The Ramsey Show - Big Debt Requires Bigger Discipline

Episode Date: July 9, 2025

🔗⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠Share the Ramsey 101 Playlist!⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Dave Ramsey and George Kamel answer your questions and discuss: "How do I navigate refusing a large monetary gift from family due to cultural expectations?" "I'm about to take on $200,000 of student loans, how do I begin to pay this off?" "Dave, have you gone soft on Crypto?" "I'm worried that if I buy a car right now, it will jeopardize my ability to get a home loan" "How do I support my household on my own when my husband doesn't work?" "Should I take the buyout or the monthly payments for my pension?" "How do I ask my boss for a raise?" "Should I take out a HELOC for home repairs?" "Should I re-enter the workforce if it means that I will be away from my friends and family more?" "Is it okay to not buy a home for a couple of years while living in a foreign country?" "My husband says I'm financially abusive, is he right?" "Can I go on vacation while I am saving for a house?" "How do I improve my credit score so I can get balance transfer credit cards?" Next Steps: ✔️⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠Help us make the show better. Please take 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.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠  📱 Get episodes early in the free Ramsey Network app!  📈⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠Are you on track with the Baby Steps? Get a Free Personalized Plan⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ❤️‍🩹 Get trusted insurance coverage that fits your budget. ⁠⁠⁠⁠📖 Your Total Money Makeover starts here. 💵⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠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! Find top Health Insurance Plans at Health Trust Financial Use code RAMSEY to save 20% at Mama Bear Legal Forms Visit NetSuite today to learn more For more information, go to SimpliSafe Use promo code RAMSEY for 18% off at The Nokbox 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 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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 actual amazing relationships. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host, George Campbell. Ramsey personality, number one bestselling author, host of the George Campbell Show and co-host of Smart Money, Happy Hour. He does a lot. He's also co-hosting for me today.

Open phones here at 888-825-5225. Amy is in San Francisco. Hi Amy, how are you? Hi, I'm Danga. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? Okay, so my husband and I recently just got married and my grandma and aunt couldn't be at the wedding but they want to send us a large monetary gift. But my husband and I, we both agree that we don't want to receive that gift. However, my mom says it's disrespectful to not take it

because it's like a cultural tradition. And so she went ahead and talked to my grandma. And basically she told my grandma that she'll take the money like my grandma can just transfer it to her and then she'll transfer it to me. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. We don't have any cultural traditions at our house that we get money from a wrench ant. So this is a new one on me. Explain to me what the cultural tradition is. I'm confused. It's like a pretty popular thing in Asian culture when like your

relatives get married instead of giving them like an actual like gift, you give them money instead. Okay, so she's getting ready to give you a bunch of money. Are there strings attached to it? That's why we're afraid to like receive the gift because when it comes to like money with my extended family, it feels like there's always some strings attached. Has this happened before? No, it's brand new. They just got married. But I mean, the context of, I get money and there are strings attached, sounds like you

have some serious hesitations. Because generally, if somebody wants to me to send money, I'll take it. I'm still a little confused here. Yeah, it just feels like in the past when my grandma has sent money to my parents, it felt like there were strings attached because she's – my grandma's always been very opinionated and involved in our family decisions, and I just don't want that for my new marriage. So let me ask you this. If you accepted the gift, the gift didn't come with any stated strings. They're just implied by part of the tradition as an interfering mother-in-law,

right? And so, including yours, by the way, oh my God, I'll take the money and hold it for her. Yeah, right. Yeah, I was very big of you. So, I mean, there's no stated thing. Yeah, I was very big of you. So, I mean, there's no stated thing. Like, if you take this money, we expect you to do X. It's just you're afraid they're going to think they have the right to walk into your house any time they want to wag their finger at you. Yeah. Okay. So what if you took the money and then when they tried that you just said you can't do that? Then they would be mad. Yeah. But they're going to be mad anyway.

And they're probably going to interfere anyway, whether there's money involved or not. They probably still think they have an opinion. Yeah, that's true. But I feel like it's easier to say no to them when there's no money involved. You just won't feel guilty. Yeah. You're going to feel guilty anyway. Guilt trips are part of your family. They're a travel agent for them.

