The Ramsey Show - App - You Can’t Build a Life You Love While Carrying Everyone Else’s Burdens

Episode Date: May 16, 2025

📈 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Are you on track with the Baby Steps? Get a Free Personalized Plan⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ John Delony and Jade Warshaw answer your questions and discuss: "I'm $350k in debt with a baby on the way" "Is it realistic to have a wedding for $10,000?" "My fiancée bought a home with her mother 20 years ago. How do we get her off the mortgage?" "My dad retired at 49 then asked me to lend him money to pay off his debt" "Does my girlfriend love me or just want to get married for citizenship?" Next Steps: ✅ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Help us make the show better by taking this short survey!⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 📞 Have a question for the show? Call 888-825-5225 weekdays from 2–5 p.m. ET or ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠send us an email.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💰⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Hurry—Your chance to win $5k is almost over! Enter the Ramsey Cash Giveaway today!⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💵⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Start your free budget today. Download the EveryDollar app!⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Connect with our Sponsors: 🛒 Stop paying more and start shopping smarter at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Aldi⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🌱 Get 10% off your first month of⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ BetterHelp⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 📱Go to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Boost Mobile⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to switch today! 🏥 Learn more about⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Christian Healthcare Ministries⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🏡 Get started today with⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Churchill Mortgage⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🔒 Get 20% off when you join ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠DeleteMe⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🏦 Go to⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ FAIRWINDS Credit Union⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ for an exclusive account bundle! 🥗 Save 15% on your first ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Field of Greens⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ order with code RAMSEY ⛨ Find top Health Insurance Plans at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Health Trust Financial⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💸 To find out more about student loan refinancing, check out⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Laurel Road⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💻 Visit⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ NetSuite⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ today to learn more 🗂️ Use promo code RAMSEY for 18% off at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The Nokbox⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💵 Learn more about ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Timothy Plan⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🏛 Get started with ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠YRefy⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ or call 844-2-RAMSEY 🔐 Visit⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Zander Insurance⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ for your free instant quote today! Explore more from Ramsey Network: 💸 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The Ramsey Show Highlights⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🧠 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The Dr. John Delony Show⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🍸 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Smart Money Happy Hour⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💡 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The Rachel Cruze Show⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💰 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠George Kamel⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🪑 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Front Row Seat with Ken Coleman⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 📈 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠EntreLeadership⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Ramsey Solutions Privacy Policy⁠⁠⁠⁠

From the Ramsey Network, it's the Ramsey Show. Hey, we're taking calls all day long about your life and your money. I'm your host, Jade Warshaw. Next to me, your other host, Dr. John Deloney in the house. All right. Without further ado, if you didn't know this is a live show, you can call in and request your call to be on the radio. The number is triple eight, eight to five, five, two to five. If you call and the line is busy, leave a message because a lot of times we take

messages and we'll schedule your call for later. So that's the way it goes down. All right. Matt is in Providence, Rhode Island. Matt, what's going on? Not much, just trying to figure out how to, you know, get some more financial freedom. Have about $350,000 in debt with a baby on the way.

And yep, and kind of in a tight space with a family of three, that's eventually going to be a family of four. So we, you know, kind of also need to look for a bigger spot. And as you know, the rental market also isn't the best. And there's, you know, no houses or at least starter homes with three-bedroom, two-bath in our area, which is at least something better than what we have. We're in a two-bedroom, one bath right now. A rental? Yes. Okay. What kind of debt is this 350? I was hoping you would say some of it was a mortgage, but also you say med school. Like, what is it?

So, 300k is mine and it's law school, undergrad, and a master's program. Wow. Are you practicing? No, I'm not. I had to change career paths because the legal field just wasn't working out in this area. It is extremely saturated. So hold on, hold on. Before we go any further, I have stuff to say, Hold on, hold on. Before we go any further, I have to say, you've created a world where there's only stop signs. And Jayden and I are going to give you five or 10 or 20 different options, but you already are a guy that just says, but no, but no, but no, but no, but no. So before we go further in the call, will you be willing to entertain that the way you've chosen to like wall yourself in, in your life isn't working and you have to be willing to entertain that the way you've chosen to like wall yourself in in your life isn't working? And you have to be willing to do other things.

Oh, yeah, absolutely. That's why I called in. Okay. All right. Good. Yeah, so I guess here's the deal. You got into an excavator and dug a humongous hole for you and your family. And so you either have to go to a different place or do that job that you hate, that's miserable, but that's what that's the credential you got. You're going to have to do something with that. You don't have the option to not practice law right now because you don't have

any money. You get what I'm saying? Especially if you say, if you tell us, hey, I actually, I got all these degrees. I like practicing law. If you tell me the only reason is because it's too saturated, then my question is, hey, that might be the case, why can't we move and go practice law elsewhere? And you already told me you don't have any houses that you can afford in your area, so what's keeping you in this area? Well, that's probably more my wife on her side,

her dad's pretty sick, and so part of the decision to stay here is help out know, help out with him, his medical problems and God forbid we move and then something happened and now she's just rushing back here to be with family. So let's wait before you go on, let's unpack that a little bit. Let's take it piece by piece because I want to know more about that situation. Is she like, is she 100% his caregiver? Is she just, you know, she's a child

who wants to be near their sick parent. Is he terminally ill? Uh-huh. Like gonna pass away in six months or is it like a four or five year thing? Like what's the deal? It's in a state of being monitored. She's more or less just more of the concerned child

that wants to be near dad. Okay, so that's a great place to start because now we can start putting some reality around the situation. Like the two of you can sit down and jump in at any point. But if this were me, I would say, okay, the truth is I wanna be able to be near my dad

when he's sick. What can that look like? How, what does the radius need to be for me to be able to do that? Whether it's me jumping on a quick hour long flight or me driving six hours up there, you know, on the weekend. Figure out what that point is, because you guys are in Providence, Rhode Island. There's got to be a radius there that you can get out of that city, get out of that

saturated area, get out of that high real estate area and still be able to see, see dad, right? So that's thing one. What's the next, what's the next limiting factor? So for her, she just recently got promoted, but her job is she has to be in the office 100%. Okay, that's not too different. Yeah, so if we needed to move, she'd probably need to look for a new job. She's opened the opened the question that, could I do this remote? Because it's actually a job that can be done remote,

in my opinion. Why does she need to work remote versus just getting another job at a place that'll hire her to do what she knows how to do? Whether in office or remote. So, well. Is it the kids? So this, well, that's part of it.

Okay. And then the scarcity of like, we move and she can't find anything. Well, you wouldn't move first. So let's put that, let's put something around that so that fits in a better space in your brain. So you guys, first you're open to the idea of moving, right? It's you guys talking about that radius

like we talked about. I've been, see my job that I have now, I'm 100% work from home and I've been trying to move out for years. How much do you make in this job? So I currently make 100K and she makes 55. Okay, you need to double your salary. And you might not get all the way to 200, but you have a $350,000 hole that you dug for your family

and $100,000 with another kid on the way. And plus, it's maybe it's 100% at home, but also you're taking cases for the state on the weekends. I don't know what it is, but, and I know you've got kids and I know you wanna be a present dad and all that. You just don't have that luxury right at this second And I do think Go ahead you go ahead. Sorry. No, go ahead

For more transparency around the law stuff. I'm actually not licensed. I struggled to pass the bar. I took it Five times before I decided like hey I've dropped 15 grand in total and just registration fees that I need to go down a different path. And then that's where I am today in my current role. Okay. So. It changes things.

It does. Did you, can you honestly say you committed to doing all of the bar prep? Oh yeah. I mean, that was three straight years of, you know, the beginning of our marriage too was like, I felt non-present because I was working a full-time job all day and then I was up all night till 2 a.m. studying, going into the test. And then even before we got married, I was in law school and that was, you know, I, part

of my debt was so that I didn't have to work so I could study full-time. Okay. So you feel good about, I went all in because I know you and I both know the data about if you just do the bar prep questions and you just follow their schedule. Okay. So you can also look in the mirror and say, I got in that ring and I got knocked out five times. Maybe boxing isn't for me. You feel good about that? Right. Okay. Great. Awesome. Then perfect. I'll be quiet about that. We can move on to the next thing.

Very good. So making a hundred grand, what do you do now? So I work in transportation services for a major company out here. Okay. Essentially I help manage business to consumer retail delivery. Okay. Can you, for a season, work that job and the moment your wife gets home from her job, y'all have dinner together and you head off for job number two at night and get your salary to 150 for a year to start knocking someone's debt out? I mean it's something we've discussed just didn't really pull the trigger on it. Okay. I guess what you're hearing, Jayden, I say there's at some point there's something's got to give whether it's something we've discussed, just didn't really pull the trigger on it. Okay. I guess what you're hearing, Jay and I say, at some point, there's somethings gotta give,

whether it's your living situation, whether it's she goes and gets another job, or it's you get another job, but at some point, you're all gonna have to look at your situation and say, we just keep talking about it, but we're doing the same thing over and over and over again. We're in the same spot. What do you think, Dave?

In two minutes, I'm not 100% sold that you're done with law. I think you're a guy who's feeling really defeated and felt the weight of his debt, and it's really paralyzing right now. All right, let's go right to the phone lines where Alan is in Dallas, Texas. Alan, how can we help?

I recently got engaged about a month ago and now we're starting to do planning for our wedding. Nice. And I realized me and my fiance are on two different pages as far as what we should spend on our total budget. My idea, I don't want to spend over $10,000 getting married hers is a little over double that she wants to spend 20 to 25 Okay, so I'm trying to figure out Am I out of touch with a reality with having a budget for $10,000? No, we and uh, should I just go in and you know do what she wants and make her happy with spending more? Oh, well.

You're my hero, man. You're my hero. It depends. I mean, if you guys really do have the money and you could spend 25,000, then that's different. If you don't have the money, then I would not do what she wants to do just to make her happy.

So tell us the funds, tell us about the money. Yeah, so the reason I'm not comfortable with it right now she's in medical school so together we bring in maybe 120,000 between the both of us. Okay. So also you know looking long-term we're okay right now as far as a living situation. We have no kids, but we're not in our forever home. So eventually we are going to want to move, plan for children and stuff like that. How much money do you have right now?

A lot. You got a lot. Yeah, total savings right now, my probability I'm at about 30,000. Okay. And how much debt? Right now my problem is I'm at about 30,000. Okay. And how much debt? This is just you. My debt, I only have about 4,000 in credit cards.

I paid for school out of pocket. So that's the only thing that I have. So you have 30,000 saved 4,000 in debt. What about her? Cause you mentioned medical school. So tell me about her situation Stewarding loans. I know she has about 20,000 and

She cast she's cast full in medical school Yes, Wow, man good on y'all. Oh Thank you. And right now bro, give her whatever wedding she wants man. You're gonna want to hang on to this one You're a casual flow medical school dude. Yeah, and right now, we're in her home that she bought maybe four years ago. Okay. And the home that is 230,000.

Okay, great. So again, she's just got the student loans, nothing else, just the 20,000 of student loans. Nothing else Yes, that in the home and credit card. I believe she has The same about 4,000 in credit card. Okay. Does she have any money saved? I'm guessing no, but tell me if she does Not much Not much. So savings right now. It's completely on me. She pretty much stopped whatever she had to getting through school.

And when's the wedding? When's the date? July next year. So you got one year, a year and a month to save this up. Can I change the question, Jade? Yeah. Alan, can I ask Jade a question? Sure.

