The Ramsey Show - App - Wife Hid $90,000 in Debt From Me (Hour 2)

Episode Date: October 18, 2019

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🎵 Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Dollar Car Rental Studios, 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. Thank you for joining us. Open phones at 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225. Starting this hour off is Alika in Hawaii.

Hi, Alika, how are you? Good, how are you, sir? Better than I deserve. What's up? I just had a quick question to ask you. Recently, I got about, to be 15-year where the rate will be manageable, and then I could attack it from there without the minimum payments being so high every month. I'm sorry. How does credit card debt, seven bombshells occur?

Help me with this. Okay. So I've been married for 16 years. When my wife and I got together, she took over the finances, which was great because I had terrible credit. So we're able to buy a house back in like 2001. And back then our philosophy was we don't spend any more than we can pay off every month and we did that you know throughout the beginning of our marriage and I kind of um I stopped paying attention to the finances and let her take care of it and the other day I opened up a credit card statement expecting it to be maybe in a thousand or two thousand range and it was 19,000 and that was just the first started digging and I found a total of seven other credit cards with a total of and a home equity line for a total of 90,000 that I didn't even know about. Wow.

That's a pretty serious gut punch. Yeah, the $19,000 was a serious gut punch. I'm guessing dinner that night was a little stressful. Yeah, well, I mean, we've got two beautiful kids and we didn't want to stress them too much with with our adult situation so dinner wasn't so bad i mean she feels terrible she's really good at paying things on time no she's not but um she sucks at it yeah she's really good at hiding it yeah yeah so why was she hiding it why didn't she tell you um i've been asking myself that question i would ask her. Yeah, I've asked her. She has been scared to tell me, she said. I think we've been kind of living the dream, and she didn't want to. I mean, I knew in the back of my head it wasn't really adding up,

but I didn't know. That's kind of why I opened the credit card statement. I didn't know it was this bad. I guess it had been happening for a long time. What's your household income? About $130,000. Okay. All right.

And how old are your kids? About 21, 15, and 11. Okay. Are you guys in a good church by chance? No. Okay. I want you to seek out a good christian marriage counselor and the two of you go see them immediately because let me tell you the statistics around discovering ninety thousand

dollars worth of deception and a divorce following are very high uh you you have been gut punched almost in the same way as if she's had an affair. The breach of trust is very similar. It's obviously different tactical actions, but the breach of trust of her level of deception, uh, and your level of lack of involvement that allowed that deception to occur. The two of you both have some things to talk through. Uh, you are now involved in the money every month for the rest of your life. Do you understand?

Yes, sir. Never again. Do you turn this over? It's not because it's because the way you guys were doing it doesn't work, obviously. And both people in the house need to be involved in the budget. I don't mind if she executes the budget after the two of you agree to it but you both need to carry the weight of the decisions because she does not have the ability to tell you or your family no right and she consequently ran up these bills because she wasn't good at budgeting she wasn't good at handling this she wasn't good at selling people no she wasn't

good at managing the big decisions of the household by herself, and that's where all this came from. And so all she did was the best she could do, but it wasn't good. And so she gets to work with you, both of you together. You don't take it over, and she gets shut out now. You get to work together for the rest of your life, and you sit down with a marriage counselor, and you talk through how this made you feel that your wife has lied to you for $90,000 worth

because a normal human being is both hurt and pissed off when that occurs. And if you're not both of those things right now, you're not normal. Yeah, I'm pretty normal. Okay. And she's pretty condemned and ashamed and beat down and has a lot of tears if she's normal. Now that her lies and deception have come in. Yeah, a lot of crying. Usually when the dam breaks, that's what happens because she's been carrying the weight of this lie.