How much money are we talking, by the way? It's supposed to be around $100,000 to $150,000. What's your husband say? He doesn't think we should take it. Okay, then just don't take it. That's fine. Okay. Okay, so we're not going to take it.

And then you understand though that when you say, no thank you, that there is no pleasant enough way to say that to tell people who think they have the right to walk into your life and tell you what to do, that they're still not going to accept that. You know that, right that right yeah yeah because I did tell my grandma no and she went around she's like oh I already have an agreement with your mom and we'll just talk about it when she comes to visit me in person well that's fine that's fine you can talk to mom if you want and but mom doesn't make my decisions I'm married me and my husband make my decisions and we're not gonna

take it and we love you anyway and anyway none of you are going to come over here inside this house and tell us what to do at the time we took that vow of uh... for richer for poorer in sickness and health uh... that means the rest of you don't get a vote anymore we love you and we respect you but we don't have to take you don't get a vote anymore so your votes are done. Ballot box is closed. And you can be nicer than that, but you've got...you're going to have to deliver that message like 46 times because your family is screwed up on this

subject regardless of taking the gift or not. You got that, right? Yeah, yeah, that's right. Like I've done this before, okay? So it's okay. Get Dr. Henry Cloud's book, Boundaries, because when you read it, one of the first chapters is going to tell you you're not crazy. You're not. And that's good. And that this is wrong, and it's not a cultural thing, it's an interference thing.

Okay? You live in San Francisco, the guy you married doesn't come from the culture that you're discussing, so the two of you get to establish a new culture, a new household, and say we're going to respect and love our elders and be kind to them, but they don't get a vote anymore, regardless of taking the gift or not. There's no work around for them. Once they realize that, you have to know they're going to be pissed. Yeah, that's true. Because people that don't respect boundaries, as soon as they realize

there is actually a boundary, it pisses them off. There will be a tantrum. 100% of the time. Also, another problem is that I think my grandma still thinks that I will get the money whereas my mom, she's happy to take the money. I don't care who gets the money. You don't want it. Give it to whoever. Tell them to give it to your brother. Give it to your sister.

I don't care. You don't want it. Why do you care who it goes to? Well, I mean, because I don't... It's not your job anymore. You denied the gift. If she gives it to your mom, that's between her and your mom. Yeah, but she...

But my grandma thinks she's giving it to me. I know. I know. But that's your grandma's problem, not yours. And between your mom and your grandma. Because your mom now lied to grandma if the money never ended up in your hands for whatever reason. It's not going to end up in your hands because you're not going to take it.

I hope. So, if mom is saying, oh, I'll get it to her, well, now your mom's lying to grandma. You can't run around over there and make these people behave. All you can do is keep them out of your living room. Yeah. That's it. Thanks. And then they're going to be pissed.

So just be ready, kiddo. That's how it works. Dr. Henry Cloud, the book is Boundaries. You can be kind, you can be gentle, you can be firm, you can be courageous in the language you use, folks. But when you set a boundary with people that don't respect boundaries, whether it's a toxic boss, a crazy boyfriend, a mother-in-law that won't quit giving you recipes that her little boy loves, and you've

been married 32 freaking years, and he's, yeah, you know, so. That one sounds personal. No, no, no, that didn't happen. No, that didn't happen. I might have given my wife my mother's recipe, but my mother didn't do it. So no, I'm kidding. Sharon's a great cook. She's got no problem in that arena. I told her yesterday, you know, you have the Michelin stars for reference. So we had a good country meal last night. I told her it's two-star Cracker Barrel.

It's a two-star Cracker Barrel. I didn't know Dave could bestow a Michelin star upon you. I can't. But I can give you a Cracker Barrel. It's a two-star Cracker Barrel record. I didn't know Dave could bestow a Michelin star upon you. No, I can't. But he's got that kind of power. But I can give you a Cracker Barrel star. That counts. Because I just made it up because it doesn't exist. It might now. Yeah.

Cracker Barrel is going to be reaching out. It was not a chef's tasting menu. It was a lot of grub on the plate. It's only just one good course. It's telling you how it works. The remedy is, okay. Well, lesson learned here is if it steals your piece it's too expensive. That's it. There's the one liner. 150 grand. Just drop the old Instagram quote right there. Boom. I'd tweet it but I don't think those exist anymore. Nobody, nobody read it.