On your behalf? Absolutely, please. Okay, so Jade, Jade a question? Sure. On your behalf? Absolutely, please. Okay, so Jade, tell me if I'm wrong here. Sometimes the question, how much you spend on that ring, how much you spend on the wedding, it's as though the number is the value. Instead of, did you get the ring you wanted? Or what do you want this wedding to look like?

Uh-huh, that's good. And so when someone sits down and says, only got $10,000, what if y'all had a conversation about what do you want this wedding to look like and feel like and who's going to come to this thing? And then y'all begin navigating and it's, I hate to use this word, but it's negotiating like do you got to get those flowers or can you get these flowers? And we have to get some super atomic baker because you might find that when you both get What you want actually at 17 grand. I think that is a very good place to start

Because I think you're right. There is there's a vibe just as much as there is dollar signs So maybe it's hey here We're on Pinterest and we're looking at the things that we want. And then based off of that feeling, we're rolling it back and saying, OK, what is the budget that we have to accomplish that feeling? Because John is right, like there's good, better, like there's good, better, best. Like there's different layers of the same thing. And if you pair them rightly together, it can still be very, very nice. So I think John is asking a good question.

Just going back to the numbers, like just purely numbers for a moment, I gotta say that I do tend to go on your side, Allen. $30,000 in the face of $28,000 of debt. Yeah, it's probably better to spend between 10 or 12, or somewhere in that range, because I want you guys to pay this debt off, and I think that that's fair enough. And I think it's somewhere meeting in the middle.

If you said 10, she said 25, maybe you land at 15. Or maybe you say this, maybe you say, hey, look, here's value number one for me heading into this marriage. I wanna not owe anybody any money. And so I got 30 grand. We're going to pretend as though the day we get married, we're gonna write a check for your student loans.

And I know you're about to be a doctor. I know you've already bought your own home, but right now let's deal in what we got in front of us. We just talked to a guy, a previous caller, who would have had the same conversation about what he was gonna make after law school. And he struggled to pass the bar, right? So let's don't count our chickens for the hatch,

but that means we got $2,000 in an emergency fund. Like if we're just, if we're talking about the day we get married, we're gonna pay off each other's debt. So how much could you look at her in the eye and say, I'm gonna go earn this money so we can cash flow this thing over the next year. And that means we're both gonna sacrifice with what we spend, what we buy and whatever.

She's going to school, you're gonna be working extra. Maybe you take on a second job and say, I'm gonna work like crazy to see what I can get done. Do you get what I'm saying? That way there's a conversation about this money isn't gonna fall from the sky and I'm not willing to borrow $25,000 for something that we can't afford, but I do wanna give you that nice thing.

So I'm gonna tell you, I'm gonna work real hard for this because I know you're in med school and it's gonna take up all your time. Can we be realistic about what's a dollar amount we're actually gonna have in hand? Because I think Jade's right. You might be able to earn $25,000 on top of paying everything off. It sounds like a tall order though. Or you'll look at her and say, I'll go earn $25,000. I'm not going to see you any weekends for the next year, but I'll go make it happen. Yeah. I'm sure it's a way that I could make it work and stick to it.

But like I said, I'm just kind of stepping out of feeling comfortable spending more money than I've had in mind. Let's don't do that because here's the thing. A compromise point. It's kind of like this, if your boss says, hey, come in this afternoon and I'll tell you about a raise I'm giving you, and you imagine the raise is 30 grand,

and your boss gives you a raise of 20 grand, you walk out of that room feeling like he took $10,000 from you, even though he just gave you 20, right? And so you sat down with a number of 10, and she said 25, and you're like, double! And she sat down and was like, half? Right? And the conversation has nothing to do with what kind of wedding do we want to have.

And more importantly, as Jade was getting to, how much money do we actually have? Yeah, and you got to look at it. This is, somebody's not gonna like this, I get it, but it kind of is, you do like to weigh the opportunity costs on this, you've got 30 in cash, you've got 28 in debt. So if you were to spend all 30 on this wedding, or even 25, you have to then ask yourself,

was I okay to go $23,000 into debt for this wedding? Because that's essentially what you're doing. If you take this money and put it on the wedding versus putting it on the debt. I'm not telling you what you have to do. I'm just telling you that's the way your mind needs to look at it and you guys both have to be okay with that.

I would much rather see y'all, if y'all are my friends, have a small, fun, like cheap wedding. And then when she's graduated from her residency and y'all can throw the party of a century. Right. Cause then y'all are rich. That makes a lot of sense. It does.

I tend to veer on this side and I say this delicately because as someone who was really looking forward to their wedding, it's very difficult to say, Hey, what if you just go to the courthouse now, get a certificate and then in three years you wild out. Like that's hard. That's what I'm saying, but. But it's fair advice.

Like you know what I'm saying? It's fair advice. Honestly, Ellen, if I was you, that's what I would do. I'd say, let's go to the courthouse this weekend. Let's have a big fancy dinner for five of our closest friends this weekend. And we're gonna announce to everybody that we're married and then we're gonna blow it out in three years.

The other side of it is my wedding was very inexpensive and it was a blast. I wouldn't change a second of it. Or you both just go hard in the paint. You go ham for the next 12 months and earn that money and then you both get what you want and there's no sacrifice other than your time to get said money. If you're tired of living paycheck to paycheck, wondering where the heck is your money going, your first step is to get on a budget. I'm trying to tell you,

our team is hosting a free budgeting training this month via EveryDollar, which is the best budgeting app out there. We talk about it all the time because we really do believe that it's the best. And if you go to this webinar, you're gonna learn step by step how to make your budget and how to stick to your budget, which is really the hard part, right?

Sticking to it, but we'll tell you how to do that. Plus you'll be able to get your biggest questions answered. The team will be on there and they'll do a live Q&A. So you'll be able to drop your question in, ask them, they'll answer it. And just remember though that the spots are limited. So you gotta sign up for this thing and you can do that. You can sign up at everydollar.com slash webinar. Lots of people have gone through these trainings and they will say that it's the

best thing that's ever happened to them, Jon. I love it. All right. Okay. Can we say this? I just have to say this out loud along that thing, that training. Go for it. I just have to say this out loud along that training. Go for it. The number of people, it's not insignificant, who are very, very successful in their business, whether it's medical, nutritional, whether it's physical, mental health, whatever, who call and say, hey man, can I have a hem hole around and then say, yo, can you help me with a budget? Yeah. And they can cure people, they can fix things, some of the top talents on the planet go to them and they say, I need some help with this. 100%. So there's no shame in this thing.

That's why I love that training there. That's why like sitting down and just saying, I know I'm good over here, but I'm embarrassed to say I don't know how to do, make this budget thing work. I get frustrated, I get triggered, whatever. Like in those trainings are not like low-fi for dum-dums, right? It's for everybody struggling. I say it all the time, budgets are like toothbrushes.

Everybody needs one. Everybody, without it, what would happen? And there's adults that go and their dentist is like, yeah, you're not brushing right. Like you learn how, you learn. Listen, things get, they get ratchet, they get messed up if you don't have it, right? So budget's the same way no matter how much money you have,

no matter how little money you have, everybody needs a budget, everybody needs a plan for their money. And that's really all it is, is you deciding ahead of time, here's what I'm gonna do with my money. That's really it, that's it. It's not a thing that's really all it is, is you deciding ahead of time, here's what I'm gonna do with my money, that's really it, that's it. It's not a thing that's for broke people

or for rich people or for poor people. Or for smart people or dumb people, it's everybody's money. Yeah, it's for everybody. Everybody. All right, that being said, really good point, John. Let's go to Tyler in Dallas, Texas. What's up, Tyler? Hello. Hey.

What's up, man? Hello, my's up, man? Hello. Um, uh, my question is I got engaged about a year ago and my fiance got in a mortgage with her mother about 20 years ago and her mother is missing payments and we want to refinance our house and we and her mother is missing payments, and we want to refinance our house, and we can't because her mother is missing payments on her house. Is there any way she can get out of the mortgage

with her mother? Has my guess is, I mean, the way to do that would be for her mom or for them to refinance the mortgage and take her off of it. That'd be the way to do it. Her mother has really bad credit and can't. And we have talked, she's talked to her mother and her mother says, the bank won't do it.

Yeah, and so the other thing is, then she needs to sell that house and get into something that she can afford on her own. Her mother doesn't live there anymore, her brothers do. Oh, even more reason. It doesn't matter, sell the house. Her mother's in bad health, she just had a stroke last anymore. Her brothers do. Oh, even more reason. Doesn't matter, sell the house. Her mother's in bad health. She just had a stroke last year. I'm sorry.

And she's in pretty bad health and we want out of it in the worst kind of way. Okay, so yeah, even more reason to put some pedal to the metal on this and make her understand, hey, you're not even living here anymore. This is affecting us on a personal level. We need to sell this property. The brothers, I'm assuming, are grown and can do grown things and go live in their own space and pay for it. Her brothers are alcoholics and not your problem for the purpose of this call. At all. And yes, I am sick of it.

Yes. When I got with my wife, my fiancee, 10 years ago, I told her mother, if you want my wife to keep, or my fiancee, we can consider ourselves husband and wife. And I said, you need to put my wife on this mortgage or on a deed so that when you die, we get it. And she says, oh no, I want my sons to get this too, not just you. Okay. And we're completely out of it I want my sons to get this too. Not just you. Okay. We're completely out of it because we moved back to their Pennsylvania.

So we're not getting the thing. The next thing you can do, and I hate this because it's family business and it's going to mess up the family, but it sounds like the family's already pretty messy. You can try to get a judge to look at it and try to force the sale since she's not living in it. Your fiance is not living in it. And basically squatters are living in it because one of the owners doesn't want them in the house. She lets them live there and I've told her my wife. Your fiance?

Well, my fiance is not on a deed. So she's on the mortgage, she's not on the deed? Exactly. Oh my lord. So she just co-signed this thing? She just co-signed for your mom? She was young and dumb. Well I mean, yeah, you don't have to call her names, it just was what it was.

When most of us, when our mothers come and beg us to do something, we do it, because it doesn't even mean we're dumb, it just means we just wanna love our moms. She was 21 years old. She didn't know what she was doing. Yeah, she didn't know any better, and now it's coming back to bite her in the butt. So the three, I mean, those were, Tyler, those are the three options.

None of them are- Like Dave says, he was young. Yeah, here's the deal. There's no good option here. So there's no way that you get through this without somebody getting their feelings hurt or somebody getting angry. So just knowing that on the front end.

That's it. Y'all can keep paying this house, you can pay it off and let her alcoholic brothers just burn it to the ground. That's option one. Option two is trying- Well, we're not paying on it. Do what?

We wanna pay our own house. But you know what he's saying? He's saying you can either leave this and it's gonna destroy your credit and keep you from having the life you want, or you can do one of the three things that we talked about. It sounds like the first two were kind of non-starts. To your point, I wasn't there,

but based off your reaction, it seemed like you tried that and it didn't work. And then the third thing is yet. Or we're afraid we're gonna lose our house. That's why I'm trying to help you, bud. based off your reaction, it seemed like you tried that and it didn't work. And then the third thing is yet. We're gonna lose our house. That's why I'm trying to help you, bud. You are gonna lose it. I understand, I'm sorry, I'm sorry.

I'm a little scared myself. I got you, I got you. Okay, we're with you. But what we're saying is there isn't, you're feeling it. There is an urgency to this. So if the first two options didn't work, you gotta get in front of a judge and say, this we've tried to force, we've tried to work with them,

the mother is failing health pretty soon, she's not even gonna be able to decide, and these guys are living in the house, you've gotta have an external party look at this and force the sale of that house. Who's got the, who has her mother's medical power of attorney? Does your wife have that? I don't know that anybody does.