And it takes a lot of energy to lie at this level and it and so you guys have got to work through that stuff and this could be the best thing that ever happens to your family it could be the best thing that ever happens to your relationship or it will cause it all to come to an end suddenly and you won't even realize where it came from if you don't go deal with it so sit down with a counselor for god's sakes you need marriage counseling okay and then i'm going to put you guys in financial peace for a year and that includes going to the class and both of you are going to go to the class and both of you are going to get on a budget and both of you are going to start telling your family no uh about ninety thousand dollars worth of no and no you don't

need to refinance your way out of this the interest rate is not your problem your problem is you guys have been spending like you were in congress right and you guys got to quit spending you make enough money hawaii is expensive to live but you make enough money and here's the deal let's do some quick math okay if we pay off 45 000 a year you're done in two years so you're probably done in about three years okay 30 000 a year for three years and you're done and you can do that with what you make but your family is going to be on beans and rice rice and beans we're not going to the inside not going to see the inside of a restaurant unless we're working there and vacation is going to be in your backyard because you got to clean this

you got to roll your sleeves up and bust this thing in the nose and turn it around so i'll walk with you brother but you do the things i'm telling you to do or you're in a danger zone get with a marriage counselor and get in this financial peace class. And I'll pay for the class. It's free to you guys. I want to be part of your healing, not part of your problem. This is The Dave Ramsey Show. I got a call the other day, and I thought it was worth talking about again. It was from a wife looking for life insurance for her family.

She asked why I only recommend term life insurance instead of cash value plans like whole life. I usually explain how you overpay for coverage, earn a horrible rate of interest, and don't get your cash value when you die. But this time, I just had her go straight to Zander.com and get a rate. And then we compared that rate to the whole life plan, and she immediately saw the huge savings.

She realized all the things she could do with that money, like paying down debt, investing in a smarter way. That made it real for her. It makes no sense to buy or keep a cash value plan when there are smarter, less expensive ways to protect your family. That's why I suggest that everyone go to Zander.com or call them at 800-356-4282 and get a free quote. That's zander.com or 800-356-4282. Carolyn is with us in Virginia.

Hi, Carolyn. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hi, Dave. Thank you for taking my call. Sure. What's up? I have a question about buying property in foreclosure. We are debt-free, and we have the money to buy a property that we're looking at. The assessed value, it's a commercial piece of property, the assessed value is less than $200,000. And in doing my due diligence, I've found that there are three judgments against it and two deeds of trust.

So the total that's owed against the property is roughly around $700,000. When I talk with the lawyer who's running the sale, they have told me that the properties are sold with a clear title, but it doesn't necessarily mean that you can get a title on the property after it cleared the auction. So I'm wondering if you can provide me a little bit of insight as to what this type of thing means. I mean, I definitely don't want to get myself into owing, you know, six or $700,000 on property on somebody else's debt. So is this something we can pursue smartly, or should we run away? No, you need to look at it.

It looks good. Assessed value has nothing to do with real value. That's just taxes. Okay. So that's not a good use of an appraisal. So number one thing we need to do is we need to get an accurate value, actual marketplace value of the property uh do you know anyone in the real estate business that can help you pull that together

yes okay um so i would pull out together an actual value and if you were going to guess you would guess that it's worth considerably more than 200 correct yes what would you think the actual market, if you put a sign in the yard, would sell for? Probably, just guessing, probably more $3,350. Okay, that's what I was thinking. Because a $200, it depends on your state and how up-to-date your assessments are, those kinds of things at your tax assessor's office. But let's use $300 as our example, okay? Now, the first, the dates of the judgments that they're recorded at the courthouse and the dates that the deeds of trust were recorded at the courthouse give you the information

that you'll need. It sounds like that the deed of trust that has been on the books the longest, which makes it the first mortgage, is who's foreclosing. Is that true? I believe so, and that date is 2014. Okay. So when the deed of trust was recorded, if it's the second deed of trust recorded that's foreclosing,

the first deed of trust will survive the foreclosure. You'll still owe that if you bought the property. Okay. But anything behind the deed of trust that is foreclosing is cleansed. So those judgment liens are cleansed. They're very likely following that deed of trust. It'd be very unusual for them to issue a loan and a deed of trust if there were judgment liens against the property. So it's highly unlikely that they're in front of this deed of trust, okay?