There's only one person tweeting and oh well. He owns it. Yeah, that's true, that's true. Can't remember who owns it now, right? Doesn't matter anymore. This is the Ramsay Show. ["Ramsey Show Theme"] Let's be honest, shopping for health insurance can be confusing with high costs, complicated terms and customer service that doesn't really serve you. Most folks just pick a plan and hope for the best.

See, insurance companies don't work for you. They work for themselves, meaning they love it when you overpay. So you need a guide on your team to help you make the best choices. Health Trust Financial Works for you. They're not salespeople. They help you find the health insurance option that makes sense and saves you money. The fact is health insurance is one of the biggest expenses

in your budget, but most people who work with Health Trust Financial end up saving $500 a month. Imagine putting that kind of money toward the baby steps. My team has worked with them for over 20 years and they've served thousands of people just like you. They're the only health insurance broker that's Ramsey Trusted to help you. So stop throwing money away and get the health insurance

that's right for you at healthtrustfinancial.com. That's healthtrustfinancial.com. Denise is with us in New York City. Hi Denise, how are you? I'm doing good, how are you? Better than I deserve, how can we help? help. So I'm entering grad school and I'm looking at $200,000 worth of student debt. I haven't started yet. I just wanted to maybe pick your brain on like a plan on how to tackle it. Make some guidance that you can give me. Wow. So you're fairly new to this program, aren't you? I think, yeah, sort of.

Yeah, okay. Because if you weren't, you would know that I'm going to break your heart and tell you not to do this. That's the way you get out of the $200,000 worth of debt is don't get in it. But let's talk about it. Let's talk about it. I don't want to just be a dream killer. I'd rather kill only nightmares, which is what you're signing up for. What are you studying, pray tell? So I am entering into interior design. It's the top program in New York City at Pratt Institute. And a year it's about $60,000. It's $57,000 to $60,000. And it's roughly about a three-year program. And you'll have a, I'm not familiar with Pratt, I'm sorry, I'm ignorant, but you're telling me that's a university and you will have a master's degree in interior design from that

university? Yes. This is not an industry certification of some kind, it's a true master's degree in academic sense? Yes. Okay. All right. And you have your undergraduate in what? I have it in English. Okay, all right. And you're

planning on becoming a world-class interior designer that makes more money than doctors and lawyers in order to pay this kind of money back, right? I'm sorry? Yes, I would hope, yeah. Yeah, that would be the only reason that you would spend $200,000 unless you're an idiot, right? You'd have to have some thought that you were going to make a lot of money, right? Yes. I assume you think you're going to make a lot of money. Maybe I'm making an assumption. Is that wrong? Do you think you're gonna make a lot of money. Maybe I'm making an assumption. Is that wrong? Do you think you're gonna make a lot of money or you just think this is worth it for the art? I know that I will. I don't, but because I

know a lot of people that graduated from there that didn't. I know a lot of people that have master, have MDs that don't make a lot of money. I know a lot of people that are lawyers that are broke and they went $200,000 in debt knowing they were going to make a lot of money. So your best laid plans of mice and men are a problem for you English majors. Have you looked into all of the options for a grad program for interior design? I did. This is the only one that I actually have a job at the same time and pay it off while

I'm going. So what are you getting paid at the job at the same time? I'm getting paid roughly $69 to $72 a year. Okay. All right. Since I'm ignorant of the space, and I admittedly am, okay, I'm assuming that this must be an exclusive school that is very highly regarded. A, it's in New York City.