Okay. Okay. Is she living in a facility or is she living at a home somewhere? She's living with her boyfriend, husband, whatever you want to call them. They're not really married. She's living with another man. Okay. Who's adjacent property. So she's just said, it's okay. If my credit goes up in flames while these brothers live here, I can live with, yeah, she's like, I can live with boyfriend.

He'll take care of me. And you guys, I mean, you guys are feeling the brunt of this 100%. Uh, today I'm going to look into this with a lawyer and say, hey. Yeah, I would just offer a new interest rate of 7.25% on my property and I'm paying 9% now, which is a $300 difference in payment. Yeah. But I can't get it because my income is only $1,100 a month. Okay, my payment is $1,000 a month. How are you eating? Well, my fiance is paying the bills and I'm just paying the mortgage. So here's the hard

part. The hard part here. I'm upside down. I know, I know, I know. The hard part, and this is spilled milk, but you guys probably shouldn't have bought a house yet. While this was, hey, take it off speaker for me, okay Tyler? Because it's echoing back. I'm not on speaker. Okay. So the hard part is, this is spilled milk, but you guys getting into a house before this was settled,

that's really why you're feeling it because this was a huge factor in your ability to be able to carry a mortgage and now it's biting you in the butt. And so I would say that if you can't, if you're not seeing a light at the end of this tunnel with your mom and the fiance and the brothers, then you might have to get out of your house before it gets foreclosed or before you lose it. If you're behind on payments, you can't refinance it. You don't have the credit. This is just going to continue to destroy your credit.

And maybe we can get out of it before it goes from bad to worse. I am so sorry. If you love the show, thank you for listening and be sure to share it with somebody. It does a lot for us when you like and subscribe and share the show. Obviously it helps get the word out there, but also on the different social platforms, YouTube, all the podcast platforms, it helps push it up in the algorithm, which is good because it serves up this content to not only you, but a lot of other future listeners. So that's really helpful.

So thank you for doing that. John, what are you listening to right now that you really like? What am I listening to? Shows? Why share something with me so they can know what it seems like. Oh man. Um, like what show, like what podcast and stuff? Anything.

I mean, I've been listening to audio books on Spotify and I've been listening to my same podcasts I usually listen to. I listen to Peter T as the Drive, listen to my buddy Sean Ryan's show. I just like, those are the ones I like. What about you? That's good. I mean, I was trying to set you up

to show the people how to do this. I know what you're asking me. I was trying to say, hey, Jade, I've really been listening to this great podcast. It's called, you know, I don't know. I listen to Mel Robbins. I love this podcast. They have a great one.

Yeah. By Peter Tia. Yeah. So that's what it looks like. You just really you like Peter Tia? I do. That's all it is. You don't like him?

Boring. You're out of your mind. Not smart enough. Let me tell you, I downloaded Outlive and I was falling asleep. You're out of your mind. That's one of the greatest books written in my time. How about this?

Let Them. There you go. That's the whole thing. That's the whole book. I love it. Yes, you're right. There you go. What are you trying to say, John?

Outlive is a masterpiece. It is. I'd rather listen to Dr. Mark Hyman on the same topics though. All right. Gosh. I'm sorry. I know. I don rather listen to Dr. Mark Hyman on the same topics though. All right. Oh my gosh. I'm sorry. I know.

I don't even know what's happening right now. This is the show melting down. Okay, let's go to Ashley. She could save us. Ashley's in Orlando, Florida. What's up, Ashley? Hi there. Hi.

What up? I'm Ashley. My husband and I have been listening to you guys for a while we actually used one of your financial advisors for a little bit until are we created a budget and it was out of budget so we've been doing it on our own now so we are both Navy veterans we just got out within a year ago we had two stable streams of incomes two careers a few bad financial decisions But like we each have a $30,000 motorcycle even we didn't do it together. We just happened to come in with it

I had 25,000 of school debt We've cleared about 28,000 of credit card debt. We have no credit cards anymore. They're all paid off. But over, and we did get rid of one motorcycle. We've been trying to get the other. It's just very upside down. So the crux of our life is we have five kids and just found out we have number six on the way.

I'm also in the Navy Reserves to keep insurance and. Um, I have a hard time. I've, I've listened to Dave a few times talk about, talking about how to really lock it down and knock out your debt. And, um, for those in situations where one doesn't work, it was very rarely like in a situation with like a ton of kids, like, they'd be like, you both need to go to work. And we do supplement, we do Uber if we need to, when the kids like us, they'd be like, you both need to go to work. And we do supplement, we do uber if we need to. When the kids are sleeping, I do twitch streaming when they're sleeping and make a little

extra. What is your income combined right now? So he doesn't work. He got out, I got the job first. So I've been working, I make about 115 a year between reserves, my job and the side hustles. That's a pretty stable number 115. Okay. Why doesn't he work? Is he a full-time stay at home dad? Yeah, he stays at home. We did try to have him work but it was very, they're all under school age. They all had to go to daycare. Oh, wow. What are their ages? So the oldest is turning seven on Sunday. Okay, be the only school age one Then it goes so it's yeah, so you have five kids seven and under Yes, oh

on the way Wow Different at y'all's house right now. Listen yo, I was just telling somebody, my house is crazy. I got two kids and a couple of dogs. So I retract my statement. Your house is for real. Okay, so dad's staying at home.

You're out there hustling, making 115,000 a year. How can we help you today? So I work from home. He's home. We have this amazing opportunity to be home with our kids. Um, and we've been at this, you know, been in this giant spiral. We've taken all of, taking care of all the little things we can do, but now we've only got the big scary things left. What are they?

So, um, my, my motorcycle. Not a scary thing. Sell it. That's done. Hold on. Not a scary thing. You're a pregnant mother of five. Motorcycle's gone. Tell us how upside down you are in it. I've tried. His, we were able to settle with the insurance. They just wanted the bike and they cleared it and it was but yours. What do you own it? And what's it worth? Okay, if I sold it I would be 20k upside down So I could make ten thousand on it from every dealer every blue book every you know

From trying and then I would so I owe almost 30 on it. You owe 30 and you can only sell it for ten That's what you're telling me. Yes Yes, I've tried for like the last three years. How old is it? It's a 2019 and I bought it fairly new at the time. And it's just been this dead weight following me, haunting me. I've prioritized the other debts first. What else? What are the other debts? So you've got you've got the motorcycle. We know this story on that. What else? What are the other debts? So you've got the motorcycle. We know this story on that. What else is there?

So I have 25k school debt. So I lost one of our kiddos, one of my oldest, and I had a hard time in school. I kept failing classes and lost concentration. So I kept pushing through anyways, just repeating them until I could pass. Did you end up getting the degree? I just can't get it from the school because I owe them 8,000. But yes, I finished all but one class.

I just need to take that one class. Okay, so one class till you graduate, but in the meantime, you've got 25,000 in student loans. Any other debt we should know about Ashley? Yes, yeah, two others, and they're all like big chunks. Just tell me what they are, mama. I owe for the 8,000 to unlock my transcripts just due to the school.

So you have an outstanding balance with the school. We also have to do- So you have an outstanding balance with the school? Yes. That's not a student loan, you just owe them that. Yeah, it's not a loan, yeah. It's not a loan, that's what it takes to get your transcripts, okay, keep going. And then after the third kiddo,

we pulled them out of private school and said we can't afford this no more. But we still owe a balance to that school and we actually, we've been paying all the debts But that was one of the last how much is that one Ashley? I want to make sure we have time to help you how much is that? Ten that's ten thousand. Okay, they actually serve us with papers on that one. We're trying to get it Ten thousand to the private school

25,000 student loans the motorcycle you're upside down anything else 8,000 school loans, the motorcycle, your upside down anything else? 8000 school transcripts, anything else? I think that's all the big, that's all the big things left. Okay, so I, my screen says that, are you wrong to prioritize time with family over kids? Um, that's what my screen says, like sending dad to work, you know, like we have this amazing balance. The kids are thriving. You're broke. And let me tell you, let me tell you something because people get this wrong all the time. For most of us, John, we will all say, what are your top priorities? And for most of us listening, it probably goes somewhere along like God or like, you know, faith, family, faith. And then it's like my marriage and that includes

like, it's kind of like my spouse and then it's my kids. And then under that is like other ancillary things, right? But we forget that when you say, when you have that line item of family, there's a bunch of bullet points under that. That's like, okay, family. The way I prioritize my family can be a number of ways. It can be, I spend time with them. It can be, I work out every day so that I'm here for them and I eat right so that I can, you know, keep a healthy weight so I can pick them up and wrestle with them.

And it can be, I get a job so I can pay our bills on time and keep the lights on, right? So there's all these bullet points underneath. And in a given season, you get to decide how am I prioritized? Cause I'm always prioritizing my family. But in this season, which of those bullet points underneath prioritizing my family, am I going to put first?

Because they're all gonna fight to have the top spot and you get to decide. And in this season, you taking care of your family and loving them well is, for a season, we're gonna work hard and we're gonna pay off debt in order to make this happen. And that is how we're prioritizing our family. We're giving them peace financially,

and that's something that has the ability to change your entire family tree. You're listening to The Ramsey Show. I'm Jade Borschot. Next to me, the person that is making faces, if you're watching on YouTube, is Dr. John Deloney taking calls about your life and your money. There's some awesome kids out here in the audience today. Yeah, it was really cute.

You would have to see it on YouTube though. Yeah, it was really cute. He doesn't just make faces. Well, sometimes he does, but we're taking calls, your life, your money. I'll hit you up on the money side. John, tell the folks what you do they already know you're famous I just I'm just here long for Jade's ride okay we're going to the phone I couldn't say that any weirder sorry about that weird I'm here all coasts in the

ramsay show with my friend love that for both of us. Sarah is in Portland, Oregon. What's up, Sarah? Who wouldn't have said that any worse? Hi, thanks for taking my call. Hi, how can we help? Well, I have the opportunity to buy my parents' business. Do you want it? However I have.

Do you want it? I think it's a great opportunity. Doesn't matter, do you want it? Yes and no. Okay, so my neighbor has this car for sale. It's like an old, like whatever car. It's amazing and he's offering it an incredible price. I just don't want it. Do you want this business?

Yeah, but is that car potentially gonna that matter? Doesn't matter. Financial freedom? It does. Oh, I love this call already. Yes, okay. I interrupted you. Keep going. That's okay. So, I already have a decent career that allows me to work from home, which is great for me So I'm wondering if you know this potential to you know grow this business You know and potentially make a huge profit on it is worth The the stress of owning your own business, are you single? Yes, okay. Um Would you let's pretend this is the way I would walk through it in my mind.

And I think it's kind of along the lines of what John was saying. So you've got this great career is it did you go to school to do this career or you just landed in it? What is it? I kind of ended up in it by accident. But it does have a I will say neither my current career nor this potential one is something that I set out to do in life or I'm passionate about, but they're both really good opportunities. So that's where I was going because sometimes it's like, some things can be serendipitous

and they just land in your lap and it's like, you know what's perfect. You're like, like this job for me, I'm like, oh, perfect. I did not set out on this path. I was in entertainment, but this aligns with the things I'm like, oh, perfect. I did not set out on this path. I was in entertainment, but this aligns with the things I love and what I agree with. And it was a previous hobby of mine.

