for that now that's why i work now and um and i enjoy my life you know i don't have no desire to spend 24 7 on a golf course or fishing at the lake i want to produce. I get more joy out of that than I do recreation. Yeah, I want to recreate too and recreate in style. But I want to do it cheap.

I want to do it great. Right. But that's not my reason for building wealth. It's not a hedonistic reason where I'm just building enough wealth that I don't have to, that all I can think about is me. You know, that's not the goal. There's no joy in that long term. But all of that to say, yes, you need some gap stuff.

You're doing very, very well, and I would do some stuff that was not in a retirement plan right along the lines of what you're talking about. Teresa is with us in Canada. Hi, Teresa. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Yes. Hello. Wow.

I'm speaking to you. I can't believe it. Anyways, my question is I'm trying to decide whether I should take my pension early. I'm currently not self-employed. Listening to you, we've decided we took consideration of that since I had left, this is a government pension that I thought I'd see if I could roll it into some pension investment in here. But I called them, and they said, no, I can't roll it at this point anywhere. My only option is I will have to take the pension.

Now, the interesting thing is I get the full pension at age 60, but I actually become 50 this year, and can take start taking the pension this year but that's a five percent penalty per year on that yeah i would take it yeah and invest it okay well that was that would give me my next question we're in baby step two should i start just investing that or should i um well i would throw it no i throw it at baby step two take it as extra income throw it at baby step two but basically from as extra income, throw it at Baby Step 2. But basically, from an investment standpoint, when you die, that money's gone. Yes. And so any money you can get out of their hands, any money you get out of their hands before you die into your name survives you.

Right. And so I'm going to take it early and often unless the penalty is just astronomical. This is a very high penalty. It would give me pause. You may want to sit down with an investment professional and actually get someone to crunch some numbers with you and see 5% a year for 10 years is 50%. Does that mean you were cutting your pension from 60 on by 50%

because you started taking it now? That one's a question. You know, that's one to look at and really look at, you know, have somebody that's an investment advisor sit down and help you crunch those numbers and look at it. But generally speaking, yeah, we're going to take the investments as early as we can or the pensions as early as we can, preferably in a lump sum.

You can't do that. So that we get the money out of the pension's hands because it dies when you do. And you've got more use for it while you're alive. And if you don't use it in some way while you're alive, it survives you this way. And that's why we do that. So good question. Thank you for joining us. Colin is on Twitter with today's constant we do that. So good question. Thank you for joining us. Colin is on Twitter with today's constant data breaches

as identity theft insurance, a smart move or a bad idea. Well, Colin, I endorse identity theft protection from Zander Insurance and I have for many years because of that. I think it's a necessary idea. You want to be sure if you're buying ID theft insurance that you are getting the kind that assigns someone to do the work to clean up the problem of having your identity theft

or having your identity stolen because that's the problem. It's not that you owe money. It takes 100 hours to get one of these accounts cleared and it wasn't even your fault. And so that's what you need and that's why I endorse Zander Insurance and why I have Zander Insurance's identity

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