The Ramsey Show - App - Your "Why" Has to Be Greater Than Your Wants (Hour 3)

Episode Date: September 6, 2019

Retirement, Budgeting, Debt, Savings, Home Buying   Tools to get you started: Debt Calculator: http://bit.ly/2QIoSPV Insurance Coverage Checkup: http://bit.ly/2BrqEuo Complete Guide to Budgeting: http://bit.ly/2QEyonc Interview Guide: http://bit.ly/2BuGnZE   Check out other podcasts in the Ramsey Network: http://bit.ly/2JgzaQR

Music Music Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Dollar Car Rental Studios, it's the Dave Ramsey Show, where debt is dumb, cash is king, and the paid-off home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host. Thank you for joining us, America. We're glad you're here. Open phones this hour at 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225.

Lori is going to start us off this hour, and Lori's in Idaho. Hey, Lori, welcome to The Dave Ramsey Show. Thank you. My question for you is whether it is a good idea to take a lump sum for your pension payments or take the payments or take that lump sum and roll it into a self-directed real estate IRA. We just learned recently about that from our CPA. So we're just not sure what would be the best route to go. My husband's 62, turned 62 yesterday, wanted to retire yesterday, but we're not quite there, we don't think.

But we're totally debt-free. In general terms, I always take the lump sum and roll it to an IRA. Here's why. Pensions are highly regulated, and they have to invest in such a way that they make a substandard rate of return. And so a typical pension is going to make 6% to 7% in a 10% to a 12% world. Okay? So they don't do very well. So if you just took the money and invested it in good mutual funds, you would make more money

than the pension would pay you. Okay? Okay. That's thing one. Thing two is, when you die, the pension dies with you. Right. Okay? And so, but if you roll it to an IRA, it's now an asset of yours. It's an estate.

And so, what's the lump sum pension that they're offering you? $147,000. Okay, so your heirs are going to get $147,000 or your heirs are going to get zero? Yeah, that's an easy choice. Yeah, that's fairly easy math for me. I can do that one, okay? So that's why I roll it. Now, then I would either roll it, I typically say just roll it to mutual funds in a typical IRA, a traditional IRA. There's no taxes on it. It sits there and grows. It's going to do well.

You have an interest in real estate, and your CPA introduced you to a self-directed IRA for a piece of real estate. If you bought a $140,000 rental house inside of this IRA with a self-directed IRA. You can do that. The only problem is that it's a bit cumbersome because you now are operating a rental property inside an IRA. And so when you, like, need to fix it, when it makes a profit, the profit's trapped in there until you pull it out and pay taxes on it. Okay? And you've got to do all of your operational decisions. You want to buy a heat and air unit.

It has to be bought with money in the IRA. It can't be bought with your money outside the IRA. So you have to treat it like it's a standalone, separate business, and there's no embezzlement allowed. Do you follow me? Right. And so it's pretty stinking cumbersome i'm not a big fan of it unless you are just really awesome people with real estate you love real estate you're very good at it this is this will be your 10th property you've already got a bunch of other properties but if this is your very very first rental property i would never do that inside a

self-directed ira okay i think i think yeah we were i want you to learn real estate outside of that yes my dad was a real estate broker so i've been raised in the business my son-in-law is a very successful you know business or real estate property management owner but we have not been and we've kind of regretted not getting involved in it sooner you know where we're at the market housing market is really high so that's another thing against us it's a bad time to buy because it's so high but no what i would propose then let's roll it to an ira and some mutual funds and let it sit there. And he's only 62.

You guys are still young. You might look up, and that $150 turns into $300 by the time you're 70, and maybe that market cools off, and maybe then you want to buy some real estate. All right. So then if we did that, then can you take money out of that IRA then and roll that over to a real estate? Yeah, you can roll a traditional IRA of 0401K, anything, into a self-directed IRA. Oh, okay. At any time.

So my point is you don't have to make the decision today. Right, okay. But I would make the decision on the lump sum distribution and rolling it to your IRA because it's $147,000 more to your heirs. That simple. Hey, thanks for the call. Open phones at 888-825-5225. You jump in.