B, it's ridiculously freaking expensive. Yes. Okay. So I'm assuming this thing is like, you know, you're getting a degree in the Harvard of interior design. Is that what you're telling me? Yeah. Yeah, okay, because I would hope you wouldn't spend that otherwise for this. Because a normal interior designer working anywhere else in the United States other than maybe London, Paris, Tokyo, or New York City are not going to make wages enough to recoup

on this kind of an expenditure. Do you understand? Yeah, because I mean like we had professional interior designers that we paid a lot of money when we built this, you know, 600,000 square feet of commercial space we have under here and they did not make enough to justify that kind of expense to pick the furniture that these kind people are sitting in out here. So that's not how it works out here. You know, we're working for an architectural firm in Dallas, Texas or Nashville or Chicago. You're gonna be in New York working for extremely high clients and so you're

asking to join the NFL. You're asking to join the NBA. You're gonna have to be the best of the best to justify this and I if you were my daughter I would tell you not to do this Right, I'm not sure I would do it if you had the 200,000 in your pocket, but I'm positive I'm not gonna talk you out of it But what I do want to do is I want to leave you with some doubts and I want you to rethink this and be sure because 100% of the time our plans don't work out exactly the way we thought they would. Sometimes they work out better.

Sometimes they work out worse. But when you take on a $200,000 loan from an exclusive anything that you expect to be in the top one or two percent in the world of income earners as a result to justify the expense that is a low probability play it's like saying I'm going to move to Los Angeles and wait tables until I become Tom Cruise it does happen but it's a low probability play. And so I would tell you don't spend $200,000 to become an actor and go wait tables in LA until you get your star found. And so this is a hard, this is a, you know, there's not a whole bunch of people coming out of that school that are making a half million dollars a year, kiddo, and you're

going to have to make that to justify this expenditure and to pay it back. And I wish you would rethink what it is inside of you that you're trying to scratch, what it is you're trying to scratch, what it is you're wanting to be when you grow up, so to speak, and is there another way to go do this? I'm looking at just some research online and there's tons of options out there and there's a lot of people even saying, hey, this is the most expensive school possible for this field. It may be the best though.

It may be the Harvard of the world. And there might be some networking there that gets you in the door and there's some pieces of that, but I still don't think it's worth four times the cost when you can do that on your own and get the degree cheaper elsewhere. Yeah I mean I know interior designers around the nation that that make you know three four and only interior design companies that make half million dollars a year some of them make more if they've got a company running you know that kind of a thing but they also learn business skills in the process and they're not doing that

based on where they went to school. They're obviously very good at their craft, but they've also learned to apply it in a way. So it's just, it's very, very scary when you think you've got it guaranteed. Anytime someone says, if I go get this degree at this place, I've got a guarantee, I'm a hundred percent sure they're wrong because it doesn't. Doesn't work out that way. I'll give you an example. We know after doing all the student loan research, this aside from Denise's situation, but that people that say where I go to school matters. If I go to such-and-such a school it has a name, that's going to get me a job. And we know from the researches that that's completely false.

When you go to the oncologist and they say you have cancer, you don't really ask where they went to school. You want to know, do you know how to fix cancer? That's all you want to know. And literally where you went to school may or may not tell you that. Are you a good doctor? I don't know where my dentist went to school. And he paid a lot of money to become a dentist.

But where he went to school did not achieve me as a client. Where you go to school matters as little as anything on the planet 99.99% of the time. Here's another thing, okay, if you go to a good school you get the big jobs. Bullcrap! 78% of the Fortune 500, of the top S&P 500, 78%, 8 out of 10 of the CEOs operating the largest companies in America went to state schools. They did not go to MIT. They did not go to Princeton. They did not go to Harvard. 78% operating Home Depot,

operating name brands that you hear that are on the stock market, the biggest companies in America did not go to prestigious schools. They went to state schools. So I call BS every time somebody starts this crap with me. And I don't know enough about her space to be mean about it, but I do want her to rethink it. There's definitely other options out there. She's got to do some homework, do some research and slow down. We all know the importance of eating fruits and vegetables, but let's face it, life gets busy and sometimes we eat stuff we shouldn't.

That's where Field of Greens comes in. It's a superfood powder made from real organic fruits and vegetables. Mix one scoop with water and you're good to go. Field of Greens is packed with nutrients designed to support your overall health, boost your immune system and increase your energy levels. And your doctor will notice your improved health or Field of Greens will give you your money back. Visit www.fieldofgreens.com slash Ramsey to save 20% and get free shipping. That's www.fieldofgreens.com slash Ramsey Show Question of the Day is brought to you by Y-Refi. If you're ready to stop drowning in private student loan debt, Y-Refi throws your rope.