Okay. So your second piece of information you need is you need to call a title company and ask them if you can pay them for a simple title search. Probably cost you $100. And then ask them in the event that the first deed of trust, the first mortgage is foreclosing, in the event you bid the property on that, would they be willing to issue title if you became the owner based on that foreclosure sale would they issue a title insurance policy okay so one what will it cost

to get title search done two based on that title search if you bid in that position would you would they issue title insurance and that'll tell you if you're getting clean title or not do not bid if you cannot get clean title okay now let's go back and let's look at another scenario just for teaching purposes okay i think you've got a first mortgage foreclosure going here is what it sounds like to me the way the lawyer when you call them the the successor trustee or the trustee doing the foreclosure explained it to to you, the title's going to be cleaned, which would mean the first mortgage is foreclosing. That's what it sounds like. Let's pretend, for the sake of argument, just so you understand, that it's not the first one.

It's the second one. And let's pretend the first mortgage you call and get the loan balance, the current loan balance on the first mortgage is $50,000. That has to be paid if you bid in the second position, meaning if the second deed of trust is foreclosing, that $50,000 would have to be paid. So if you bid $1 at the foreclosure sale, you paid $50,001. Okay. In other words, you would add your first mortgage that stays in place to any bid you're

making and so you would not bid on this property you know you know plus the first mortgage very much depending on the size of the first mortgage if there's a first mortgage that's 250 000 this property is not in play forget Forget it. Walk away. Right. Because you'd be bidding $250,000 if you bid $1, and you don't want to pay that for this property at the steps. You're trying to get a deal. Right.

Right. So it looks to me like the two deeds that I can find, one is at $155,000 and the second is at $144,000. Doesn't matter about the second if it's not being foreclosed. If the first is being foreclosed, the second is going to go away. Now, the second lender can step up and bid to protect their position. These loans aren't with the same bank, are they? That I don't know, yeah.

Okay, that's another reason it could get squirrely but the second mortgage lender so you think the first one is 144 and the second is 155 no reverse okay 155 okay and if so if the first mortgage is foreclosing they're going to step up they're probably going to bid 155 422 dollars and 32 cents which is their loan balance plus their legal fees because the property is worth considerably more than that and if nobody else bids they're willing to take it for that because they can put it on the market with a realtor later and sell it and get their money out right right so they're going to bid their 155 so you got to come in there ready to do that and more because that's how that's the bid is going to open with the first mortgage lender

with their balance plus legal fees. Okay. Then the second mortgage can bid up to their balance above that, and it doesn't cost them anything because they own that position. But if they don't show up and you bid a dollar more than the first mortgage, the second mortgage will get that dollar, and the judgment liens will be cleansed and get nothing, and you bid a dollar more than the first mortgage the second mortgage will get that dollar and the judgment liens will be cleansed and get nothing and you'll have clear title okay you see how this works i do yes i do the position that is being foreclosed is vital to

understand and get a title company to verify the numbers that you've got there. Those might have been the original deed of trust amounts, and if they're old, they may have been paid down. That might not be the actual balances now. Okay. So we've got to get into that as well. But the big information you need is what position is being foreclosed on, what's the building actually worth, and can you get title insurance after you buy it?

If you cannot get an insured title after you buy it, I want to know why, and I'm not buying it. That's from a guy that's bought almost 2,000 foreclosures in my life. I used to do this for a living. Can you tell? Yes, that's why I called. And you can do it safely, but you can do it wrong. I watched a guy bid what he thought was a first position in a second position one day, and he was $350,000 off on this purchase.

And I'm looking at him going, dude, what are you doing? And he goes, man, I just got a deal. And I'm like, yeah, plus $350,000. And he went, what? It's a second mortgage foreclosure, dube. And he got hammered because he didn't realize he was bidding in second position. Yeah, plus $350,000. He went, what? It's a second mortgage foreclosure, dube. You know? And he got hammered because he didn't realize he was bidding in second position. He thought he was bidding in first position and everything else was going to be cleared.