We'll talk about your life and your money. Pascal is with us in Florida. Hey, Pascal, how are you? Hi, Dave. Thanks for taking my call. Sure, what's up? Yeah, so basically, I just graduated college.

I've been going through the baby steps. I've paid off my car, my credit card, and I'll have my student loan, which is about $14,000. But while I was doing that, an opportunity came to invest in a franchise down here in Florida. And so basically, the guy's asking me $70,000.

You don't have $70,000. Right. I don't have it. Right. So I was thinking of getting a small business loan. No. No. You're a fresh college graduate. You don't get a small business loan. No. No.

You're a fresh college graduate. You don't get a small business loan and invest in a franchise. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. This is a good way to end up deeply in debt and broke quickly. Nope. Sorry. I'd pass on that opportunity. You don't have any money. That tells you God.

That's God saying not yet. Right. So what do you do for a living? I got a degree in computer science. Good. You making some money? Yeah. Yes, sir.

How much you make? Right now I'm making 62. Good. Okay. You working 40 hours? Yep. Cool. Kick your hours up.

Let's make 100 and let's bank 60 or 70 in the next couple years and if you want to open a business you could decide later if you want to do that as a franchise or just opening your own thing what kind of uh what kind of business is the franchise opportunity uh ice cream okay all right yeah it's like an ice cream shop and then the guy was saying since you know he's florida it's always hot so people would want the ice cream and you know so it would be pretty successful yeah ice cream is pretty popular everywhere most people like ice cream okay yeah that's you know it's hot so this is going to be successful not you can still go broke i mean you can still go broke by doing this stupid and ended up in debt and all kinds of i mean there's all kinds of ways for this to go sideways on you.

Just like it's hot. So people eat ice creams, our business plan. Nope. I think I'll pass. Matter of fact, I'm sure I'll pass. Please don't do this deal. Please just, and by the way, write, write all this down so you can look back five years later and remember that you did not do this deal. And you will feel smart.

The deals I have passed on are the ones I feel smarter about than the ones I did that worked. I look back at some of this stupid butt stuff I almost got in, and I feel like a genius for not getting in it. That's how you'll feel, dude. I promise. This is the Dave Ramsey show Talk about low interest rates, baby. I know right now that Churchill Mortgage can get qualified buyers into a 15-year conventional loan for well under 4% with no discount points or no hidden fees. Listen, if you're even thinking about buying a home or refinancing, do it right now. These rates are incredibly low.

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They know how to do this. So do not waste your time and energy screwing up your house deal with a beginner that sells three houses a year i'm sorry if you sell three houses a year but no one should list their largest asset with you how do you get to more well you'll find somebody but i don't think you ought to do it go to dav DaveRamsey.com slash agent, DaveRamsey.com, and look at the ELP program for real estate, and you will find the high-octane, high-protein real estate agents all over the place. Emily is with us. Emily is in Virginia.

Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show, Emily. Thanks for speaking with me, sir. Sure. What's up? So I have a question. My husband and I found you about a month ago and we're currently working on baby step two. Um, however, about six years ago, my dad passed away and I was blessed enough to inherit an IRA at the time that he passed away. Um, I still feel like I have a lot to learn and a long way to go with managing money.

But just given the fact that I've inherited, I've kind of been faced with the reality that I need to manage it a little bit and manage it well. After I got it, I had put it into a managed account thinking I could work on my debt and learn what I needed to about investing before I did anything with it. I really want to honor my father and be responsible with it. However, I looked at the balance and it just seems like it's not growing. I heard you recently say that you could expect to see an investment double every seven years or so. It's been about six and it's so over six years on, um, a balance that started at 101,000. It's currently at 108,000. Not good. Yes, sir.

So I, I just don't know since I'm on baby step two and have a long way to go. How much is in your baby step two debt? My debt is $49,000. How long have you been on a budget and not acquiring more debt? About two months. Okay. Have you cut up all your credit cards? Yes, sir.