So it made sense, right? It wasn't me just going, well, it's a good opportunity. I should just take it. And so that's what I would guard against, especially since you said you don't have passion about it. And I think that it's one thing to become an entrepreneur and a business owner, but if you ain't have passion about it. And I think that it's one thing to become an entrepreneur and a business owner, but if you ain't got passion about it, it's about to, that'll dig you a grave in two seconds.

Like that's tough. Do you see what I'm saying? I just wanna look back on my life and say, I took a series of opportunities, but ones that took my soul from me. They gave me some money, but they took my soul from me. If you told me, hey, I owe $150,000 and I have an opportunity to do something

that I don't like for two years and be done with this, I'd be all in. Do it. Because it's temporary. What's the job? What's the business? It's a small plumbing business. Oh Lord.

Wait a second. I'm going from being a single woman working at home to something like my life. Now I'm going to go be a... To toilets? Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Are you going to... Yeah. I know nothing about the industry or owning a business. It would all be new to me.

And to be honest, it sounds exciting. And also all this with the caveat that I'm not passionate about my current career either. I'm giving you the 100% you have to do this. Yes, go buy this plumbing. You say do it? Okay, here's what I'm doing. I'm doing an old counselor trick. I'm just smashing the other side of the teeter totter.

Okay. Go buy it. Does that excite you? Or you're like, okay, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. Does that excite you? Or do you think I'm going to be plunging other people's cha-cha-cha for the next five years of my life, just paying back my parents? And paying money to plunge other people's cha-cha-cha. I need to know how much this dat gum business is going to cost.

They're thinking somewhere between one and 1.5 million. Oh gosh. Where did they get that number? They've been talking with their financial advisor, tax attorney, broker. Okay, there's people who do business appraisals, kind of like real estate. I want you to find one and tell your parents, I love y'all. I want to get a number on this from a third party professional. That will do a net present value of the business.

And it's just a numerical calculation. Here's what it's made in the past. Here's what we think it will make in the next two years, four years. And that's going to determine the value. I promise you, unless you're like, my son's gonna buy my old truck from me. We looked it up and I'm giving him a deal on it cause he's my son. Usually when it comes-

And that's what they said they would do to you. Okay, but usually when it, maybe, usually when it comes to parents selling their business to their kid, it's one of two things. They give you a steal or they think it's worth way more than it actually is because it's their life's love. You get what I'm saying?

So that's why I wanna take, this is a million dollar business transaction. I would not wanna blow up my family and my relationship with my parents over this. And so I'm going to get a, let's go ahead and get an agent that's gonna sign off on this and say, hey, we did a net present value on this business.

We went through the numbers. This is what we think this is worth. And this is what it would fetch in the open market. And then dad can decide and mom can decide whether we're going to cut you a deal on it. Here's what it's worth, all that. Right. Yep. It's a million dollar business purchase.

Think of it that way. And by the way, for all that is holy, please don't go borrow a million dollars to buy this from them. Yeah. Yeah, we've kind of talked about that, that they would likely carry the loan and help me out. No, no, no, no. Don't do that. Don't do that. Don't do that. They get a, if you're going to do any kind of plan, they get a percentage of profit only. Until they're paid back. Until they're paid back.

That way. Not a consistent amount every month. It's gotta be a percentage of profit. Cause if it's not, then you don't make a profit one month, they're still gonna be knocking on your door. The bank's gonna be knocking on your door. Now you're in a mess. I just gotta raise a flag on this one, Sarah. And, and, and. Don't buy this.

Don't buy this. Just, just view me for a moment as just your best friend sitting down, like the person who always tells you the truth, right? You've got that friend, yeah? Yep. What I want to ask you is what makes you think that you'll be able to just jump in, run a business and grow it for crying out loud from scratch. Because your parents have had this business for however many years, they've made the mistakes, they've had ups and downs.

It's not a straight line to success. And for you to kind of hop in cold for 1.5 million. And if we're really, I don't know how they did a valuation on this, but if they really just said, hey, we're doing this at three to four times net profit, like for you, like that's all right. Like that's not a crazy, it's not a crazy opportunity in my mind.

It's just a normal business. Like I also want to frame that in the right way. Like this is not the opportunity of a lifetime. This is just a normal kind of mom and pop small business. How many employees does it have? Uh, six. Yeah. If it's value, if it's at one to 1.5 million, like it's, y'all are trucking along.

Like I don't think this is the opportunity of a lifetime that it might seem like, you know, you, as the owner, maybe you make a hundred thousand dollars a year, you know, 150, but I. Especially you make $100,000 a year or, you know, $150,000, but I... Especially after paying out six full-time plumbers. That's what I'm saying. I don't think this is what you think it is. Dealing with their HR issues and their insurance issues when they bust somebody's pipe and

yeah, this doesn't sound like it's for you. So are you staying on track with the baby steps? You can find out if you hear us on here from time to time. We're always talking about a financial framework that we call the baby steps here. It's seven steps that you walk through to find your the easiest and most risk-free path to building wealth for your family. Seven steps. And if you want to know, hey, where am I at?

Am I doing okay with these baby steps? You can take a quick quiz to check your progress and receive a personalized plan that's just for you. You can just head over to the show notes and click on the link that's titled, are you on track with the baby steps? And you can complete that quiz. All right, let's go to Mike in West Palm Beach, Florida.

My hood, what's going on, Mike? Hey, thank you so much for having me on the show guys. You're welcome. How can we help? I have a question. Um, trying to see if you can guys can help me navigate these both financially and relationally, um, my dad is in quite a little bit of debt. He is retired by 65 years old now. And I'll kind of throw you some numbers of that to

give you a decent picture of all of this. Yeah so he has about 85,000 in personal loans another five in credit card and then he makes about 4,000 net a month about 48 a year I would say. He's still working or that's what he's drawing No, he has a pension he's that's what he gets from his pension gotcha He also gets some bonuses at the end of the year so between October and December about I'll say it's sent seven to twelve thousand dollars in bonuses on top of that How much?

Seven to $12,000. I don't have the exact number, but roughly around that. And that's between October to December? Correct. Okay. Gotcha. So the situation that he's seeing his monthly payments for the loans, it's about $2,500 a month. Okay. And you can see's about $2,500 a month.

And you can see how I'm making $4,000 that can be an issue. So he's reached out to me and my brothers for some help. And we're trying to see what the best course of action here would be to help him out. And what he's asking from us ideally would be to for us to lend him about a thousand dollars a month so that he can repay us at the end of the year with the bonuses that he gets, which I just want to get your take on that. You think that will help? Is he, is he healthy? He had a little medical situation last year.

Had a heart attack. It was minor, but mostly he's healthy. He retired at 49. Oh, okay. So that puts some context around this. He retired at 49. I feel as though, and John, you're looking at me, Mike, I feel like if I were in your shoes, if I had a father who was 49 and when he retired, he decided in that moment, I'm okay with $48,000 a year as my pension, and I'm doing this knowing

that I have debt, I would say you need to go back to work. Yeah, he's put you and your brother in an incredibly awkward position and on behalf of dads everywhere, I'm sorry that he did that to you because dads aren't supposed to do that to their boys. Like I hate the yeller in this position. Has he just not done anything for 20 something years? Uh no, I mean he does have let's say a farm that he grows some mangoes and stuff, but this is just hobby stuff. Yeah, so he just piddles away his time, he just kind of spends on buys what he wants to and now he's annoyed at the payments and he's even gonna have the money this year he just annoyed at the payments so he just

hollers at you two to bail him out? Yeah, yeah, mostly we had no idea of any of this. As you can imagine we had no idea of his financial situation until the medical situation came up and he was pretty much, he told us, hey, here's all the logins to all of my accounts and all my stuff. And is he broke? He said, make the payments with what I have in my account, whatever you decide to do, it's fine with me.

And that's how we got the picture of his financial situation. So have y'all had a reckoning after that day? Cause even that move is a lot. It's hard to watch your dad be sick and wonder if he's going to die. But then for him to say, hey, whatever dude, you just take care of it. That's a lot too. That's tough. And that at least warrants a follow-up conversation with, all right, hey dad, you're broke, man. Like what's your plan here?

Right? You get what I'm saying? Yeah, well how do we... Sorry, yeah. What's his living situation? They don't live in the US, so living situation, they have a paid off house. I went back home and we did have a conversation about that and I proposed maybe he could sell some of the properties land that he had like a farm it's not a lot of money I

would say maybe seven to ten thousand dollars that's exactly what he's asking you for yeah correct yeah I just think doesn't need to be repaired at the end of the year but he said that that was his dream when he retired to be able to have that land and in the future. Yeah, but was his dream also to go hit up his sons for money? You know what I mean? Like that's pride, that's ego, man.

You know, I don't think... I would much rather my dad call me and say, I've always had this dream to have a couple of acres with mango trees. I would love it if you and my other siblings could get together and like, I would actually be tempted to figure that out. Then, hey, I've got this dream.

I know you guys are in your prime wealth building years. You guys wanna start families, get married. Forget y'all stuff. Can you bum me 10 grand? I just. That's just tough for me, man. And my thing is like, he can work. He's not 85, he's 65. And he for sure has six good working years in him to say, okay, instead of asking, bumming a thousand bucks a month off my kids, let me at the very least go earn that myself. And if he really wants to get this debt paid off, you know, he can do something more.

But I this is your dad. You love him. This is your family. But at the same instance, like there is a hard line that you kind of have to draw of. I didn't do this like this is not it would be. This is not mine. Cross to bear. You know, like this is not my burden to carry, I don't think. And I don't think that's being callous. I just think that he made a decision at 49 years old,

very prematurely and has had many opportunities to about face and has chose not to do that. And this is different in my book rather than if my dad called me or my mom called me and said, I don't have any food. Sure, 100%. I have no shelter, then I would say, come live with me. 100%.

I got you, we'll figure this out. And by the way, when you're in my house, here's how our house, my house runs, and I can come here and run my house, but I would be all about that. This isn't that, this is, I have a fantasy, I don't wanna have a job, I don't wanna do anything, I get these checks that come in a couple of times a year, but nah, I want that money right now. Will y'all do that? And here's another

question we haven't even asked you. Can you afford it? You got 10 grand to spend? Yes and no. So right now, my wife is working very minimal because I'm helping her through her master's program. Well, it's basically just me right now. I know that you didn't answer my question. Do you have five or $10,000 to write a check? I do. Okay. I do, but it's the money that I have saved up for school.

Yeah, it's earmarked for something else. So that means you don't have it. If it's earmarked for something else that's a necessity like your wife's school that you've said you're going to do, that means it's earmarked for something else. So that means you don't have it. If it's earmarked for something else that's a necessity, like your wife's school that you've said you're going to do, that means it's not extra. Or it's actually y'all decided y'all are gonna do that with y'all's money.

Uh-huh. Yeah, you definitely can't take her school money and say, hey, I'm gonna give it to my dad who's been retired since he was 49. She would probably flip her lid, right? Yeah, yeah, definitely not something that she'll be very happy about. Yeah rightfully so rightfully so. And he's not even asking me for money that he's not going to return but at the end of

the day I don't think that. How can he return it? He gets these bonuses at the end of the year. He gets these bonuses at the end of the year. But then we're in this it's another form of a loan. It's dead. That's right. Yeah it's another form of a loan. It's debt.

Yeah, it's another form of debt. Which doesn't solve the problem. Right. And loans, dude, loans destroy... Look, he already put a wedge in y'all's father-son relationship by saying, Hey, I know your wife's in school. I know y'all are thinking about having a family. I know y'all are thinking these things. I don't care.