You see what I'm talking about? I do. Yeah, that's what you... That's the part. That's the new part to me. So I appreciate you filling me in on that. Yeah, and I think these judgment lanes you don't have to worry about at all. So, very interesting.

That's kind of fun. Of course, you're paying cash. You get title insurance. You're about to get a bargain, I think these judgment lanes you don't have to worry about at all. So, very interesting. That's kind of fun. Of course, you're paying cash. You get title insurance. You're about to get a bargain, I think. Very neat. I like it. I like it. This is The Dave Ramsey Show. Thank you. In the lobby of Ramsey Solutions on the debt-free stage, Logan and Kelly are with us.

Hey, guys. How are you? Hi, Mr. Ramsey. Welcome, welcome. Good to have you. Where do you guys live? Normal, Illinois. Normal, Illinois.

There we go. Okay. Okay, I got it. I see the t-shirts now. Far from normal. We're weird people. You're weird and normal now that you're debt-free. I love it. I see the t-shirts now. Far from normal. We're weird people. You're weird and normal now that you're debt-free. I love it.

Very cool. And your son is with us, and his name and age? Balian, and he's 10 years old. Balian is 10. All right, cool. So how much debt have you guys paid off? So we paid off $98,353.37 in 31 months. Good for you.

And your range of income during that two and a half years? It was $115,000 to $120,000. Good. What do you guys do for a living? I'm a claims licensing analyst. I'm a learning analyst for an insurance company. Cool. A couple of analysts.

So you sat down and analyzed this. What kind of debt did you pay off that was 98 000 it was mostly student loans so like like the themes today is like we don't want our son to fall into the same trap that we did so we wanted to set a really good example for him very good very good yeah and a car yeah sally may in a car so you gave the old woman her eviction notice yes sir get out of our house and you're never coming back never i love it i love it i love it well congratulations what put you on this journey 31 months ago um well our journey started about eight years ago when i first heard about

your program and we did financial peace and we did it for about five years the wrong way and so about three years ago we we were living in Texas at the time and we kind of hit just a real low part in our life. Everything just seemed to not be working out for us. And so I've heard you say before that sometimes it's not a financial problem, it's a problem with something else going on in your life. So three years ago,

we just decided to kind of give our life a makeover and I found a different job that I'm much happier in, and we really worked together as a team. I read Boundaries by Henry Cloud, which is life-changing, and so that really kind of got us on the same page together, and we've been attacking it. And part of that journey was we decided to move from Texas back to Illinois, which is where we're from. And so we owned a home in Texas, and when we sold it, we had about $20,000 profit from that house. So instead of doing what we would have done, which is to put it in a new house, we decided to do it the right way. And so we took that money, paid off one of our student loans, moved in with a mother-in-law

for a couple of months, and then we've been renting an apartment. So now we're on baby step 3B. Allb all right saving for a down payment to buy again yes and you so the 20,000 equity jump started the whole debt snowball yes we had managed to get the car paid off before that and that really just kept it going and then we just had my student loan to okay and so that enabled you to knock it out even faster though and then uh you had to reset your whole mind though but you're doing a complete makeover we're gonna move into a new place yes we're gonna live with the mother-in-law then we're gonna move into an apartment uh we're getting new jobs and we're getting rid of the debt absolutely that's a good move yeah i like this move well done you guys very how's it feel to have no payments? It's a huge relief, and it does provide freedom and choice.

And there was actually sort of a middle point where we'd paid off all the debt, and we were just starting to go beyond the $1,000, the baby step one. And we were a little scared because we couldn't fall back on the, well, we're already in debt. So it was like this middle point where we're like, oh, we don't have very much to fall back on, but we're never going back into debt again. But it's amazing just sticking to the budget, putting pride and impulse aside, and just really working the plan the way it's designed.