Good. What's your husband's attitude about all this? Slow to come around. Still working on it. Still working on it. All right. To get into that gazelle mode, yes, sir. Yeah.

I would want both of you completely on board and both of you living on a budget and both of you with shared goals for the future and a little bit more track record under your belt a few more months of budgeting and handling it together and then i would pull enough out of that because it's not got any penalty on an inherited ira it's only tax i'd pull enough out of it to pay off your debt. Okay. But I want proof you're not going back into this, and with a half-butt husband, half-butt on board, that's not proof.

Yes, sir. He's got to get on board before you do that, and you want to prove it to yourself. You already told me that, which is very wise on your part. How old are you two? 30. Okay. You guys need to go through

financial peace university have you been through yet no i asked my library to um get a copy of your book but we have not been to the course no sir okay you need to go through it i'll pay for it i want you and your husband to go for go through the class if i pay for it can you get him to go that's very generous yes i think so yes sir okay because it's mandatory he goes okay because otherwise you're just going to be pissed at him because i'm going to teach you all the things he's doing wrong okay i don't want to cause i don't want to cause problems in your marriage i want you to win okay because you know financial university is not good for your marriage unless you do it together and then it's awesome for your marriage. It'll change everything.

So hold on. I'll have Kelly pick up, and we'll do that. We'll put you in the one-year membership of everything, too. That puts you in every dollar plus. It puts you in everything, the whole thing. And it's like $1,000 worth of stuff I just gave you. But you've got to go do this stuff now. And someday, I'm not going to charge you a thing for it, but someday when you're rich and famous and you're making a lot of money,

you find somebody that's right where you are now and you give it to them. You can pay it forward later, okay? Hey, thanks for the call. Ashley's with us in Indiana. Hey, Ashley, welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Oh, my goodness. Thank you so much, Dave, for taking our call. My honor.

How can I help? Well, I'm a longtime listener. My husband and I have been following your program for about five years. We've paid off about $170,000 worth of debt in that time. Look at you! And I've heard people call in, my husband also, to ask about the federal loan forgiveness program. And I'm pretty confident I know your feelings on that. But our situation is a little bit different than other callers I've heard. My husband has documented, he has documentation that he has only two and a half years left to qualify. We have everything paid off except his student loan, um, that we're trying to get forgiven.

It has about $135,000 left. He's an attorney. Um, our house has about $165,000 left. And we calculated we would be able to pay off our home in two and a half years. So the timeline is about the same. I'm wondering, his and I plan right now is to attack the mortgage on the house, pay it off in that time, and then hopefully his loan will be forgiven. The other option we've talked about is saving that huge chunk of money.

Okay. You understand that the Department of Education has denied the request for forgiveness 99% of the applications. I do, sir. 99%. Your husband really thinks he's in the 1%. He absolutely does. I know, and I think that's a dream. I'm confident as I listen to your show more and more.

I'm not getting confidence in it at all. Anytime the federal government screws something up as bad as they have this program, I don't have any confidence in it at all. If you want to do it this way, you're not going to go broke. You're not going to go bankrupt. It's not going to be the end of the world. You are going to face an amazing amount of disappointment, and you're going to have to continue to step up and knock the student loan out just like you were going to knock your mortgage out

because all you're doing is flipping these two amounts if you want to go this way you can go this way but i i really you know i really want to set you up so you're not so disappointed i want to lower your expectations right if you want to go do it go do it but don't go do it like i know i've got this it's. When 99% of the people get turned down, there is no such thing as a lock. Right. So would it be better in that case to save that huge chunk of money and re-evaluate in the two and a half years? Yeah, you could do that too and apply.

And then when you get turned down, you could just pay it off. Well, my husband will be listening to this, which is the reason I called. So I wanted him to hear it from you. Well, I mean, there's a 1% possibility that he's in that 1%, and he's an attorney. He knows how to fill out stuff, you know, and so he knows how the law works. But, I mean, that's the numbers. It's actually less than 1% of the applications for student loan forgiveness to the Department of Education have been accepted. It's a 99% turndown ratio. That's a pretty, that's not much of a plan, you know.