I have this dream and I haven't wanted to work for 15 years. Will you send me some money? I'll get you back later." So he put a wedge in it. Don't further that wedge by creating a business transaction between the two of you. I'd rather you say,

no sir, I can't do that right now. All right, all right. Today's question of the day is brought to you by WhyRefi. So when life happens and those private student loans go into default, WhyRefi offers real possibilities, not judgment. WhyRefi will help you explore a low fixed rate loan based on your unique circumstances. So go to whyrefi.com slash Ramsey. That's the letter y-r-e-f-fi.com slash ramsey. That's the letter y r e f y dot

com slash ramsey may not be available in all states. Today's question comes from Ryan in the great state of Texas. Ryan asked I'm 30 years old and I feel pressured to marry my girlfriend so she can stay in the country. Uh oh. Yeah, no kidding. Uh oh. We've been dating for a year and part of me thinks she might be the one. I'm just gonna stop right there.

Ryan, there's no such thing. That's not a thing. As the one. Oh, I thought you were gonna say as part of me. Do what? Oh, yeah, part of me thinks she's the one. A quarter of me thinks she's all of the one. Yeah, no.

But to be honest, I don't know how much she really loves me versus how much she just wants an easy way to stay in the country. Uh-oh, yikes. Yo, I really don't know what to do and I really need advice. Run, run, run away, run away, baby. I'm gonna turn you over to the relationship expert,

Jade Warshall. Jade, what do you think? Oh, man, no you over to the relationship expert, Jade Warshall. Jade, what do you think? Oh man, no, you're the relationship expert. What do you think Ryan should do here? Oh gosh. Only he knows what's really going on, but my sense is if he's even asking the question, there's probably some of that that's there.

Otherwise, you wouldn't even think to ask the question, I don't feel like, but I've never, it's hard to know. I have never been in this situation, John. Well, I can identify with the feeling of, or the question of, and I get this a lot, which is if I'm even wondering, is this the right person? That's what I'm saying. But I don't know many people who aren't,

the night before going, is this, are we, are this for sure? Are we for sure? I felt pretty good. Yeah. The night before my wedding. And I'd say my wife did too. She's like, oh, all of a sudden I'm marrying that dude. Rachel Cruz, we talked about, she's like, oh, 100%.

I was 100%. I mean, I was like, I hope this works out. But it's a testament to me and my insecurities, right? Okay, I got you. My concern for Ryan is he's having those natural like, I don't know, man, I don't know. James, what about you? How are you feeling?

I was feeling 100% the whole time. Yeah, I felt 100% too. I know Sam Warshaw better have felt 100%. Have you met James? James is like, really, really, really? Okay, okay, yahoo. That's why I'm saying that's saying something. Yeah.

Look at Jay, Jay better have, I mean, Sam better have been at 100. I'm telling you right now he was not. I'm already getting mad and it's not even real. So here's the thing. I, there's like to question, to wonder, I just want to back out. Yeah. The idea of the one comes from that myth of a soulmate on the front end. There's just no such thing as that. It's not real. You're going to have to decide. I'm going to wade

through my, my, my, I'm going to, I'm going to be all in on this real. You're gonna have to decide, I'm gonna wade through my, my, my, I'm gonna, I'm gonna be all in on this thing. You're gonna have to decide that. And here's my bigger concern. If you have this big of a question, I want you to be able to ask it to the person you want to spend the rest of your life with. Wow, yes. So if you have a concern, let's take this, I have to leave the country, let's take that off the table, that's huge. What if you find out she dated people in the past, you didn't like?

What if you found out she actually, I don't know if she actually finished college, she talks about it, but I don't know, she doesn't. You just ask. You find some things, right? You just sit down and ask, right? And sometimes it's a hard conversation or, hey, your dad makes me feel uncomfortable. Like let's ask that hard question.

So I'm less concerned with the answer or what the questions actually are when it comes to do I, should I marry this person? I'm more concerned with, can I ask that question? And will that person hear me out in a respectful, honorable way? And not even agree'm more concerned with can I ask that question and will that person hear me out in a respectful, honorable way? And not even agree with me, but can they hear that question?

Then we're starting to say, okay, now we're both on the right path. So Ryan, this is a hard one. If you are concerned that the person you've been with for a year who's pressuring you, let's go, let's go, let's go, ask her. Hey, I've got this weird feeling in my guts that you wanna marry me because of my citizenship status.

I know that, I hope that'd make me feel creepier with it, but I just wanna be honest. I wanna put all this on the table and I wanna hear what you say. Hopefully she says, dude, I can totally get that. I totally get that. I see that. I need you to hear me how much I love with you I am.

Or I just want, I can't wait another minute to time your wife. Or she might say, how dare you ask that question. Yeah, what if she gets pissed, what does that mean? Then she's gonna get pissed about what house to buy, what neighborhood to buy, how much money we're gonna send, we're gonna expat our money over. She's gonna get pissed. Is she allowed to be pissed for at least just a minute?

Of course. Okay. Yeah, anger's okay. Cause I feel like that could feel, that could feel like if she does truly love him, that could feel hurt course. Okay. Yeah. Cause I feel like that could feel, that could feel like if she does truly love him, that could feel hurtful. Absolutely. Yeah. And so the question can hurt, but also look at this,

I'm marrying a guy that is not gonna hide his questions and bury them down in his chest. He's gonna actually put on the table, even if it's uncomfortable for both of us. Right, right. I wanna marry that guy. Right? True that. And so, yes, everybody gets permission to feel what they wanna feel.

It is, can we hold the space for each other to have those feelings and then we go to the next right thing. That's good. I think that's wonderful advice. Let's go back to the soulmate business. You like the one idea, huh? The one. I want to ask the studio audience, do you think that there is a person out there that

is the one that's the person God has for you or you know, or do you think that, hey, I could make it work with really anybody I'm compatible with. So if you think there's the one, raise your hand. Okay, it's not split. I was thinking it'd be more split. And if you think it's like, hey, if we're compatible, we could have made it work. Wow. Look at me.

I won that one. Interesting. I don't know. I'm somewhere on the fence. I don't have a clear stance on that, but I thought that that was interesting. Yeah, I think the idea of the you complete me, the Romeo and Juliet. There's one puzzle piece and that's it. I just got to find it. Yeah, is largely, I mean.

I don't think I think that. Insanely debunked. Yeah. When I do believe in a soulmate, but I think I always go back to my grandparents They were married 72 and a half years and when my granddad passed away my grandmother literally lost a part of herself And so when I looked I was like, oh, there's the soulmate like you did three quarters Over time, you'll breathe the same with through with the lungs, you dream with the same heart. Like, oh yeah, but you, so for, in my world, you can have a soulmate, but it's only in the rear view mirror.

We like to try to do that on the front end and work the back, work pack. I like that. I like that. Okay. But at some point, yes, I decide, ah, I'm gonna get up today, I'm gonna be a good husband even though I don't want to be.

I'm frustrated, I'm annoyed, I'm gonna get up and I'm gonna do the right thing today. Choices, every single day. Every day's a choice. You decide though I don't want to be. I'm frustrated, I'm annoyed, I'm gonna get up and I'm gonna do the right thing today. Choices, every single day. Every day's a choice. You decide, I do. That's right. I do again. There you go.

I think I do. I think I do. That's the way it works. All right, let's go to a social question, John. I like these. Let's see. Let me get one that's good for, oh. Let me get one that's good for both of us. Actually, most of these are money, so I'll just do it.

OK, Miguel from Facebook asks, how do I determine your budget if you're self-employed and your income is always fluctuating? I like this question. So this is probably a question that we get all the time with people. The hardest, I'll say hardest in quotes, the hardest, hardest money to budget is the money that's not regular. So you have either irregular income or yeah, your budget is changing a lot.

Maybe you're paid on commission or maybe you're self-employed, right? And it's just not the same. So the truth is you still need a budget. And if anything, you need one more than ever. And the way I like to do it is kind of by a ranking system. So I start out with the least amount that I might possibly make.

So if I know I can make anywhere between, I don't know, six and $8,000, I'm not gonna budget at 8,000 to start, I'm gonna budget at 6,000 to start. And then on my budget, everything is listed by priority. So it's like, hey, when I get that $6,000, four walls gotta be first, right? We already know what that is.

That's like your rent, that's your utilities, that's your food, your transportation. Those are first bar none. Then after that are really what I would call the second two walls, which are usually insurance and daycare, right? Child services. And then after that, whatever we can get with that $6,000 and as more money comes in, now we're able to hit those other areas that are lower down on the priority list.

So that's one way to think about it. And then when you do have a month that's like gangbusters and you do a lot of money, you're setting that money aside for basically a rainy day or a lesser month. So you always have that cushion. And I, you know, as a small business owner, if you can get a month ahead and kind of have that money,

it's not an emergency fund. It's not that it It's just I'm always a month ahead on my budget so that if something heaven forbid happens and business is kind of lag in that month, you've got plenty of money and you know how much it takes to run your household. So knowing your numbers when you're self-employed so so key and of course when you have that fluctuating income you're doing it by priority and you're making sure that you keep extra cushion in your account if you can keep a whole month and be a month ahead.

That is a win. It happens all the time. People get caught up, John. They're trying to pay off their debt. They're trying to build wealth, and they forget about a very, very important component of this whole money thing, this whole wealth building journey. And that's insurance. It's so, so important. You got to have

the right coverage. You don't want to have too little and you don't want to have too much because that can impact how long it takes you to actually accomplish those goals that you're working on. Right? So skimping on insurance might feel like in the moment that you're saving money, but when life happens, man, you're gonna be left out there without a safety net. So the right insurance, just remember, it really is a shield around you and your loved ones and your wallet if you do it the right way.

It's a shield when disaster strikes. And in some cases, it can even save you money if you happen to be paying too much for coverage right now. So insurance is so, so important. So how do you know if you have to be paying too much for coverage right now. So insurance is so, so important. So how do you know if you have the right coverage, you need to take the Insurance Coverage Checkup. It's a free online resource that creates a personalized insurance action plan

that's unique to you in your situation. It makes an overly confusing topic like insurance very easy to understand, and it gives you very, very clear next steps. So if you wanna do that, go to ramsysolutions.com slash checkup like insurance, very easy to understand and it gives you very, very clear next steps. So if you wanna do that, go to ramsysolutions.com slash checkup to take the coverage checkup, or you can click the link in the description

if you're listening on YouTube or podcast. So, so important, my husband is the one in our family who kind of leads the charge on this, John. He does it once a year, specifically when it comes to your home, cause the value's always going up, you wanna make sure that your insurance is right. Trust me, you don't wanna play with that.

And when you're getting out of debt, a lot of times people skimp on the things they need, life insurance, and even having the right, I don't know, if you're self-employed, not having the right medical insurance, people do all sorts of crazy things. Well, and it's medical bankruptcies, it is my basement flooded, and there was a rider

that I didn't have on my insurance, and so they don't cover it. Those are the things, the big things that we see just crush people. And so just making sure you got those basic. And dude, when you're trying to get that debt, let's be honest, it hurts. When you see that payment coming out every month

for a maybe, man, you and I get the honor, but not the privilege, the honor of sitting with people that they didn't have it, right? And I tell you what, I've been going through some, the honor, but not the privilege, the honor of sitting with people that they didn't have it. Yeah. Right. And I'll tell you what, I've been going through some insurance claims and Xander has been awesome. Xander is great.