Talk to Y-Refi to see if refinancing your defaulted private student loan with a low fixed rate is an option for you. If it is, it's going to help you get out of debt a lot faster. Visit yrefi.com slash Ramsey. That's the letter Y, R-E-F-Y dot com slash Ramsey might not be in all states. Today's question comes from Chris in Florida. He says, you used to be hard-line against crypto, but in the last couple of months you've said that if you want to spend your fun money

on crypto, go ahead, but it's speculation. Have you softened your stance on crypto? What would it take for you to see crypto as legitimate as any other currency, as as legitimate? Dave, have you gone soft on us? Well, let's start with the basics, okay? There is no currency, regardless of how legitimate, that is a valid investment. You should not buy the Chinese yen as an investment because your golfing buddy said it was a good idea or some idiot on TikTok. You should not buy the US dollar or the euro and speculate on currency values. That's what Bitcoin is. If it's having a good day, that's what Bitcoin is. It is not a place to invest. If you want to speculate in commodities like gold or silver or wheat futures or whatever future, that's what currency

is. You're speculating. You're gambling. Then that's up to you. But don't call it an investment and know I haven't gone soft. Anyone who does that, I think, is wasting money. Speculating in commodities, I do zero of. Gambling in Las Vegas, I do zero of. My daughter Rachel, on the other hand, has been known to be at the craps table in Vegas, but she thinks that's fun. I don't think this is fun. I don't understand it. I don't think it's fun. I've got a buddy of mine put, you know, he put $10,000 and he's worth about 40 billion or something. I don't know what he's worth a bazillion dollars.

He put like $10,000 into crypto just so he could make fun of me because he knew he'd get a rise out of me. And I'm like, you're an idiot. You just put $10,000 on the red and spun the wheel. But he got the joy of getting a rise out of you. So it's worth 10 grand to him apparently. Yeah. I just, he wanted me to call him an idiot and I did.

So he goes, I got more money than you. I know you do, but you're still an idiot. You just wasted 10,000 dollars. Yeah, Dave would call you an idiot for free. You don't need to drop 10 grand. I would have done it for talking about it, but you don't even have to really lose the money to do it. If that brings you joy and you want to speculate, you want to gamble with some of your money,

a small portion of it, then do it. But that doesn't change the fact that I don't think it's smart, so I don't know. That's always been your stance. I think we just, as it comes up more, we always go, hey, we're not mad at it, we're not gonna yell at you for doing it, but realize what you're doing is speculating and don't make it a big portion of your world

or your net worth or your investment strategy. Now the problem comes in when you substitute the word invest, that tells me you put a large portion of your life into this and worth or investment strategy? The problem comes in when you substitute the word invest that tells me you put a large portion of your life into this and you're getting ready to screw up your whole freaking life because you're an idiot. That's where your problem comes in. Okay so no I haven't solved on that at all. Now what was it take for me to call Bitcoin a legitimate currency? It needs a longer track record that is stable. Okay, let's go to an

example. Okay, I have some money on my shelf that a friend of mine, the Special Forces brought back to me that has the picture of Saddam Hussein on it. It was Iraqi money in the former regime that we went in and took out. Special Forces guy cleans out a room, there's a bunch of stacks of money that's basically worthless colored paper now, right? Because that regime is gone. Now there's a whole new government in Iraq, right? There is a currency in Iraq today.

I don't even know what it's called. The chances of me telling you to put money in an unstable, new, unproven currency in Iraq is zero because you're putting money in an unpredictable environment that has no track record. That's dumb. That's Bitcoin. Okay? It's only Bitcoin is cool. Well, it just has better marketing. The hype has really worked. Well, it's only Bitcoin is cool. Well, it just has better marketing.

It's a hype has really worked. Well, it's cool. And it's what we talk about on TikTok. I don't talk about Iraqi dinar on TikTok, right? Or whatever it's called. That's what the old one was called. They probably call it the new one. No, you're right.