Sure enough, within no time at all, we had that buffer where we felt safe, the 3A. So we're like oh okay we breathe now so yeah very good very good yeah that changes a lot too when you get that in place well well done you guys so what about the person that says to you then yeah you're out of debt but you're in an apartment yeah well what's your answer to that um i i wouldn't change it we. We're very blessed to be in a great apartment. So we're in a great school and our neighbors are really nice. And so we haven't had any complaints there. And I do get the eye from some people every now and then.

And at our age, to be starting all over again, it feels like sometimes that's a little rough. But I wouldn't change it for anything. And it's making the house experience just so much better like we're having fun looking on Zillow and just deciding like what are we going to do and when when the time comes which hopefully will be next summer it's just been it's been great I wouldn't change it even with the apartment we're not being forced into it we're going in and on on our own terms and with our own plan and with a down payment and that's that's the right way to do it so thank you well if somebody says that to you i'll give you the answer i wasn't taking a poll yeah right this is my life and i'm living it well uh good for you as part of winning is you quit

worrying about what all those other goobs think yes you know you start living your life that's a boundaries thing you know you say i'm gonna i'm gonna do this and i'm really i wasn't buying a house to impress you anyway darling i was buying one for us to live in so uh we'll let you know when it's time for you to be impressed oh man people i just love it well i get all the pushback and i'll get sometimes somebody will tweet something like that after a debt-free scream and i'm like you dudes you just don't understand these people are on a track to be millionaires. And that's where you're headed. So, I mean, make $120,000 a year, you don't have any payments.

Right. Wow. And a pretty low rent and a nice place. And, you know, it really comes back to that mindset shift. It's like opening your mind to not try to do it like I was trying to do your plan my way. But it's not the Logan Ramsey plan. It's the Dave Ramsey plan. And so once, once I opened my mind and it really was faithful giving, that really was the shift for my mindset

because when we were doing it our way, we were all, we liked to give, but we would try to give at the end of the, like after we'd paid all of our bills. And then we just, we, she convinced me, thankfully, she's a huge blessing to shift that to, well, let's set aside money to give first. And it was the same income and the same bills. And it was a miracle because we were able to give what we wanted and still pay all of our bills. When I saw that happen with that faithful giving, my mind just was blown. And I was like, okay, well, what else should we do differently? So that was really the start.

That's cool. That's very cool. that's a great place to start well congratulations you guys we're very proud of you who were your biggest cheerleaders um I really think the slow guy here was our biggest cheerleader so yeah he's he's kept us on our toes and just being there for each other um through everything through moves and jobs and and just everything we've been through in our lives together. We look forward to brewing coffee and sitting down with our spreadsheets in the EveryDollar. We're both nerds. Yeah, we're both nerds.

We're your analysts, yeah. That's right. I like it. That's fun. This is fun. Well, congratulations, you guys. Thank you. Got a copy of Chris Hogan's book for you, Everyday Millionaires, because you're going

to be one, and we're going to show you what it looks like, that's the next chapter in your story just chapter one now chapter two this isn't the end of the story this is just the next chapter okay so well done y'all very very very proud of you all right logan and kelly and balian balian balian balian i'm sorry i didn't want to mispronounce your name and 98 000 paid off in paid off in 31 months, making $115,000 to $120,000. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Three, two, one. We're debt-free!

We're debt-free! Love it! How fun! Well done, you guys. Very, very well done. Very well done. Megan is on Twitter. Is debt settling something to consider when getting out of debt?

Well, if you can't pay the bill and you can settle the bill, it's better than not paying the bill. If you have the money to pay the bill and you owe the bill, you should pay the bill and you can settle the bill it's better than not paying the bill if you have the money to pay the bill and you owe the bill you should pay the bill you told them you were going to pay it when you signed the papers and if you have the money you ought to pay it and so i only recommend settling to someone who can't pay it otherwise and um i have a company for instance that uh owes me forty thousand dollars from 15 years ago. I suspect I will never get that money. Would you bet?

