The Ramsey Show - App - You Must Be Intentional With Your Financial Planning (Hour 3)

Episode Date: September 8, 2023

Девочка-пай Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create amazing, healthy relationships. I am Rachel Cruz, joined this hour by Dr. John Deloney, and we're taking your calls from anywhere in the country at 888-825-5225. So give us a call and we will help you hopefully through a situation that you have. All right, coming up next, we have Kelly in Savannah, Georgia. Hey, Kelly, welcome to the show. Hey, how are y'all? We are doing great. How can we help? I was

calling because I'm trying to figure out, I'm currently in baby step two and I'm trying to figure out if it's okay for me to move now or should I wait until I'm out of baby step two? How much longer do you have in baby step two?

Maybe about four or five months. Okay. And what's the current living situation that you're in that you're wanting to move? I am a single mom. I had to move back with my mom a couple of years ago, and I'm sharing a room with my two sons and it's getting a little wow that's like being in a blender without the top on right oh yeah yeah yeah so do you have Kelly do you have good margin to be able to afford you know rent for I wouldn't probably I wouldn't buy anything right now but if you go and look at an apartment or a condo or something do you have other places in your area that you feel like you could afford there is I mean all of the places are kind of

expensive so it would make it very tight for me so like moving faster they said to wouldn't really happen too quickly um but i mean i would be able to you know move out and afford to live on my own what what what about a finish line like a a if you knew by january. Kelly looks in the mirror and says, Kelly, January 1, we move out and we move out debt-free. Most of us can put up with just about anything, as the great Nietzsche says, if we have a big enough why. I've got to get out of here. I want to preserve my relationship with my kids. I want to preserve my relationship with my mom. I want to preserve my sanity.

And also, I want to get out of debt. So, I'm going to put a clock on this thing. And we are out of here January 1, and we're out of debt. Would that give you some peace to do both things, or do you need to go right now? I think I can hold off. Yeah. How long have you been in it, Kelly? How long have you been in this situation, living situation? For about five, six years now okay so you've done it right so so i mean you've you've proven that for five

that's a long time but also five years versus four months um it shows you don't even mean like that you have the stamina you've been doing it for five years so you can hold your breath for for four more months to get through it would you say yeah that makes sense and here's what a complete bit i'm sorry i was gonna say like my my conversation i've sat down with single moms over the years, one of the pervasive feelings that I hear them explain to me, and you can tell me if I'm wrong, but it's just this sense of looming dread over the house. This what next?

I only have this much time. I only have this much margin. We've got so little money. There's just this pervasive air in the house that is heavy and laden with angst. And there's something, does that sound familiar? Yeah, it does. Okay. So what if you focused on what is the air going to feel like in our apartment when we move out? And you could move out today. And like you said, you could cover the bills, but you know as well as I do, you'd be covering them with, it would be like playing Twister, and you would have one foot on one corner

and another foot on the other corner. You'd be so spread thin. And those little boys, you know what they're going to do? They're going to act like little boys, and they're going to break stuff. They're going to get in trouble. They're going to run around because they're little boys. That's what they're designed to do. And think about it.

What if you moved into that apartment in January, and you owed nobody anything and it gave you that that deeper air that deeper air to breathe so that might mean you're gonna miss some little league games or some soccer games or whatever because you're gonna work a second job but I would love to see you put a clock on it get out of there debt-free you've been there five years it's time to go. We all know that. Your mama's ready for you to go. Everybody's ready for you to go. But let's do it. Let's not jump out of the frying pan into a fire.

Let's jump out of the frying pan into ah, now it's time. How's that sound? Right. It sounds great. I love that. I mean, you can do what you want, but that's what I'd recommend. Yeah, absolutely. And unless, Kelly, something drastic changed in the recent, you know, few months or weeks that you feel in danger, like, right,

if there's something there that you're like, no, I need to get out for the safety and the health of my family, then that's one thing. But if it's just that you're almost there, you're four months away, and you're just exhausted, you're like, can I just jump the gun? Go ahead and get out. Even though it may stretch all this a little bit longer, I would push you to stay in it.