Every step of the way with me. Just my personal, they've been taking care of my family, which I just appreciate. 100%. So just remember, insurance is not a baby step. It's not baby step three, like you're probably thinking it is. It's the moment you find out about it,

you gotta get it in place. All right, Elora is in Las Vegas, Nevada. Elora, am I saying it right? Yeah, you are. What a pretty name. Hi. Thank you. I really messed up and I make too much money.

I make more money than my husband and I want to stay at home with my kids. That's all I want. I have three kids and they're so good and they're so cute and I just want them, I wanna stop working and I wanna get him on my team to do that. So that's my question. Why do you think you messed up?

How do I transition? You said you messed up, why do you think you messed up? Because now I make too much money. I make more than childcare costs. Okay, that's a blessing. I would love to stay home. You didn't mess up nothing. Yeah, because I wanna be a stay home mom.

So I really, Laura, you know what this is? Applied myself. This is like when I, my brothers and sisters when we were kids and I messed up and did too good of a job cleaning The kitchen and then it became my chore all the time to clean the kitchen That's not messed up that you that you applying yourself I'm proud of you

Okay, so tell us tell us why your husband okay, so tell us the money first tell us what you make tell us what he makes why your husband. Okay, so tell us the money first. Tell us what you make. Tell us what he makes. Okay, with my like yearly bonus and commission, I'm making a little over 100,000 and he's making like almost 50, 50, like maybe sometimes 55 ish. He is, I work from home and it's like a good corporate kind of tech job. And he is, he's kind of switched careers from business management to being a truck driver. And like, I'm, I'm pretty much maxed out at where I can go with, with my job, like I can't make more money. And like, I don't want to, I don't want to like work more. And he, like, he could go over the road, but he's a really really good dad and a good husband and he wants to be at home. Yeah, we'd like to see him every day.

I understand. So you want everything all at the same time? Yeah. Well, what's the what's the problem? Is it debt? I mean, obviously, 55,000 is, What's the problem? Is it debt? I mean, obviously, $55,000 is it would be tight on $55,000. So what else is super tight? Yeah. Well, we've paid off $40,000 in debt, a little over $40,000 in debt. We're almost completely out of like any consumer debt. We have like almost $20,000. We have two loans, one of a solar panels on our home,

which we had to take over for when we bought the home. And it would be another six to eight months until we can pay both of those loans off. Like we would be completely consumer debt free in eight months. So we're almost there. Can I tell you, I love that. I love that.

Can I tell you why? Jade, tell me if I'm wrong. So we're almost there. I love that. Can I tell you why? Yeah. Jade, tell me if I'm wrong. That is six months, seven months is a, hey honey, in six months, we're gonna have no more debt and I wanna stay home with these kids. And so we have six months, you have six months to find something else.

Yeah, that's a great on-ramp. I mean, that's a perfect time. But y'all are asking existential marriage questions. You're not asking finance questions right now. Well, there's one other big financial component to this. And this is the piece, Elora, I hope it doesn't bust your bubble because I do think there will be a solution if we need one, but it might not be a fun one. So a lot of times what happens is couples get married and they're both working and they purchase a home based off of both of their incomes

Right and that home is a certain percentage and then one of the spouses wants to stay home and suddenly That mortgage becomes a greater chunk right of their take-home pay because the take-home pay has now shrunk So what I want to know is on his income, let's say he's at fifty five thousand, what does that put your mortgage to percentage wise? Well, um, because that's where that's where the struggle could be. You see that, right? Yeah. So and it's like, right now we have like two to like we have like basically two to $4,000 left after budget and stuff to put towards debt. But don't think of it like that. Don't think about it as what's left. Think about what piece of the pie your mortgage is. So like for, for instance, right now, how much do you guys bring home a month combined? After taxes? Around like nine to $10,000. Okay, so you're $10,000 dollars and then how much is your mortgage?

1800 okay, so you're fine, right? So what will that be about half of his? Income see that if we just said right now, that's the issue Yeah, and you're not gonna find a house payment for a $200 Uh-huh. No, we're not so he's gonna he's gonna have to make more money He either has to make more money or maybe you guys can ease into this by saying, hey, I'm gonna go down to part-time work from home. Do you see what I'm saying?

That's the debt. The debt is a huge piece of this puzzle for you guys, but when it comes to making that sort of change, like one spouse is just no longer working, that mortgage piece is huge because to John's point Yeah, yeah finding a house for less than that. It ain't happening But and I think that's a great mortgage price that you have But how can you fill that gap and still get at least some of what you want that it might be there

It might be him getting more money and you working part-time. Why did he quit? management to be a truck driver He hated it so bad. It was really, I get that, but this feels reactionary. Yeah, like it was 2020, he got laid off and then it was like, he's always wanted to drive truck and get a CDL. And so he did that in 2021. And there is like, there's room, you know, for him to grow in that industry, but he wants to also like start a business and become a partner with the people that, you know, he works for right now. But there's just not like a ton of initiative. I'm like, Hey, this is like important now so that we can. So he doesn't want those things, he's just a schemer.

He's just a dreamer. You know, I'm a dreamer. No, I think that he really does want it, but I think that he is. But if he did, he'd go be doing it. Yeah. Let me put it this way. My wife has to tell me, please don't write a book this year. Wait till next year.

Sam, I'm confident, he's like, hey, Jade, we're good. We're good, we're good, we're good. Right? Like, people who want it, their spouses are like, hey, what about us? Yeah. Not in your situation like, hey, I really wanna be with my kids.

Y'all have a deeper question, which is, hey, we hit the pendulum after 2020. All right, we got a new marriage, it's 2025, 2026, I wanna stay at home. This is a math problem for us. How can we make that happen? You're listening to the Ramsey show. I'm Jade Warshaw.

Next to me, Dr. John Delaney in the house, taking calls about your life and your money. You can call in at any point. The number is 888-825-5225. We do the show from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. But you could call at any time and leave a message and get your call on the line, or at least scheduled to be on the line.

How about that? Let's go to Nick in Atlanta, Georgia. Nick, what'd it do? Hey, how are you? I'm good. How are you? I'm really, really grateful that I got the two of you. I've been praying that the two of you would be on today so I'm glad I got you both. Look at that prayer getting answered. How can we help? I am in a broken marriage of 18 years

raising three kids. We have been living in a rental unit for the past three years. I'm now on a month- month. The lease has expired and so the rent is really exorbitant. I would like to purchase a home. I've been working the baby steps by myself. My wife will not work the baby steps with me and so I have enough money saved up for a down payment. I'm trying to get into a first-time homebuyer program but she's pretty she's pretty checked out at this point and not wanting to buy a house with me or really do much of anything.

And so I'm trying to figure out, should I move forward without her or should I be patient and continue trying to work through this mesh? Are you, you paid off all the debt? Yeah. Wow. All of mine, I haven't paid off all the debt? Yeah. Wow, how much? All of mine, I haven't paid off all of hers. I, yeah, her debt is still lingering.

Are you staying together? What's the plan? We are still in the same home, but I'm not able to get an up and down for her, from her as to whether or not she wants to stay married. And we've been in this situation for three years now. Oh man. Yeah, this is one of those moments where at some point,

let me put it this way, there will be a confrontation at some point. My hope is that it's a confrontation of two adults who want the best for their kids and best for each other and, or even not the best for each other, want the best for our kids and best for each other. And, or even not the best for each other. I want the best for our kids and we're gonna do this as adults. And so the phrase I always throw around is somebody has to turn the music off

and turn the lights on and stop the dance. Or this will end in an attorney's office and you're gonna spend a whole bunch of money making other people wealthy and you're gonna burn everything to the ground. But a confrontation is coming. So when I say that to you, do you think in your head, dude I've had every conversation in the world with her or she just avoids it and avoids it and avoids it.

If you came home tonight and said, I got childcare for the girls, tonight I ordered in dinner, you and I have to decide about the future of our marriage. What would she say? Actually, I knew you were gonna say that cuz I've been listening to your show and so I took her out for breakfast Saturday morning That a boy and what'd she say? It didn't go well. I mean, what did she say much more? She said that working on our marriage Damages her okay. She just can't that she just can't work on the marriage and that she's here for the kids. And that's really it.

Okay, so this is affirmatively not good for the kids. Just FYI. This isn't good for them, right? So what she's telling you is, I don't wanna be married to you anymore because even the thought of working on this is something, is a pain that I refuse to endure. Can I ask, and John, cut me off instantly if it doesn't matter.

Nick, did something like catastrophic happen that kind of blew you guys up or was, is this just over time just growing further and further apart over small, like death over a thousand cuts? It's both, but I don't want to bury the lead. The most catastrophic thing was infidelity. That was on my part, a hundred percent.

Okay. But there were definitely those thousand cuts there. The environment was there. I've admitted to my infidelity and I'm, you know, working with my church, doing counseling, you know, I ended the affair. And I'm willing to be, I love my wife, you know, I'm willing to be patient with her. I, you know, I want to care for her. I want to provide for her. Yeah, but it sounds like she doesn't want, it sounds like she doesn't want you and she's pretty clear about that. Right, right.

So she thinks staying is for the kid, like staying in a unhealthy relationship, that's her doing that for the kids? Well it sounds like she can't imagine a world, my guess is, and this is just having this conversation too many times, she can't picture a world where she doesn't go to bed, she doesn't do bedtime every night, and so the thought of having to split custody, the thought of any of those kind of things is too painful, but what you did she has chosen that she can't come back from that. Right. And so she feels trapped. And so she feels trapped.

That's just what it is. And so for the last three years, your kids have gotten a ringside seat too. This is what love and marriage looks like. And I would suggest that's not healthy for them. It's not healthy for you, it's not healthy for your wife. But when she said the other day, it was pretty instructive, she looked at you and said, I will not work on this marriage. I cannot work on this marriage. But when she said the other day, it was pretty instructive, she looked at you and said, I

will not work on this marriage. I cannot work on this marriage. Can you then, John, paint a picture of what would look healthy? Because it's hard, it is hard to imagine, well, what health can come out of this? Can you paint that picture? Two regulated adults. Yeah, two adults deciding whether we're here, and that would be my preference that she choose the electric shock of healing and y'all coming back together or saying, I can't be in this

marriage and I just feel like I got to fight you because I don't want to do bedtime without these kids. I'd rather that that's a more adult conversation than just walking away from the electricity. Does that make sense? Yes, it does and I do bro. I get that you love your wife I get that this is painful all that that nobody doubts any of that kind of stuff and I don't doubt that you're not Heartbroken and sorry about what happened with the affair and all I get all that The bigger deal is just dealing in reality here

Yeah, I think it's over. It's over. Yeah. And so maybe sitting down on a follow up breakfast and say, I heard you loud and clear last week. I hear from you that our marriage is over. How do you anticipate wanting to move forward? Do you want to move out? Do you want me to move out? How would you imagine custody going? do you want me to move out? How would you imagine custody going? And start having those real conversations and she might say I can't do that, I don't want to do that. Then say okay well the other option is we work on our marriage but we're not gonna live two enemies in the same house. It's just too destructive. The

research says that a great marriage or a marriage that continues to rebuild itself and repair itself and get better and stronger time, every single facet in your life is better. You live longer, you recover from illness better, your net worth is higher, you have more and better sex, all of those things are that way. But the data also says if you're in a abusive or ugly or unhealthy marriage, it's like a reverse

ROI. Every part of your life is worse. Right? Yeah. And you're living that right now. She's living that. Those kids are living that. Yeah.