I can bet on that, right? But if they called me up and offered me a settlement, I would take it in about an instant. Because right now I'm counting on nothing. Because I figure I'm not ever getting anything from them. But if they offered to settle that for 10 cents on the dollar, I'd take the four grand. That's four grand more than I was going to get. And that's the way these banks look at it sometimes. So if you're broke and you can't pay the bill, then you settle.

If you can pay the bill and you owe the bill, you pay the bill. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. Our question of the day comes from blinds.com. A 100% satisfaction guarantee means even if you mismeasure or you pick the wrong color, they will remake your blinds for free. You get free samples, free shipping, and with the new promos every month, you save even more. Use the promo code RAMSY to get the best deal. Questions from Amanda in Indiana. I'm in the middle of a divorce and not sure what to do with my will.

What do I do with my will after my divorce is finalized, especially where my young kids are involved? Well, you would reset your will. You need a new will. Anytime there's a major life change or anytime you change states you would need to set a new will and so you'd rewrite your will it's certainly up to you what you put in the will and who's going to be taking care of your children in a divorce situation unless their father is unfit to care for them, and the courts have ruled that,

it would be difficult, even with a will, to keep your children from their father in the event of your death. But if the courts have ruled him to be ineligible, and I'm not an attorney, but I'm just trying to think through this logically with you, then you would decide who's going to take care of the kids if something's going to happen to you. Now, I cannot think of a case like none. I can't think of a scenario in which I would leave him money, your ex. I would leave money to the children in a trust that is to be managed for the good of the children and someone else is managing the trust maybe your parents your sister your brother

i don't know but that's managed for the good of the kids and that can include and should probably include some of the monies like if you you had a million-dollar life insurance policy on you, you would pay that into the trust for the good of the kids if you were to die. But your ex couldn't get his hands on that because it's being managed by someone else. But income off of that trust to support the children should be going to him. He should be getting a check once a month from that trust, morally speaking, to take care of your kids and assist in caring for them. he should be getting a check once a month from that trust, morally speaking, to take care of your kids and assist in caring for them.

You can also put provisions in the family trust to take care of your kids. When they turn 16, you could help them buy a car. In our case, the way I was written up, we paid half of our kids' cars, meaning we matched. We had 401 Dave, and um we had a matching plan and when they turned 16 we paid half of their first car and so if they saved up 500 bucks they got a thousand dollar car uh and we had that as a provision in the will that the trust if sharon and i died would do the same thing now that trust is long since disbanded of course and will never never occur because the kids are now grown,

and they have their own cars and so forth. The next thing we said was if something happened that they had a major medical event and some of the trust needed to pay out some extra monies to take care of their health needs. You know, if a child had a major health issue, then some of the trust money could be used for that. Some of the trust money could be used for that some of the trust money could be used to pay for college and then after college uh in our case ours was set up to where they got some of the money upon graduation they got some more at 25 and some more 30 and uh that would be all of that would have happened if we had died while our children were minors that's just an example of the kind of things you could put in your will.

And this trust, you can make it do anything you want it to do. But it would be highly unusual for you to allow your ex-husband to manage your wealth for the good of your children. If you were that trusting of him, you probably wouldn't be getting a divorce. So I don't think we're going to go that way. So I'd put someone else to managing the money and then you determine based on the situation and the eligibility legally who's going to take care of the kids if something happens to you and all of that is in the will and as soon as

the divorce is finalized you need a new will that's simple anytime there's a big life change you get married you get divorced divorced, you move states, you have a change in wealth, a substantial change in wealth, up or down, you need to re-look at your will and re-think about it. We revisit and go through ours every year. It's a big, hairy deal. We comb through it, look at all the different things we've got structured, is everything right, we go over it with the attorney, we go over it with the family. We go over it with the leadership team here at Ramsey so that if something happens in the coming 12 months,