You've done it for five years. You can continue to do it for four. And you got this, Kelly. Being a single mom, it's a heroic role that you're in. And there's a lot of moms out there and a lot of dads as well. But man, it's really tough. And I really believe though, Kelly, you've done this. You've done it so far. I'm like, you have four months left. You can do this. So close. And the piece

that John's talking about that happens when you actually can do it and you're not stressed to your limit of trying to figure out how to pay this rent. When you have no payments leaving, no debt, all that extra margin, then you'll be able to live in there pay the rent and enjoy life so john we're doing a first ever uh money and marriage events yes live here here a full weekend we've never done this we've done some live streams we've done some evenings around the country even before covid um and then we decided gosh this has been an event that a lot of people tune into for the live stream so let's make it not just an in-person event, but a full weekend experience. So the first ever Money in Marriage Getaway is October 19th through the 21st.

And you and your spouse will come together. And John and I are the main teachers of the whole weekend. We have some special guests that will be coming in and out. But we're going to spend a whole weekend together, you guys, and really dive in and help you with your family, with goals, with your money, with your relationships, your intimacy. We're going to touch on every area of your marriage and give you the tools to walk away not just inspired and growing and learning new things, but actually what to do when you get home. And so that's a real big thing for us. We want to give you tactical things as you continue to grow. And we've talked to people that have already paid and they're coming. And some of our team has done some calls with them just to kind of understand who's the

audience. And it's so great because, I mean, all of them, they're like, we just want to grow. We just want to learn. So if you're one of those people that's like, I just want to continue to do better in areas of my life. Well, when it comes to your money and your marriage, this is your weekend. And by the way, people, Rachel, people, and I know you get this too,

people reach out from all over the country saying, hey, could I get an hour with y'all? Could I, would you be my coach for my family, for my husband, for my wife? This is it. Yep, that's it. You and I will be there for two and a half straight days. We'll have Q&As.

We'll have access. We'll have meals together. We will be in this together. Yep. So we'll be hanging out with you. Go to ramseysolutions.com slash events to get your tickets to Money & Marriage October 19th through the 21st.

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slash budget at chministries.org slash budget. Welcome back to the Ramsey Show. We are taking your calls, America. And up next, we have Kate in Philadelphia. Hey, Kate, welcome to the show. Hi, thank you so much for taking my call. So excited to talk with you both. Oh, glad you're here, Kate. How can we help? So my husband and I have been debt-free since 2020. We paid off $120,000 of my student loans.

Good for you. Thank you. And currently we're kind of on 3B. We're saving. We actually own a small home in the city, and we're trying to save for a larger home, like thinking of starting a family and moving to the suburbs. So recently, I guess my question is more pertaining to a trust fund that we were recently blessed with. It's $1 million. And we're trying to figure out how we use that blessing and apply it into like our baby steps or if we save it for our kids future if we're supposed to use it for our home we would just love to hear your advice yeah that's great so you guys are on baby step 3b you're saving up for a home we currently have 80,000 saved outside of our emergency fund we make about 185 a year 185 a

year that's awesome so before this million dollars showed up yeah what houses were you all looking at um well it actually so we got married in 2021 and about a week before our wedding is when we had found out about it um and then and then we're 30 now and so once you turn 30 is when you're able to uh draw from it for major purchases like a house or a car. Because my tendency right out of the gate is... It's not going to make us get a million-dollar house by any means. And that would be like, hey, we're looking at $250,000 or $300,000 houses. We got a million dollars. Let's look at $2 million houses, right?

So it can get out of whack really quick. So that's why I was asking that question. But y'all have known about this for a while. Yeah, and our first thought was almost to ignore it like it didn't exist because we were like, okay, let's just keep going with our plan. Because I mean, we both drive the up car, 2005 Toyota Camry and like have a really small row home in Philly. And we're totally okay like living this way.

We like love our life. But I'm just curious about how kind of how much better of a home we could get and maybe not have to move again, like kind of in a quicker amount of time. Yeah. Where did the trust come from, Kate? My very generous and hardworking father-in-law. Okay. Okay. So it's your father-in-law's. That's great. And where is, where is the money? I know it's in a trust, but is it? Managed by, yeah, it's managed like in a mutual fund. It's in a mutual fund. Okay.

Yeah. With a management group that they use. Perfect. And so you're making money on that because it's in the market, correct? Yeah. Yeah. So it's growing, which is, yeah, which is awesome. So yeah, Kate, I mean, yeah, it's one of those things that, you know, you guys as you and your husband, and you've done this well already, I think there's this dignity piece to you all to know that, hey, regardless of this million dollars or not, we're going to be okay.