It's still that. Okay. So anyway, yeah, it's the non-Saddam Hussein, Iraqi dinar, right? And so I've got some Confederate money that from the states of the south during the Civil War. Worthless. Okay? So if a new country pops up somewhere and they have a new currency, it's the same thing as Bitcoin. It doesn't make it cool because it doesn't make it more stable or more palatable or a better investment because it's technology based and because you

think people can spell blockchain and actually describe what a blockchain is, which is an interesting concept. But until it stabilizes, and it ain't stable, boys and girls, it's like riding the worst roller coaster that went off the rails at Six Flags, the one that's on the news where you were left hanging upside down at six flags. That one, right? And your mother's throwing up and all that, right? That's the one we're talking about here. This is not good.

For some people, that's fun apparently though. I know. Use a little fun money on that. That's right. So I'm going to put a little of my money on this. Chart the volatility of Bitcoin and then smile at me with a serious face and tell me this is a solid investment and I'll take your smoking crack. Okay, because it's not it's all over the freaking So when it stabilizes, I think it will I think it's here to stay and I think it'll be a legitimate form of

transferring goods and services Okay at some point. I think you know. I think it's here to stay. I think it's not a bad concept. It's not an investment for sure, and it's not a stable currency for sure. So, you know, no, I haven't got a soft on it at all. I've actually gotten better at trashing it. I mean, the longer it's been around, and I feel like your stance since the beginning has been this way, so I don't think you've changed your stance. Yeah.

When, I had the same stance when people were putting their money in Beanie Babies, too. Actually had people call the show back in the day that had put their kids' college money in Beanie Babies. How do you, like they just took the money, bought Beanie Babies. Well, Beanie Babies were quite the rage. And thinking, well, it'll go up in value and I'll sell. You couldn't get the Princess Di Beanie Baby. Oh, that's right.

And it's on eBay right now for $10,000. But it's never sold for $10,000. But it's listed for $10,000. My dog came through the house the other day with one of them in its mouth, but none of them have ever produced any value. So it was a fad, it was a thing, everybody got wild about it, Cabbage Patch Kids, whatever you wanna go to next,

Xboxes, whatever you're gonna line up. What are you people gonna line up at Walmart for next year at Christmas, right? And so that's what we're dealing with. It's a, that's the thing. So. You're hoping the next person is willing to pay more than I paid.

That's not an investment. That's a commodity. That's a commodity That's a commodity and it's the the commodities go up or down based on shortage or over supply and Shortage or oversupply is caused by greed or fear So what you're doing is you're you have too many people chasing too few goods drives the price up basic supply-demand curve from seventh-grade econ and so the price up. Basic supply-demand curve from seventh grade econ. And so, you know, if you have a lot of supply and not enough people chasing it, price goes down. It's called a glut in the market, right? It's too available. Nobody cares anymore. There's no scarcity. When the Beanie Babies were going through the roof and people were paying $1,000 for a Princess Di, buying it off each other,

on the bet that it was going to go on up is because they actually thought it was going to go on up. It was shortage of shortage and scarcity. Toilet paper during COVID. Remember that? Yeah. People were selling that stuff on eBay. Plexiglass. Don't you remember the time you were in the Plexiglass business?

Man. I wish I was in the mask business and the Plexiglass business at one point. Yeah. Oh, and hand sanitizer. Oh, yeah. That was the other one. They were making it out of like vodka. They were just anything you could make hand sanitizer out of. You could sell a jug of

that thing. Yeah, that's, hillbillies are drinking it. I'm just saying. The hillbillies made out good selling their bath tubed hand sanitizer. No, we have not gone soft on it. We've, you know, what we're trying to do honestly is we're trying to teach you to talk about it differently so you realize what it is. To quit saying it's an investment and start calling it speculation. And if you're going to speculate on anything, it needs to be with fun money because that means you're gambling. If you're day trading in stocks, what's the percentage of people make money in day trading in stocks?

Very few. A few percentage points. Like two? Yeah. I think over 100 days, only 3% actually come out. Profitable. Yeah, profitable. 97% lose money if they keep up for 100 days or more. That's actual research, not TikTok. Okay, so I mean if you're getting your own financial advice from TikTok, you got a problem. This is the by BetterHelp.