And so I would go forward and re-establish a conversation and say, hey, I want to follow up on conversation. I hear you. I hear you saying our marriage is over. And now we have to go about the business of how are we gonna end this thing. And with us holding each other with dignity and respect and taking care of those kids in the process. And that, I mean, that's the conversation I would have.

Because she told you, I'm not, I can't physically even talk about healing this marriage. I'm out. I can't get over with what you did. And I'd still, Jayden, I hate that for everybody. I'm so sorry for both of you. Really tough. Let's go straight to Britt.

She's in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Hey, Britt. Hi. Britt's really excited to have, to get through to both of you. My husband and I are big fans. Nice. We're glad you're here. How can we help?

Um, I, we kind of just found this method, but we're kind of doing it. We've done a little out of order. So at this point we have about a 12 month emergency fund saved up, but we still do have some debt. And how do I get over the fear of draining that to pay off the debt? That's such a good question. Can I get the numbers first and then it'll help me choose which of my responses I don't wanna go with

cause I have a couple. How much does 12 months of emergency fund equal? It's about $72,000. Okay. And how much debt do you have? It's got about a little under $12,000 on a car and a little under $79,000 on a home equity loan and then we still have our house house but all other debt is paid off. Okay. So and what's your income? Collectively we bring in about 9,200 gross. Okay. Okay.

Or no, I'm sorry, net. Okay. Got it. That's your gross or net. Got it. Okay, so the 72th, I mean, the truth is for you to reach over and pay off this $12,000 car, no problem, like you could do that, nothing in your world is gonna change. Cause like to your point, you said, hey, this thing is overblown anyway, it's 12 months of expenses.

So kind of logically thinking, even if you're like, Jade, I don't wanna part with my six month emergency fund, you still could reach over and pay that, right? I guess. And nothing would change. Right. Right. Okay. Then I'm going to just kind of walk through the gamut with you because there's there's a lot of ways you can think through this. And I'm sure John has a few as well. What I usually find is when we think about an emergency fund we're thinking okay if the worst happens here's where I want to be right and when the worst happens people are always thinking of my house first

like I want to make sure my house is secure I don't want to lose my mortgage I don't want to that's where people land and so if the worst were to happen which for most of us is I can't work, I either hit a disability, I get injured, I get sick, I lose my job, for some reason I can't work, you have to think about it on, would I rather my expenses be higher or lower? Because if I came upon hard times, I'd want my cost of living to be as little as possible.

Because when you have a bunch of debt laying around, your cost of living is high. Therefore, any savings you have, you go through a lot faster because not only do you have to just make your basic house run, you got to pay debt payments as well. So there's one piece of kind of critical thinking you could think through. And then you pay off the debt. Now you go, okay, I paid off this debt. How quickly could I save up the money that I just spent, right?

Because now I'm not making payments anymore, so I have that money at my disposal to where I can stack it back up my savings very, very quickly. So that's a couple of ways to think about it. And then the other way to think about it, Britt, is just math, all right? Because in your mind, you have $72,000, but that's not true. If you do the math, you have 79,000, then you have another 12, right? And so now we're like at 83,

and you have to subtract your 72,000 from that, right? So you don't really have $72,000 of money. You have $9,000 of debt. That's what you have. That's what the math says. Did you track with me? So if nothing else, just let math alone, be your guide. You said that like Obi-Wan Kenobi.

So tell me what you're scared of. When she said pay off that car, I heard your like chest tighten up. I heard it all the way here in Nashville. Like, what are you scared of? I think it's just having it there. I mean, it makes sense what she's saying that it's not necessarily real at this point,

but I feel it took so long to accumulate that reserve and it just, it feels like my safety net, my nest egg, and that like okay if one of us were to lose our job we at least have that. So I don't know, I don't know that the fear is rational but I think it's just such a scary jump to make. I just wanted you to say that because that's the first step in aligning your head and your heart, your head and your chest, which is maybe this fear isn't totally rational. Because like Jade said, this isn't your money. This is somebody else's money. You're just using their stuff, but you already told them this is your money. You're just holding it like a blankie, right?

Like it makes you feel warm, but it's not yours. And I guess, yeah, just to reiterate what Jade said, the challenge is thinking if we were to lose a job, we don't owe anybody anything. Nobody's coming knocking on the door because this is all ours. That to me is a much more powerful sense of freedom than the other. Right. Would you suggest draining it and then restarting or at least sticking with the three to six months? I can tell you what I did in my house. I drained that sucker. Yeah, do the baby steps. Go take it down to a thousand. That's what the steps say. And can I tell you, I freaked out.

And I was embarrassed at how much of my self-worth and how much of my identity I'd put in. Look how much cash I have in the bank. But it was just a false, it was a false sense of security. It was a false sense of identity. And I'm gonna tell you right now, I haven't worked that hard on the back end ever. You think you worked hard getting it in there,

wait till you have it down to a thousand and you remember how good it feels. And now you don't owe anybody any money. You and your husband are gonna, your house will catch on fire. You'll be working so hard. Oh my goodness. It's a mental shift.

I mean- What does he wanna do? Oh my goodness. It's a mental shift. I mean- What does he want to do? I'm not sure that I don't, I'm not sure where he, where he stands. I'm standing right next to me. I'm looking at him. Does he want to owe nobody anything or does he like having the warm blankie and- Well, it's not even that warm because you're how you've leveraged your house.

So this is like that guy on, on peanuts. He's got that old blanket that I mean, you've leveraged your house. So this is like that guy on peanuts, he's got that old blanket that, I mean, you've leveraged your house with a HELOC. So if we're talking about this feeling of being like risk-free and warm and cozy, I'm like, you're really not there. Yeah, you put your, like on the game of, on the life that is the poker table of life,

you put your house on the block. Right. And by the way, mathematically, you're your house on the block. Right. And by the way, mathematically you're paying every month the same payment for a car that's worth less every day you own it. Yeah. And mathematically I did the math a little bit wrong earlier cause I was doing it in my head, which was a mistake,

but you're $19,000 in debt, not nine, if you don't pay this off. That's the math. So you're not safe at all. Oh, what's your husband saying? Well, he's shaking his head at me that we should pay it. He's shaking his head, yes or no? He's saying that we should, yeah, that we should do it.

You should, cause here's the thing, here's the thing. You have proven that you have the savings muscle, which is a grand thing, I might add, because some of us, and I say us because I'm talking about me, some of us really struggle, Britt, to save. Whether conditions are good or bad, it's just not, we wanna spend our money.

Some people really struggle. You have shown, hey, the two of you together, when it's time to save, y'all got it on lock. That's the good news, is when the time comes to hit baby step three, you're going to be rocking and rolling. No problem. Right? So you don't have to worry about that. And my guess is that to John's point, you will go to extremes to get it done because you like the feeling of it. Everybody likes to see a stack of money sitting there.

You just, you just have to like, cause you haven't been there before. You just have to trust somebody when they tell you you think it feels safe having seventy five thousand dollars in cash even though you owe whatever like whatever you owe 85 grand i promise you having 50,000 in the bank and not owing anybody anything the feeling of peace and security is something you can't fathom well i hope uh hope we'll be there soon. Listen, here's my promise. If you pay all this debt off and you hate how it feels,

you can go borrow it back. Facts. Yeah. You can just go put your house, you can take a full HELOC out on your house, take 75 grand out in equity and just go, ah. You can put it in a checking account and be like, look, we're safe now.

You can go do that. Just see what it feels like when you get so much. Listen, see what it feels like when you get no bills other than your utilities and your mortgage. Let's see what that feels like. I promise you it will feel nuts. It will feel it's just a feeling of peace. And almost no American has that right now

When you're tackling debt actually I already read this one guys, let me go to this next one All right buying or selling your home is a big deal This is the truth and between clickbait headlines and confusing data It's tough to know what's actually going on in the housing market, but we have you covered We're here to make the latest trends really easy to understand. You can find out median home prices, you can find out did they go up slightly last month? Turns out they did. They're up to about 430,000.

You can find out how many homes are on the market. Right now there's nearly one million, which happens to be the highest since 2019. And in a lot of areas, it's still not enough to meet the buyer demand. So we've got the pulse on all of this. The average 15-year fixed rate, that rose to 5.90 last month, and we can tell you that.

But it's still under 6%, that's good news. We can tell you if you're financially ready, a small rate increase shouldn't hold you back from buying the home that you love. So, if you wanna learn more about the housing market trends and get free tools to help you buy or sell with confidence, go to ramsysolutions.com slash market or click the link in the show notes. If you're listening on podcast or YouTube. Alrighty, then we got Dylan in Knoxville, Tennessee. Dylan, you're on the line. Hi. Hello. I'm basically just

trying to figure out if I should use my trust fund money that I'm basically just trying to figure out if I should use my trust fund money that I'm gonna get to help pay my dad's mortgage off for the house that we live in, or if I should use that money and put it towards long-term investments. How old are you? I am 24 and I get the trust fund at 25. Who's the trust? Your

grandparents? No it is for being Native American. Okay how much is it? Two as of right now two hundred and sixty five thousand dollars. Okay and you're still living with your dad? Yes sir. Why don't you have your own place? That's a good question. I have not been able to hold a job and that is completely my fault. I am looking next month into getting another job that's going to be hopefully 23 an hour. Well hold on, you haven't been able to hold a job but then you took what I applaud you for as responsibility and ownership. You've chosen not to stay at a job. Why do you have why have you continued to choose that? There was just a problem with me and one of the managers at my last job. What about the job before that? I honestly can't

remember why I left there. Okay. I think the worst thing that's about to happen to you in your lifetime is that you're about to get a check for $200-something thousand dollars. Yes, sir. And I've also considered that too. Now I'm not the type of person to just spend money. I even just like buying something that's $10 kind of just puts a hole in my chest. Do you have any debt?

No, ma'am. Okay. It's probably good that you don't spend because you don't keep a job. You don't have any money, right? No, sir. Okay. Dude, I'm nervous for you to get this money, dude. And for the record, the move is not to pay off your dad's house.

Please don't do that. Because you're not going to live there forever. You're not gonna live together. It's his house And he probably got his his own check at some point And even if he did that's here nor there so I Don't think the plan is to Buy anything just yet Yeah, I would put it in a high yield savings account until you can hold a job for six months or a year and then I would buy yourself a place. Is there anybody that you is there anybody that you really trust when it comes to these kinds of things like you can sit down

and they've got a level head and that sort of thing? I don't know. Most of the people in my family who have gotten the money have went through it all. So I'm like really trying to avoid doing that. Not family members. I'm talking about a friend. Can I just be honest with you dude? I'm going to be vulnerable between you and me and a couple million people. Is that cool?

Yes, sir. Last week, this is not a long time ago. This is last week, I was gonna make a huge purchase but I wanted to move some money around and move one thing over here, one thing over to somewhere else and it just so happens that the guy who is the executor of my will is also the guy that I do banking with. He's a banker. And he said, as your friend, I reject this request. And I was like, you can't do that. You're my banker. He goes, I know.

As your friend who has known you for 30 years, I'm telling you, once I've known you, once you crack this door open, this account will be gone. Don't do this, please. And you know what? He was right. And I am on the Ramsey show. I do this for a living and I still have somebody in my life, multiple people actually, that hold me accountable. And brother, you need that desperately. A friend, a friend's parent, somebody not your family because you said it like they are not... anyway.

Yeah, but please don't, everyone in your circle is gonna come for this check, aren't they? Yes. Thankfully, no, I've never told anyone about it. That's the thing. No, no, your family's got it. So my mom knows about it, but my dad doesn't, and I haven't told them anything about it.