We're going to save. You all saved $80,000. You're debt-free. You're working towards a home. And so being in that mindset, I think think is really important just for you and your husband for longevity, right? And it doesn't sound like you guys obviously are fishing for money or that this trust fund dropped and you're like, finally, we get to go buy the yachts that we've won. It's not this air about you. But I think that's the encouraging piece, though,

is that you and your husband, y'all are okay, right, regardless of this money or not. So then I think from there, since that's established, to be able to say, okay, out of this million dollars, what, how, how much could we, how much would we have to take out of this trust to get the kind of house, like what you're saying, maybe could last us a little bit longer than just the starter home we were looking at so for you guys in Philadelphia have you priced anything that you know you have your starter home that you guys were saving for and then you have this trust now we live in a home now that's uh it's probably worth like 320 something okay oh still like 260 on it we bought it um shortly after like 2020 we saved a bunch money, paid off the end of my student loans, and then paid for our down payment and then got this house.

Okay. How's the house now? Yeah, it's small. Do you guys have kids? No. No. The dog that we act like is our child. Yeah, that's fair.

I think we all do. Okay, so were you guys looking to move? Were you wanting to move before this trust? Well, you guys, I guess, already knew about the trust, but I'm just wondering if you guys. We can be very patient in our timeline. So we kind of, we want to probably start a family in the next year so we're looking to maybe have our house in the next year or so.

Okay. But we could be very patient and aren't trying to like jump at the next house or anything by any means. Sure. Totally. Totally. Let's reverse engineer this. trying to like jump at the next house or anything by any means. Sure. Totally. Totally. Um, let's, let's reverse engineer this. If your father-in-law was alive today,

what would, what would he want to spend money on? Oh, he is. Okay. Okay. Gotcha. Gotcha.

Sorry. Um, he is. Okay. Um, I thought he passed away and left this money to you. And we actually can meet with him and we we are meeting with him next week to talk about it, to be more open about it, because I've always kind of felt a little shy about it,

because we manage our money together, but I'm a spreadsheet person. So when I found out about it, I really wanted to know more about how we could apply it to things, but I didn't want to kind of jump in and be like, okay, how can we? But it's been, you know, we've been married two years now. Yeah, you've been very respectful of him. Well, my impulse is, since he's still alive, this makes us a little more awkward,

but he didn't put any restrictions on it. He didn't put any other than 30, right? He didn't put any to be used for a house or for med school or anything like that. He just said, when you turn 30, here's a million dollars. Right. And so part of me says, what do we think would be his dream wishes that he would want us to

have a paid for house to start our life and our family with? Because if so, let's pull out 300,000 of that. Let's sell our house or 400,000 of that. Let's buy a $500,000 house or 600,000, not a crazy house in the Philadelphia area. And let's honor him by being a good steward of this money. And let's put the rest being a good steward of this money. And let's put the rest of it. We've already got the college fund taken care of, right? For our kids or what, whatever that thing is with him being here. My hesitancy to go ask him is you invite him to become a co-steward of the money. And it's real easy for him to say, Hey, this, this is my money that I gave you. And y'all need to be spending it on X, Y, and Z.

And that stipulation doesn't exist now. And so I'd hesitate to bring it into the world. But you could, Kate, you and your husband sit down and yeah, what John's saying, I think having a house that's paid, I think living a life without debts and then being able to change your lives and your kids' lives and all of this, using this money as a tool to do that is a very honorable thing. And so I do wonder, yeah, if you guys say, if you and your husband agree, yeah, let's pull out 300 of this or 400 of this. We're going to leave some of it in the market because we're not we don't need it right now. But once we have a kid, you know, we're going to pull some of that out to start a fund like

you kind of have a little bit of a game plan and you and your husband agree and shake hands. This is what we want to do as our family. And then I think it would be a, I don't know what your father-in-law's like, but I do think it's a kind gesture just to be like, hey, I'm not asking you, but we are so grateful for this and we're so excited about the next step. And we are excited to say that, you know, we're going to take some of this