Life can be chaotic, work can be stressful. And when your life outside of work and your work life collides, your mind and your body feels it. Listen, there's a ton of research about workplace stress impacting your mental and emotional health, your boss impacting your mental and emotional health. And most of us can't just say peace out and leave work anytime we want for a vacation, but we can start with small steps to help manage our work stress and our personal lives every day. This includes getting great sleep, taking care of your relationships, exercise, and for many of

us it's seeing a therapist. Therapy can help you navigate whatever challenges the workday or your personal life brings. And if you're thinking about starting therapy, contact my friends at BetterHelp. BetterHelp is a hundred percent online. And that means it's affordable and convenient. You just fill out a short online survey to get started and you get matched with the licensed therapist as the largest online therapy provider in the world. BetterHelp offers access to mental health professionals with a diverse variety of expertise.

And BetterHelp has an app store rating of 4.9 out of five stars based on over 1.7 million client reviews. It's incredible. So manage your work day or everyday challenges with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash Ramsey to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp, H E l p dot com slash Ramsey Lilayna is with us in Denver. Hi, Lilayna. How are you? Well, I have to push the button I'm a little. I'm a little off. What's up, Lelaina? How can we help? First off, I want to thank you. I started FPU back in 2011 and it's been a game changer.

With that I've had some fluctuations. Right now I'm looking to relocate to Denver. I'm in California right now and it's coming down to the wire and I feel like everything is not necessarily falling apart, but it's definitely a storm coming in. I, um, looking to buy a house, but now I'm teetering on whether I should just rent in this new state for a while. Um, I got my pre-approval. Um, I do have some debt that I've incurred over the past

couple years from divorce. And now the transmission is going on my car and it's 10 grand and I need to get another car. And that will affect, oh, I'm guessing it will affect my pre-approval of my loan since I'm kind of running on a tight budget as it is. You're talking about you're going into debt to get another car. What's that? You mean you're going into debt to get another car. Well I have some debt from my divorce. No I said it won't affect your it won't affect your pre-approval unless you go into debt to get a car. Right so how I it, if I traded my car now, blah, blah, blah, I would end up with like around a 5 to 7K personal loan or an auto loan of some sort.

Yes, that will affect your pre-approval. In order to cover... Yeah, your pre-approval was based on your current debt level and now your pre-approval is no longer pre-approved. So you are screwing that up. How much money do you have right now? But if you don't need to be buying a house anyway because you're in debt. Well, okay, so here's the thing. I'm selling my current house so that will give me the You are screwing that up. How much money do you have if you don't need to be buying a house anyway cuz you're in debt Well, okay. So here's the thing. I'm selling my current house So that will give me the cash that I need to move forward. What does move forward mean?

Well, I will have the money to pay off my debt and then also put down on the house Okay, and pay for the moving expenses and all that kind of stuff. So I've had the cash. When is the house sold? No, it's gonna be listed here in a couple days. So I feel like my little whirlwind is whirlwinding. And then... Okay, let me stop. I want to make sure I've got the logistics of what you're doing. You're moving from where to where? Moving from California to Colorado. To Denver, okay. And the house in California is getting ready to be listed.

Right, everything's ready. And you're pre-approved, not counting your new car loan, to move to Denver. But you're not going to need a new car loan because your house is going to be sold. Right. Okay. but you're not going to need a new car long because your house is going to be sold. Right, but I do need a new car like in the next couple weeks. Not a new new car, but a different car. And you have no money? Well the only money that I have is the money that I was going to move with. Okay, you're going to move and buy a second house before your house in California is sold? Well, it's kind of like that, you know, you sell your house and then you put the down and then the contingencies and blah blah blah

that kind of Thing this is my son. No, that's not how it works. It's not there's no blah blah blah. That doesn't work that way So what happens is you sell the house in California and you have the money in your hand and then you blah blah blah and buy a house. And then where do I stay in the meantime? You rent. With my two children. You rent.

So then that's the answer that I need. Renting is probably the way that I should go. See, the only way you can do it, otherwise you're going to end up with two house payments. You can't close on the new house until you're sells and until you close on the new house you don't have a place to live. Right. So just stay in your house, it sells, and then you move. Can you wait to move?