Right. If you've got a 1% chance for success, that's not really encouraging. So, yeah, if you want to just pile up the cash for two and a half years, that's fine. And then beyond that, go ahead and start paying on your mortgage. That's probably what I would do instead of paying off the mortgage. Yeah, let's just keep these baby steps in order. And you just pile them up. You've got two and a half years, you're still in debt, but the money's sitting there.

And then once you give up and say, gosh, I'm not really in the 1%, they're not going to forgive it, then there we go, right? Just write a check and pay it off. Thanks for the call. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. Business leaders, if you're not using LinkedIn jobs, you're missing out. Our Ramsey Solutions Company page on LinkedIn has over 100,000 followers. That's 100,000 potential like-minded people our team communicates our current openings to. We also post our jobs on LinkedIn because we know the best candidates already have jobs.

And LinkedIn makes it easy by doing the legwork for you. It's no wonder a hire is made every eight seconds on LinkedIn. And over 600 million members visit LinkedIn to make connections, learn, and grow as professionals, and discover new job opportunities. Get started today with LinkedIn Jobs and get $50 off your first job post. Visit LinkedIn.com slash Ramsey. Terms and conditions apply. Well, it's a big celebration around here at Ramsey today. We're doing our grand opening. The governor was here this morning for a ribbon cutting,

and Senator Marsha Blackburn will be here this afternoon. We're going to do another ribbon cutting. We just like a big party. We just keep partying all day. We're going to have food, and the families of our team are here. Our 800 team members have brought in their families so they can enjoy the show today, enjoy the second ribbon cutting, tour the place, do everything. And we thought it would be perfect in the midst of all of that to do a team member debt-free scream. So Sarah Webb is one of our

team members. She's a senior assistant or the personal assistant to one of our senior VPs, Jason Blake, over in real estate ELP section and has been with us for two years. She and her husband, Justin, are here to do the debt-free scream. Congratulations, guys. Thanks, Dave. Way to go. How much have you paid off?

$185,000. Good Lord. How long did this take? It took four years and 11 months. All right. Almost five years. Yes. Wow.

Yes. And your range of income during that time? Because part of the time you weren't here, so we can ask that. Right. So we started at around 50. Uh-huh. And then went up from there. Okay.

That's good. Perfect. Good for you guys. What in the world? What kind of debt was your $185,000? Well, we were normal. So it was student loans was the bulk of it. And we had cars, credit cards.

But, yeah, the majority of it was the student loans. Right. Cool. So, Justin, what do you do for a living? Hey, pull your mic up in front of your mouth. Just transitioned to a new position at Mars Pet Care. Oh, okay. Yes. Cool.

Very good. Good for you. Very good. And so, like, how much are the 185 student loans? Probably 70% of it. Yeah. Okay. All right.

Wow. And so some cars. So you guys were normal plus a bunch of student loans. Yes. You were deep in. Yeah. And how long have you been married? Five years. Five married five years okay so that's what got this started obviously yes and then in the middle of this trek you joined this place and so now it's game on i mean you

can't you can't work here and the peer pressure is just too great it's not like it's a policy like we're checking out up on you or something but everybody's doing it, you know? So very cool. So tell me your story. What happened? What made you decide after you got married to do this instead of just struggle along like most people? Sure. So it started before we even met.

Actually, my parents are FPU graduates. And so when I met Justin in college, we got engaged. They gave us FPU as a Christmas gift. And so we took that and I got to admit at first we weren't, you know, a hundred percent on board. We weren't, you know, just super proactive with it. But I did know that it was something that we needed to instill in our lives in order to start our marriage off right. Right. And so probably a couple years into it, you know, we came together, put all of our debt together, and that number scared the crap out of us. A six-digit number.

We thought, there's no way we're going to. It's overwhelming. Yeah. There's no way. And so we just, you we just talked to our parents. We listened to your show all the time. We went to some live events. And we just got really in the culture with Dave Ramsey.