and we're going to buy a house debt-free and we were going to use some for college. You know what I mean? Like kind of tell them your plan just for, I would think if I'm a parent and I do something like that and your kids are responsible mature and they come back and like wow here's what I'm doing to multiply and to be wise about it do you know what I mean like there's something honoring about that if y'all want to I don't think you have to but no and he's like they're

both just my parents are my parent involved are just like the sweetest people ever and they would have the best conversation and I'm sure that they would be very respectful of it i i guess that would make me feel better about it because i think my inkling is like i would like to almost just have a paid for house and like start that way but uh i would be very anxious about like just pulling that amount definitely without a conversation let me say let me say it this way and this this is probably worth the a can of beans, right? But if I gave my son, who was 30, a million dollars, and he had just been married, and they'd been busting their butt, and they'd paid off their student loans,

and they had put some money away for a house, and they were talking about starting a family, and my son came and sat down with me over, I'm gonna get all choked up, geez louise, and he came and sat down over coffee with me, he was an old man, and he said, hey dad, I just bought a house with cash and I just create, I put it as what I could in a longterm savings account,

which I, for, for college. So for our two kids, college is covered and that's because of your generosity. And now I can spend my life not catching up, but I could spend my life creating trusts for my kids. That will be a million dollars. Thank you. I would weep if my son used that money in that way to use it as a

springboard into him, like you said, multiplying it for his kids. And so I love the idea of you getting a house, a reasonable house, paying it off, starting your whole life with no debt. Man, that just sounds amazing. It's amazing. So great, Kate. You guys are wise, kind people. So I'm excited for you. Thanks for the call. This is The Ramsey Show. So student loans have been in the news often, a lot recently, because payments start back next month, you guys. Interest has kicked in and people are feeling the toll. And there's a article, John, and I thought it was a really interesting one. Austin, our producer, pulled it, but talking about how student loan debt takes a toll on vulnerable populations' mental health. And it tells a story of Melanie. She's 38 now, but she wanted to be

a university theater professor. So she went, got her PhD, and she was just rock and rolling. But then the Great Depression hits in the late 2000s, and she couldn't find work and so by 2012 her undergrad and master's degree loans totaled $81,000 with $900 payment a month and so she briefly was on food stamps depleting her savings she was sharing a one room apartment and so all this was going so then it leads in the article starts talking about the anxiety and the shame that starts getting wrapped around people that have this amount of debt. They're feeling this. And we look at the loan debt average is $37,000 per borrower in America today. And so that's where we're at. And what's fascinating is now science is coming out and saying, and studies are now showing, that your money, your debt levels,

do have a direct effect on your mental health. Yeah, and let's just call a spade a spade here. This person, it's kind of a case study that leads into a broader conversation about mental health and student loan debt. But this student did, got a PhD in performance studies, wanted to be a university professor. So is that wise, right? Is that wise? Probably not. Probably not the wisest degree in the world.

That's an $80,000 degree, but also had a very clear direction of mind. And here's what she says, and what she says is actually very true. Students are told an untrue narrative. If you work hard in school, you'll be able to pay back your loans. If you take out these loans and get this PhD, get this master's, get this degree and whatever, you will be able to get a job that pays them back. And that's not true. Now, I do have colleagues across the country, like in history departments and English departments that will tell their incoming students, especially PhD students, you will not get a job

as a university professor. Just so you know. There will be four openings next year across America and there's a lot of Stanford and Harvard grads. It won't be you. They're being as candid as they can, but these students keep showing up and they keep showing up.

But the narrative globally is, if you just go borrow this money and get through college, you'll be great. You're going to be okay. You're going to be okay. And then you increasingly talk to marginalized populations who have not been told in history, like this is a path. And now they're being told this is the only path. Go, go, go, go, go.

And they don't have parents that went to college. and so they don't know how to navigate this system and so they're sitting in front of the student loan counselor take signing their life away because they just want to do what's right and i'm just going to follow this plan and now man the journal of addictive behaviors in april 2023 followed 331 college graduates which is a small study but it's an important start and they linked high debt levels with problematic drinking, anxiety, and depression, especially among the most economically insecure graduates. And let's be honest, this makes sense. Yeah. Your brain's going to sound the anxiety alarms if you're not safe. And if you owe a whole bunch of money and you can't pay your bills, you're not safe, right?