You think he doesn't know? If you have this in your lineage, they all know because they're getting the same or some version of the same situation. So my dad isn't native, so he doesn't receive anything. Okay. Let me ask you this is and let me ask you this. Is there a way that you can defer this? Until later do you have to take the money at 25 next year?

Yes, yes, they can't hold that any longer than that, okay Or I would totally let them because all that's doing is just gaining more So I mean sort of depends on what the vehicle is. But the pot here, let's play about on both sides because we might it might help us to talk about this out loud. So what I don't want is you to have just a lump sum of money sitting in an account in an account waiting for a Caribbean trip to arise. Right. Because once that money sitting there, suddenly you see a truck you want. Suddenly Uncle Boo Boo's getting married in the Caribbean,

suddenly a buddy needs to borrow 10K, right? Like, and it's just a drain. Yeah. So it becomes a great opportunity. Yeah. On the other hand, you don't have any debt. Keeping a certain portion of this, say three to six months of expenses could be positive.

And then forcing a savings account through the purchase of an outright home could be a good And then forcing a savings account through the purchase of an outright home could be a good thing for a guy like you. That's exactly right. So if you can look for a place, I mean you're 24, you're about to be 25. If you can look for a place that costs no more

than the money you have, like you buy it outright and then you've got it, I think that could be a good thing because then it's not like, it's not a rope you can hang yourself with, you know what I'm saying? I would say find a $200,000 condo brother and move into it and put $50,000 in a high yield savings account.

Yeah, that way it's out of your life and you've done something truly smart with it and there's no question about it. Okay. Please listen, please don't put it in crypto. Please don't go put it in the market. I'm not gonna get crypto. Please listen, please don't put in crypto. Please don't go put it in the market. I'm not going to get crypto. Please don't put it on a single stock.

No, no. Of course, of course. But my, so the whole reason I have this thought of buying or like helping him pay off his mortgage is because he, he still owes about, let's say, the same amount, more or less, but for about the past year or two, like I said, or I don't know if I said it to you guys or not, but he's not able to get a job in his profession. He's been having to do seasonal work,

and even doing that from sunup to sundown, he's still not able to, or I guess he's just struggling. He's got to get a different job. That means he has to get a different job and maybe a different living situation. And maybe he's got to sell the house, or maybe your mom's got to get a job. This isn't your problem to solve, brother. It's not. It can't be.

You're right. I'm just- Because look, when you pay this house off, you pay this house off house off he's not gonna be able to pay the taxes next year and He's gonna roll him over and he's not gonna be able to pay him the second year and then the Taxes and Knoxville are gonna go up because that city's booming and then they're gonna take the house in three years You see what I'm saying like you're contributing to somebody who already has decided I don't I don't want to look at math in the face and deal with that reality.

Dude, you've got a fresh chance. You just said, oh, my friends, my family, they took this money and blew it. Like, this is your shot. Yeah, this is your shot, brother. And I am not throwing away my shot. Please get an advisor or a friend in your life that you trust or a friend's dad that you trust. Yes. Sit down and say, hey, help me with this, please.

Our Ramsey Show scripture and quote of the day, Psalms 65-11. You crown the year with your bounty and your carts overflow with abundance. Meatloaf, Mr. Loaf himself said, I know you're looking for a ruby and a mountain of rocks, but there ain't no Coop DeVille at the bottom of a Cracker Jack box. That sounds like something that I would say. That sounds like something Meatloaf would say. Hey, when I met him, I was like, what I call you? And he said, call me Meat.

And I said, I can't do that, sir. And he said, call me Meat. Wow. That's awesome. That's what James says Mr. loaf James says hey I know my name is James child call me meat okay let's go to the phone lines Josiah Spokane Washington the city I was born what's going on Josiah not much I'm getting married here in about two months and I have a question about credit card I grew up married here in about two months and I have a question about

credit cards. I grew up in a Dave Ish household and my fiance did as well and I'm sure you can guess what the Ish part is. The credit cards. Yeah. So I've been listening to the show since about last November and I've been convinced of the evils of credit cards, but my fiance has not. I kind of firmly believe on being like in a grants and aligned on things and I just, I'm curious if you guys would think it's crazy to slightly compromise on one issue while I wait for her to come around to it and maybe not pressure it as much early on

and just kind of show her what not using a credit card looks like rather than just saying, hey, we're gonna cut it off. Yeah, good question. Very, very good question. I am of the mind that it is very, very, very, very, very, very important to be on the same page financially. And if you can do that before you get married,

it's a plus, right? As opposed to later on having to struggle that out in the same breath. I also am very, very, very, very much of the mind that these, these conversations tend to rarely be light switch moments, right? They tend to be a bit of a journey, many, many talks, many, many. I mean, I don't know, maybe for Jade Warshaw, a couple of heated discussions where one person is very frustrated. Right. But my point is, it's not usually a light switch. And I you're getting married in two months. So the question is, yeah, you could start this conversation now.

It might not be resolved in two months. John. Yeah, I always like to have these conversations. Credit cards become a proxy war, right? Credit card, being on the Dave Ramsey plan becomes a proxy war for not feeling free, makes me sick to my stomach and I can't sleep at night. I wanna have that conversation. What does freedom in our home feel like? What does freedom in our home feel like?

What does peace in our home feel like? In the one that we're gonna try to make together. And by the way, Jade's right, the home you make in years one and two and three will look very different than the home you're making in years 35, 36 and 37. The most important thing is if one of you says, there's a difference between, hey, pick up the towels, hey, pick up the towels,

hey, pick up the towels. And then the one time my wife said, every time I see those little black hairs when you shave and they're on the sink, I wanna stab you in the neck. And I was like, okay, I'll get those. I'll clean those up, right? And so the bigger thing with your marriage is, can y'all have preferences for things?

Can you, I don't like burritos, well, I don't like cheeseburgers, cool. Can we have those preferences? But when one person says, hey, I don't sleep at night when, or this particular thing scares me, it might be going to Christmas at your family's house makes me incredibly uncomfortable, and here's why. And then you stand up for your wife and you say, cool, done. Or it may be that you sit down and say, when my family

borrowed money as a kid, money was always a thing we thought about, it scared me to death and the thought of us doing that in our new marriage scares me to death. And if she says, well, my little piece of plastic is more important than that, then you have to have a harder conversation about this marriage about to enter into. And to do the John Delaney and she might also say something to this to a similar effect, but her comfort is found in a different thing. So she could say, well, I feel the same way I feel like cutting these up would cause me to not be able to sleep at night because this is what I know this is safety. Right. I was going to say. And that's, that's

the part where I go into many conversations. That's right. And we, and then we say, what's the real issue. So you're about to say something, go for it, brother, go for it. Just say, I was just going to say, I think like as much fear as I have about having a credit card, I think she has about not having one. Okay. So do you see where the issue is? Not the credit card. It's security. The issue is security. The issue is not the credit card, I think she has about not having one. Okay, so do you see where the issue is not the credit card? It's security. The issue is security. The issue is not the credit card. The issue is security. And so then let's ask a real question. What would make us feel safe

having $30,000 in cash in a savings account? Can we do that? Well, that's the thing is her parents have set her up very well and like and minded too like we'll be walking into this marriage with uh... money zero debt uh... and well on our way to having paid for degrees in education like so then it's not a problem i think she's just scared about if we can get a good enough interest rate on the house when we go to buy a house

oh that's a whole different conversation that's just that's just bad information because the answer to that is absolutely. Yeah, that's just solved by looking at actual facts. But when you sit down and have a conversation, ask the security question. When you say, I feel less safe, I mean, having credit cards, and she says, I feel less safe, well, let's go one layer deeper, one layer deeper.

And by the way, this is the good stuff of marriage. People talk about intimacy It's just about like sex and doing it intimacy is these conversations where you get beneath the layers of a person and you find out What really keeps you up and I what really scares you and then you get to enter into oh, dude I'm in on that. I'll go I'm gonna go save up 30 grand or we have 30,000 bucks What keeps you let's practice six months not using this card and see how we feel having 30,000 dollars in an account ah okay now we don't really need these cards we haven't used them for six months can we just not have them you get what i'm saying

yeah it's it's practicing your way into these things but i think that the i'm 100 with jade the mechanics of these things take years. The hard conversations, like a mortgage doesn't bother my wife at all. Doesn't bother her one bit. I can't sleep. And so we have that conversation. And so being able to get to the root of this stuff,

you're gonna learn it and you're gonna change over time. It's coming up with a framework in a way that y'all can talk to each other, but it's also, can we do three months without using a credit card at all and see what our life is like? But one of the foundations is in this house, we're free. We don't borrow money. Those are one of those anchors. I think it's good to say, man, this is a big deal to me or not. Becomes a tenant in your household that you agree on. That's good, oh man.

Those are, you know, yeah, those are tough conversations and it takes a minute to align on them but when you do, it's worth all of the work it took to have. Then it becomes the L2 versus the world. Exactly. But also, you don't have those conversations once, you have them over and over and over again. Exactly, it's not the light switch where it's like,

oh, why did I? It's like, oh, my kid's gonna go to this school. No, I want my kid in that school. We talked about it, it didn't happen. My kid's gonna wear these shoes. No, no, no, I want my kid to wear those shoes. And it's like, you'll have this forever. So the earlier you can establish it's okay

and it's safe to have this conversation with each other and you won't hurt each other with the information or with the fears. Man, y'all could take on the world. Honestly, that's the most important part. And as I, so Sam and I had an anniversary this week 18 years yeah yeah knowing each other 20 years which is wild wild but one of my favorite things about our relationship at this point in time is I can really just say

anything I can bring up anything I can bring up anything as a and I just know we could talk about it and you know what Sam Warshall knows? Jade's not leaving. No, exactly. He knows that she's not going anywhere. Exactly. And so there's nothing we won't figure out because we're not leaving. That's right.

There's something powerful about that. Man, that's so important. And I think that this is just a Jade and Sam thing. If you can say that as often as possible, like I'm in, I'm not going anywhere. Like you need to understand I have a choice and my choice is this all the time, regardless. I think, I'm not going anywhere. Like you need to understand, I have a choice and my choice is this all the time, regardless. I think that is such a powerful thing.

Woo, love it. When you do that in the mirror, when you look and say, I'm not ever taking an off ramp, I'm in this. No, plus I wouldn't wanna be out in these streets anyway. Bro. Come on. Yo, yo, W Rudd's in there. Will Rudder's like, you ain't lying.

Catch of the century, he's like, man, your thumbs on fire from all that swiping right you're doing. And it ain't happening. Oh no, I thank the Lord. I'm like, God, I couldn't be out here, John. Hey, listen, I had a buddy that got divorced a few years ago and I sat down, we were having a burger and I was like, all right, tell me about it.

And he leaned forward and goes, whatever it takes, don't do it. And he's like, he said those exact words, it's crazy out in these streets. And I was like, all right, we'll figure it." And he leaned forward and goes, whatever it takes, don't do it. And he's like, he said those exact words, it's crazy out in these streets. And I was like, all right, we'll figure it out. We'll figure it out. Oh man, oh man. You heard it here first.

Love the one you're with. Don't go out in these dating streets if you don't have to. Love the one you're with. Don't do that either, America. Good God Almighty. That's true. That's true.

Thank you, John. This has been The Ramsey Show. We'll see you next time. need a budget. Start budgeting for free today with the EveryDollar app, the easiest way to budget. Track your expenses and reach your goals faster. Go to EveryDollar.com today.