And so a few years into it, our career started growing. And we made progress on some of our smallest debts. We were like, we can do this. This is awesome. Once we make those little progresses, eliminating our smallest debts, it just gave us the encouragement, the power to keep going. We moved here two years ago, and and of course that just ignited everything and it just gave us the fuel to keep going yeah where were you before you lived here uh indianapolis okay all right cool yeah so yeah you come into this culture as i said you don't

really you know everybody around you is doing it so you're like weird here if you're not getting out of debt. So very cool. Absolutely amazing. So the intensity just turned up and turned up and turned up. From the early days of the four years and 11 months all the way up to the end, you were like on fire. Yeah. We even took FPU again when we came down here together. And so that just fueled the fire again even more. How old are you two?

30. 30 and 31. Yeah. Okay, so millennials with $185,000 with overwhelming student loan debt. Yeah. And you're not a victim. You simply paid it off. Yeah.

I mean, you simply did it. But it took you five years. I mean, that's a long slog. It was. It was definitely a journey. When you push against it, you push against the rock that long, when it finally goes over the hill and disappears, there's a relief in there. Oh, yeah. I mean, y'all aren't just like happy.

You're like, I can freaking breathe. Yes, absolutely. It's been incredible. Yes. Yeah. What's been incredible. Yes. Yeah. What do you tell people the key to getting out of debt is? It'd be being committed. You have to communicate.

That's one thing we didn't do at first. We didn't communicate enough, and it took us a little bit longer to get to where we need to be. But once we started doing that, it was like nothing could stop us. Yeah. I would definitely say those two things. And then your why has to be greater than your wants. And, you know, we want to go on those trips. We want a new car.

We want to go shopping all the time and do all those things. But our why was so much greater. And to have that financial freedom to know and to have faith that we are going to be able to do those things. What was your why? What was the thing grabbing you? It was just the freedom overall. The idea of getting loose from the chains. Yeah.

We were slaves to the lender for sure. And we felt that every single month living paycheck to paycheck. And so the why for me was just having that financial freedom being able to provide for our future family and not have to worry about money there's enough to worry about in the world you know amen so it was just that and then i love to give so i'm really excited um about giving fun so what is the biggest thing you're going to do now that you're $185,000 lighter? What is the biggest thing you're going to do to celebrate? To celebrate.

To be honest, we're so in the zone. We're just like, yeah, knocked out baby step two, baby step three. Here we go. Game on. We're halfway there. We're going to celebrate by doing baby step three. baby step three. Here we go. Game on. We're halfway there. We're going to celebrate by doing baby step three. I like that. I like that.

From somebody that used to be ish to that, I like it. But ultimately, we would love to buy a home and start a family. Yeah. Great. Well, you guys are incredible. You're obviously a sharp young couple. Very, very proud of you. Proud to have you on our team.

Thank you. And this is an absolutely incredible milestone for you and to get to do this today with the grand opening yes what a perfect day for a debt-free scream very great very cool you got family we're here here today yes who's here my parents oh okay there they are great very cool good good good stuff well we're honored to have you here on the team honored to have you here on this stage today, and very, very proud of you. Of course, you probably already have one, but we have a copy of Chris Hogan's book for you. It's the next chapter in your story to be everyday millionaires, and you're on your way.

So very, very good stuff. All right, it's Justin and Sarah from right here inside the Ramsey organization. $185,000 paid off. took them four years and 11 months. That's sometimes known as five years. And, man, that's incredible. And they're 30 years old. And so next time you hear someone about it, hear somebody say something about millennials that aren't any good, I got a whole team full of them that look like this.

They're rock stars, and they're studs, and they get stuff done. And you guys are absolutely incredible. We're so proud of you. Sarah and Justin, count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Three, two, one. We're debt-free! We're dead free!

Yeah! I'm telling you, you walk that road out, you feel it. Now that isn't I paid off $10,000 in two months. I mean, that's five years, almost $200,000. You know you were a slave, and you know you're free when you do that. Wow. Absolutely impressive. Hey, you know what that means to you if you're listening today?