But it found one in 14 participants within the group, another study found one in 14 participants in a group of a couple thousand loan borrowers reported having suicidal thoughts that they attributed to being trapped. I can't get out of this. My best option is just to cash out. This stuff is not just a political football to be thrown back and forth. Student loan debt is crushing young men and women. It's crushing adults who went back to school and it is really devastating people's mental and emotional health, their relational health.

This is for real. It's for real and it's scary. If you are wondering if this is you, like you were starting to feel that panic, that burnout feeling, that chronically stressed feeling, that anxious feeling, we do have an anxiety test. It's not diagnostic by any stretch of the imagination. You take this test and it's not going to tell you you have anxiety. What it is going to tell you is, hey, here's the areas in your life that you should pay attention to. Rachel and I took this test. If you're interested,

ramsaysolutions.com slash anxiety test. But you took the test and I took it too. And it's very instructive, very instructive. It's really good. Yeah. So the areas that the test hits on is connection, freedom, mindfulness, health health and healing belief and reality and uh these are the parts of your new book how to build an unanxious life that comes out october 3rd and so yeah you can go online at ramsey solutions.com slash anxiety test anxiety test and you can take it for free so what did you say we just did it well it's the results there's a you get you get all the areas, right? And that it. Okay.

So let's go through them. So mine connection was yellow. I was kind of shocked by, I feel like I'm very connected. I think you communicate a lot. Your body. But you probably don't have a lot of people that you can be completely open with. I do though. That's my thing.

I got my, I got my four people. Yes. I got my four people. I don't believe you. We have three couples. I was like, I was like, we genuinely, I'm genuinely i'm like i feel very no not by a lot though i mean i have a lot of friends sure but there's like those four that know every everything so god bless them so but but apparently i'm yellow okay and i'm gonna trust it all right i'm gonna trust it because i can also think glass glass half full a lot about life so anyway so it says your score your body it might

be nudging you to uh get your attention in this area so that's yellow my other yellow score was mindfulness and mindfulness is about two words curiosity and awareness okay do you go to judgment real quick okay or or do you win very ted lasso-esque when winston leaves towels on the floor do you say oh my gosh winston why did you leave or do you think what must have happened in his day that's how he like something must be going on because he knows i care about this and one of those your body goes to war and one of those your body goes to empathy and let's support this thing see i feel like i'm a very empathetic person i'm obviously not very self-aware just agree to disagree i yeah apparently not i mean i don't know i don't know i i maybe maybe it is i mean i i can't be more black and white

in thought no do tell oh my gosh all right so here's my well hold on the rest are green hold on you're a very non-anxious person. My reality is green. My freedom is green. And my health and healing are green. Okay. So you see a counselor. You don't owe anybody any money. You're a board member at a super successful company.

Yeah, of course. Those things are going to be great. Oh my gosh. You take care of yourself. You've been working out with Winston. Y'all are getting after it. Yeah, we do. We are working out.

Six weeks in. Mine. So I'm in the middle of a book tour. I'm traveling all over. So this does change. Oh, absolutely. I can't wait about yours. Stressful John.

Please go, Stressful John. Freedom Rachel's here. Not me. Mine actually started flashing at me. But here's the first indicator. Okay. So I've had a struggle over the last few years with my daughter. She was five and six and now she's seven. Her tiny little body

identified me as not a threat. I don't yell in my house. I don't hit my kids or anything like that. But that guy's got a lot of turmoil in his chest. I've done a lot of hard counseling over the last few years. And for the last six months, I'm like a jungle gym. My daughter won't get off of me. She wants to hug all the time. She wants to piggyback rides all the time. And it has been transformative in my house. In the past couple of weeks, the old, no dad and she'll run away. And I'll say, can I have a hug? And she'll just duck and move and run out the other room. And the other morning I'm just gonna be honest I was just crying on the way to work I was like my own daughter won't hug me then I took this quiz and I have red for mindfulness yellow for choosing reality yellow for connection yellow for choosing freedom and if I'm honest and I

really dig in it's right I'm in a wild season at work and I tend to isolate myself and there's frustrations. Anytime you launch something big like a book, there's frustrations and I have to wait on another department to do a thing. So I don't have the freedom to, and I'm looking at this and I thought, huh, my daughter, she felt it. And that's what I'm bringing into the house. And so I need to lean into these areas so that my body can not all the stress is going to go away, but my body knows, okay, you're back in the driver's seat of your own life. Yes. Even though things are still chaotic, you're driving. That's right. I can turn the alarms off now. That's right. That's right. And it's just the awareness of it.