everyone is aligned on what's going to happen. There are no surprises. You should always, by the way, everyone needs a will. You need to go to mamabearlegalforms.com and get your will going. Everyone needs a will. And it doesn't take but about 20 minutes to knock one out, a basic will. A hundred bucks or so will knock it doesn't take but about 20 minutes to knock one out a basic will 100 bucks or so will knock it out and uh it's just good management of your life and it's really kind of a it's a

an emotionally strenuous exercise because you have to actually sit around discuss you dying and so i call it the monty python meeting that we have once a year. I'm feeling much better. It's only a flesh wound. You know, I mean, all that stuff, right? And so because we're sitting there talking about me dying the whole time for this two-hour meeting, and we go through all these details of what's going to happen in the coming year if I die, and Sharon has figured it out that our estate plan is predicated on me dying first,

which makes me a little worried, like she has a plan or something. So anyway, yeah yeah everyone needs a will all right kunal is with us in pennsylvania hi kunal how are you hi dave i'm good how are you better than i deserve what's up so i just graduated college uh about a month or so back congratulations what's your degree in? Thank you. Human-computer interaction. Awesome. And I'm currently living off my emergency fund. I have like two months of runway left. I'm starting a job in November so I'm not too worried about that, November 1st.

I'm on baby step 3 if it still counts. Now, once I start working, I'll set aside the 15% of the income for retirement for sure. I'm thinking of saving much more than that. Now, I need your advice on what to do with the remaining savings. I don't have that. So I wanted your advice on it. I have one very stupid goal in mind for when I'm 30, but I wanted your advice on it. You have one stupid goal, did you say? Well, stupid as in unrealistic. I'm hoping to save up a million dollars by the time I'm 30.

Okay. How old are you? I'm 24. All right. So you have six years. So how much do you have to put aside to have a million dollars in six years? 130,000 per year. And what are you going to be making? So I'm going to be making like just the salary is going to be 120. Then there's going to be bonuses. I'm going to get the sign-on bonus. That's why I'm not worried about replenishing my emergency fund and then equity and stuff. So I think realistically I might be able to save $130,000. My expenses are like $3,000 a month right now.

Okay. I don't think it's a stupid goal at all. I think you've got it mapped out. I think you've laid out your details. You've figured out how you're going to get there. Anytime you set a goal, the first thing you should ask yourself is what has to be true. And what has to be true here is mathematically we have to set aside $130,000. And crud, you're starting salary out of college.

Your starting income is big enough to support your goal. And your income shouldn't go anywhere but up from there, right? Right. So you ought to get more and more and more towards the goal. I suspect you're going to get to this goal early because your income will probably not be linear. It'll probably be on a curve. Right, and I'm not accounting for, like, the side gig I'll have

while I'm working, like, for the weekends to work. That will add a bit more income. Yeah, so why didn't you do some kind of side gig instead of burn your emergency fund right now um legally i'm not allowed to since i'm an immigrant here um i have to wait for the real job to kick in ah that's the only reason i'm not doing it okay i have to wait for the real job to kick in okay good good for you Good for you. Okay. Yeah, don't put that green card in jeopardy, man. That's a bad idea. Yeah, exactly.

That's the whole point. It's very, very valuable for you right now. Very cool, man. Congratulations. Well, I'm proud of you. I think you're going to do it. I'd get after it. I mean, it's pretty simple.

You're investing money, and so if you don't care where the million dollars is, then I would max out every retirement that's available to you. And that's Roth IRAs and anything that's available at work, 401ks like that, max all that out. And then above that, you're just investing in good mutual funds. And I'd look for low turnover mutual funds because you won't have much taxes on them as they go along. They're taxed to capital gains, which means only as you draw it out and then only at 15%. So I think you're going to be a millionaire, man. I'm proud of you.

Well done. This is The Dave Ramsey Show. Hey, guys, it's Blake Thompson, senior executive producer for The Dave Ramsey Show. This hour's over, but you can find more great content on our YouTube channel. Catch the most watched Dave Ramsey, debt-free screams, and the very popular Everyday Millionaire segment. Go to the Dave Ramsey Show YouTube channel and click subscribe.