It's your turn. It's your turn. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. our scripture of the day john 16 33 i've told you these things so that in me you may have peace in this world you will have trouble, but take heart. I have overcome the world. Winston Churchill said, Success is not final. Failure is not fatal. It is the courage to continue that counts. That's actually printed on the walls around here at Ramsey. Success is not final.

Failure is not fatal. It is the courage to continue that counts lynn is with us in texas hi lynn welcome to the dave ramsey show hi how are you better than i deserve what's up in your world oh nothing like i have a general question maybe a couple um i'm actually starting the program. Okay. So I know that I guess the first step is to save the $1,000 for an emergency fund, correct? Yes, ma'am. What would be the best way to do that? I was thinking about high-interest savings accounts.

What can you tell me? Well, interest rate doesn't matter on $1,000. All that matters is you've got a little buffer between you and life, so when crap happens, you've got some money, right? Okay. That's all that matters. And so you can keep it in an envelope in your underwear drawer for all I care. I was thinking about something a little different.

Okay, that's fine. you can put it in a savings account i wouldn't fool with high interest on a thousand dollars that's a lot of effort for a thousand bucks it doesn't matter i mean add up how much the difference in what you make is but just you know keep it fairly simple fairly clean and the main thing is it needs to be accessible and a lot of the high interest rate things have a penalty if you pull it out early which then causes you to have this tendency to not want to pull it out when there's an emergency oh i'll just use my credit card and then you wander your butt back into debt and you don't want to do that nikki is with us nikki's in florida hi nikki how are you hi dave how are you better than i deserve what's up well we have kind of a unique situation.

We have a nine-year-old who is professionally employed and is bringing in a pretty good chunk of money every two weeks. Help me with this. Doing what and how much money? He is a paid professional actor at a theme park here locally, and he brings home about $ every two weeks wow look at him congratulations that's fun yes he loves it uh it's been a great blessing to him so um so we were looking into custodial Roth IRAs we were you know just we don't want this money to get furthered away he's allowed to have a little bit each month to play with, but he's nine.

He doesn't really need it right now, and we want it to be there when he does. Okay. All right. Well, I would do a couple of things. The main thing here that I get concerned about is not the money. It's that he learns the lessons around the money. Okay? When people have kids that start making money, serious money of some kind,

sometimes they get all caught up about the money, right? And this isn't enough money to get all caught up about, but it is a substantial amount more than a 9-year-old normally has. So there's three things everyone must learn with money, and he must learn that with this money. Actually, there's four things. Number one, work. He already knows I do that.

He's working. That's where this money's coming from. The second thing, once he's working, then he gets money. There's three things, and I want him to feel the weight of making some of these decisions with your oversight okay and the decision is i want him to build his saving muscle which you're talking about you know a custodial roth ira for part of it that's fine uh or putting it into a 529 for his future college that's fine i want him saving some i want him to learn and i want him to save up to buy some things you know like his first car or something, too. Okay? So his savings muscle needs to be built. The second thing is his spending muscle.

I want him to learn to spend and do it wisely and with maturity beyond his years. Mm-hmm. Okay? So he gets to spend some, and it's not just crazy, crazy stuff, but some of it can be crazy. He's nine. Of course. Okay?

So let him have a little bit of leeway to blow some money and uh then the third thing is he needs to be giving some money yeah well we we are evangelical christians as you are so we've told him anything he takes out of the bank has to be tithed on okay so you know that that is definitely a priority for us um you know we he does have a set budget amount that he is allowed to take out every month. He really hasn't done much because he is saving up to buy himself a video game system. That's perfect. That is perfect.

But, you know, we kind of limit his monthly spending to about $50. Okay. That's not bad for a nine-year-old. He's got to save it up over multiple months to buy himself this video game. Perfect. That's a good thing. He can save up. So he's building the savings.

He's building the giving. He's working. And he's saving. Work, give, save, spend. Work, give, save, spend. Work, give, save, spend. And if I can get anybody doing that at any age, they'll be able to prosper with money. Work, give, save, spend.