And that's the thing is I'm like, yeah, you think maybe you're aware on things, but you're not. So go to ramsaystolutions.com slash anxiety test. See how anxious you are. Are you more freedom Rachel-esque or stressful? I think you need some connection and some mindfulness. Jeez Louise. Judgment here. This is the Ramsey Show.

Our scripture of the day comes from proverbs 12 11 those who work their land will have abundant food but those who chase fantasies have no sense wow fantasy sports players that was for you proverbs all the guys doing their boards fantasy days. Fantasy sports. Unbelievable. Fantasy sports where grown men use other real grown men as imaginary action figures to play imaginary games. Do you do fantasy football at all? No. You know what I do? Is the drum roll, please.

I go outside and I just like go fishing or play with my kids or like talk to my wife like you can do all of that and play fantasy football but just you know that right think of the people probably say that about like guitars and they're like John yeah okay fine but go outside think about think about fantasy football I don't really even understand it you know why Winston really doesn't do it because it's not real it It's a fantasy. Where other grown men are sitting on their couches pretending they're other grown men. Look at the points I got.

I'm coach of... Really? It's like Zelda, except with real guys. Golly, I don't understand it. Not even a little bit. Tell us how you feel about fantasy football. Start a softball league and go play. Go do something.

Go jogging. It is so interesting that this is, well, we're getting off topic, but with sports, here's my thing. I enjoy sports, right? I grew up in the South, college football. Oh, of course, me too. I'm from Texas. I love them.

Yeah, I can't wait. I can't wait for the fall, like all of this. But I now draw the line, if your attitude or your emotions change because of a win or a loss of a game significantly oh mine do i'm done oh mine do i have to be careful no your days how are you mad at fantasy football people listen it's embarrassing i'm ashamed of it how but how do you well then people i would that's what i would yell you yell at fantasy football people. I would yell at that. Here's the thing I really yell at. That is so frustrating. I'm like, an 18-year-old ruined your day.

The real thing I get frustrated with is when I go- Because you are pretending that your happiness is from this other person. When I go to a sporting event, a college sporting event, and adults are wearing jerseys with the name of children on the back of them, teenagers, and they're screaming at teenagers from the field. I know. And they're 19.

That's what we do at our house. I know. We scream at the TV. Do you have, does Winston have shirts of college men on his jersey? No, he doesn't. No, he doesn't. Okay, good. Actually, to be as like into sports as Winston was, he's not like, like we don't have like

ESPN, like I have friends, you know, they have ESPN in all the time and stuff like he's not a big like sports watcher yeah it's more just the environment but but i yeah we i know people and like their whole mood will change because their team loses now if you had money on the game which i don't support but like i get that like that sucks but a bunch of teenagers didn't come through for me this weekend i know all right and then our quote thank you proverbs for taking us on that uh Like, that sucks. A bunch of teenagers didn't come through for me this weekend. I know. It's ridiculous. I know. All right. And then our quote.

Thank you, Proverbs, for taking us on that. Good enough never is. Debbie Fields. Way to go, Debbie. Right. It's great. All right. Going to the phones to close out the show today is Caroline in Manchester.

Hey, Caroline. Welcome to the show. Hi there. Thank you for taking my call. Absolutely. How can we help? So my grandpa has offered to help me a little bit by paying for things like gas and groceries. So I accepted his help for a little while, but then I started to feel very guilty because I wasn't actually supporting myself 100%. So my question is, because now I'm rethinking that decision, once he was insulted by my not using his money, because he's just trying to be generous. So I'm rethinking that decision.

So I'm just wondering, what do you think about accepting this kind of small support from a family member? Okay. How old are you, Caroline? I'm just wondering, what do you think about accepting this kind of small support from a family member? Okay. How old are you, Caroline? I'm 20. You're 20 years old. Okay. And what's your current living situation?

Are you in school? Are you living on your own? Yep. I'm in. I was in school for two years, and I'm just taking a gap year. Okay. This year. Okay, great.

And are you renting a place? Do you have a house? I'm actually living a gap year this year. Okay, great. And are you renting a place? Do you have a house? I'm actually living with my employers. They're pastors, and they've offered me a room in their house. Okay. It's free. And where do you work? At the church.

At the church, okay. Are they paying you? Yes. They are paying me, yes. Are they paying you a livable wage? It's $18 an hour, $40 hours a week. Okay. Yep.

So with free rent and with an $18 an hour job, $40 hours a week, you're not able to make your bills? Well, I am, so that's my question is, is it wrong if I accept his help knowing that I couldn't just support myself financially? Well, I think it changes from, he's not giving you help, he's just blessing you with money every month. If you tell him I need your help with tuition

or I need help with my housing because I'm in college, that's one thing. If your granddad just likes sending you checks because he loves you that's another thing but if you're telling him a third thing is hey grandpa i need your help i need your help i need your help and he's worried about you well now we're getting into some dishonesty so i don't think he's sending you money for help as much as he likes blessing his granddaughter with some cash and you're making do with the situation you've chosen right now. So, I mean, I don't, where does your guilt come from? I think it's just because I feel like I could just support myself financially.

So, the fact that I'm accepting outside help just makes me feel like I could just support myself financially. So the fact that I'm accepting outside help just makes me feel like I am lying. Yeah. And did he get offended when you said you don't need the money anymore? Okay, so that's weird to me. Well, and that makes me think it's not, he's not trying to do... I mean, if you feel guilty about this, do what's best by you. I think you're feeling guilty about something that your granddad may not intend.

Because what you could do, Caroline, on one end of the spectrum, I mean, really, like what John's saying, it's like, you know, if you have a granddad that just has a lot of money. Yeah, put an save for a house that's right that's what I was going to say is just say you know hey grandpa like where I am financially I'm okay uh he's not like concerned about your living situation and he's wanting to you know tell you Carolyn you need to go do something else and here's the money you need to put yourself in a better situation at all. He's not concerned for you, is he? No. He just wants to help me.

Okay. Put money in the account. Yeah, so I would just say to tell him, hey, Grandpa, this is what I'm doing right now. And I want to practice the diligence of knowing that I can stand on my own two feet. And this is feeling good for me. I'm 20 years old and I want to just know I can do it. But I really appreciate your generosity. And so what i want to do is take your money i'm going to put it in an account and i'm not going to touch it except for major purchases

so when i need to replace my car uh for a down payment maybe on a future home maybe it's that you know your your living situation in six months caroline you may say gosh i would love to move out and have my own place. And maybe you can take some of that to help with a little bit of rent at the beginning till you can cash flow it. Do you know what I mean? Like you can give it a purpose without feeling like you're lying and that you're very honest with him and open with him, that that's what you're going to do is you're going to let it be in an account and you'll use it for major purchases later in life because that is a gift and that's wonderful. But if he's weird about that that's what's kind of well strange to me i'm thinking i'm

trying to put myself in his shoes i can't but i can put myself in a dad's shoes if my daughter told me hey dad i just turned 18 i'm dropping out of college for a year or 20 i dropped out of college for a year and i'm going to live in a room in this couple's house. That sounds incredibly temporary to me. And if you told me, no, dad, I'm making all my bills, I would think for this weird second that you've created, this little pocket out of reality, you're right. You're making your bills, but reality's coming soon. Rent and electric and water bills are coming soon. Food bills are coming soon. And so I can imagine he's concerned about what happens when this thing ends and this does end sooner than you think it does whether they have

a kid whether they start getting weird whether they just want their space back or whatever so i do think it's very very wise to begin planning very intentionally for where you're going to live after this. Okay? So I don't have any problem. And you can do what Rachel said. I wouldn't even bother telling him unless he asks. And he says, what are you doing with all that money I'm sending you? I'm saving up to get my own place.

He'll probably smile from ear to ear and then back again. But you can sit down and tell him, here's what I'm going to do with this money from this point forward. But I think you need to start planning for a new living arrangement ASAP. That's a great, great idea. Thanks, Caroline, for the call. Thanks to all the guys in the booth for a wonderful show.

Thank you, John, for another great hour. And thank you, America, for listening. This is The Ramsey Show. Hey, it's Rachel Cruz. If you like what you heard in this episode and want to know more about getting started on the Ramsey baby steps, go to ramseysolutions.com

and click the Get Started button. We'll help you figure out the best next step for you based on your specific situation. That's ramseysolutions.com and click Get Started.