And so let's do that. Now, as far as getting a little bit more sophisticated, I wouldn't go too heavy into that Roth. I'm more concerned that he goes to college debt-free. Right, of course. He'll have plenty of time to do Roth later. And so you can put some in there, and certainly you're filing a tax return on him, and so he's got an earned income, can you can put some in there and you certainly you're filing a tax return on him and so he's got an earned income and he can put some in there i did roths for my kids uh but i didn't take it out of their college and i didn't take it out of their money i took it

out of my money uh i would file a tax return on the work that they did the money that they earned and then put money however much you can that they have earned income you can put that in there this guy could do a fully funded roth if he wanted to right yeah now my understanding on the custodial roth is once the principal had been in there for five years that it could come out without penalty um so he could use it for college i wouldn't use it for that though true that is true but i would not do that okay i would use five i'd use a 529 for college it's um it's you know get get with your smart investor pro and sit down with them and they can work you through that because the 529 is going to be just pure you don't have to worry about it and whatever you put in the roth is

that's like dream money that you know he started when's nine and when he's 69 he pulls it out and it's worth a bazillion dollars. You know, that's what you're looking for there, and that's very, very cool. So, yeah, I mean, the good news is you're thinking about this, you're being very intentional with him, and I want him to learn the character-based lessons more than I want him to learn the math-based lessons. And that's what I'm after here. So good question, Nikki.

Hold on. I'm going to give you a copy of the book that Rachel and I did together that's a number one bestseller called Smart Money, Smart Kids. It's about teaching your kids how to handle money. You're doing most of it, but there'll probably be some things in there you can think about. Very good stuff. Scott is with us. Scott's in Nevada.

Hey, Scott. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hey, Dave. Thanks for taking my call. I really appreciate it. How are in Nevada. Hey, Scott. Welcome to the Dave Ramsey Show. Hey, Dave. Thanks for taking my call. I really appreciate it. How are you today? Sure, man. What's up?

I'm short on time. How can I help? Oh, sorry about that. We have a mortgage question. My wife and I are currently in a 30-year, and we are big advocates of the Dave Ramsey program and the financial piece. We're in the process of signing a refinance for a 20-year, where we got the rate drops from four and a quarter down to three and a half. So just the rate savings at a 20-year, we're looking at saving, you know, thousands and thousands of dollars on the interest.

Yeah. We want to make sure this is the right process. The 15-year, we looked into the 15-year. It was a little bit more than what we wanted to handle on a monthly basis. Go ahead and do it anyway. Do it anyway. Do it anyway. Get it to a 20 and pay like a 15 no take a 15 but we uh you can do it with the 15 you can do it go ahead you can do it my wife is concerned if anything happens to me and my

income she didn't want to have that larger not to crack on a month sell the house let's do it you plan on dying? Eventually. Yeah, I know, but, I mean, you're not that old. No, no, no. That's just whining because she doesn't want to tighten the budget up. Do the 15. Do the 15.

Do the 15 and do the deal. If you're going to stay in the house, the bottom line is you do need to refinance because the interest rate savings is going to recoup your closing costs. You're going to hit the break-even, and you're going to be in a closing costs. You're going to hit the break even. And you're going to be in a good position. But go ahead and do the 15. Stretch and do it. Because here's the thing. The tightness that you're feeling is not going to be there that long.

Because you all are young enough that your incomes are on the incline. Your careers are blossoming. And two years from now, you're going to be making a lot more than you make now. And you won't even notice the difference. And you will have made the mistake of being in a 20 because you were whining now do a 15 it's the only way i would do it man hey thank you for the call that puts us out of the dave ramsey show in the books we'll be back with you before you know it in the meantime remember there's ultimately only one way to and that's to walk daily with the prince of Peace, Christ Jesus.

Hey guys, it's Blake Thompson, Senior Executive Producer for The Dave Ramsey Show. This hour's over, but you can find more great content on our YouTube channel. Catch the most watched Dave Rants, death-frees, and the very popular Everyday Millionaire segment. Go to the Dave Rants Show YouTube channel and click subscribe.