Well, I don't really have anywhere in between to stay. Like I can... I mean, can you stay in California? You got a new job or something in Denver? No, this is kind of my opportunity to get out of California. I've been wanting to do it for quite some time. You misunderstood. Are you working in California right now? No. You quit? I work from home, technically. I go to school and I teach home school classes. Okay, so you have a job in California. Why don't you just stay there until your house sells?

And stay where? In the house you live in kid. That I'm selling? Yeah it's not sold yet. Why don't you live there until it sells? Oh yeah, so that's like my month. I have like a month. We don't know. You're not going to go through the market for a week or seven weeks, nine weeks, ten weeks We don't know but you live in there until the house closes and you have to leave and at that point You'll have money in your hand. You will be debt-free and you will purchase a home in Denver and Then so I will be having to rent for a couple months. No, honey You're gonna stay in California in the house you live in until it sells. When it sells, you will leave with a check in your hand and move to Denver having bought

a house in Denver. But you don't need to go buy a house until your house sells. I guess I'm kind of gray on that whole transition because if I sell here and have to move out and I don't have another place. Well okay let's pretend you get a contract on it tomorrow okay? The contract's gonna say that the people have to get a loan and it's gonna take about 30 days. You run over to Denver and you put a house under contract then contingent upon your house closing. George sold his house

the other day. It closes on the 16th. His new home that he and Whitney are moving into closes on the 18th. And we have occupancy in the contract that says we can still live there a few days. And they're going to move from one house to the other. He put his house on the market, but did not sell it out from under himself until he had the...and he didn't close on the other one until he had this one done. Right, the contingencies. Yeah, yeah, the one the contingency would be on the one you're purchasing but it'll be a very short one. Right, and really fast. Because you're always going to have a contract on your house. It's only contingent upon not your house

selling but it closing because you've already sold it at the point we're discussing here. Right until I get that money. Yeah so if you get a contract today that says you're gonna close one month from today run over at Denver buy a house contingent upon the closing of your house one month plus a day from today. So you close on the house in California a day later you close on the house in Denver and you move. But not until then. And a good agent will walk you through this. They'll make sure this is all in the contract and explains it all and so I don't know if you have one yet but you need one to help explain all this simply so that you're not making any mistakes. There is no whirlwind here

and there is no blah blah blah here. It's just lining up the dominoes and understanding how they fall, and you stay put until you get this house sold. Because it might take you three or four months to sell it. And you don't need to be in Denver renting and have a house payment in California hoping it sells. You're going to become a motivated seller. And you're going to end up giving the house in California away because you freaked out and took off before you were ready to go.

So sit tight until your house sells. When it sells, run over to Denver and find something or run over there and rent something for six months. I don't care. But you don't need to do either one until your house sells and yes, you've got to be debt free before you buy in Denver from the sale of your current home So the only whirlwind is this car situation and you said you have money set aside for moving Well, we'll take that money out later from the home sale right now You need that money to get you a used car in cash in cash and or fix the transmission a cheaper way than $10,000 I just put a transmission in one of our vehicles here at the office and it was 7,000 But I didn't buy a new one. I had a rebuilt one done and vehicles here at the office and it was 7,000 but I didn't buy a new one I had a rebuilt one done and they quoted me 14,000 for a new one and nice car. You talked them down? No I got I didn't buy a new one I bought I had a rebuilt. It was almost half.

50% off I'll take it. Almost yeah. Yeah well get connected with an agent jump on ramsaysolutions.com agent Liliana and we can get you connected with a Ramsey trusted pro who knows what they're doing who will help make your home a Blessing not a burden and help you get some calm in your life and walk you through the right next steps That's what you need right now Yeah This is the old cart before the house thing when you buy another home before your home has sold You turn yourself into a motivated seller and you're going to cost yourself tens of thousands of dollars in

Panicked price reduction to get the other payment off your back that listen people don't do this Okay, you move you move deliberately and you put the dominoes in order until you push the first domino we don't push the second one and otherwise you end up with a set of two payments and a highly motivated, panicked, freaked out situation. It's not a good place. You have no negotiating power. Then you start taking the worst offers because you're desperate. You have no negotiating power.

Yeah. I have a property on the market right now that is debt free. It'd be nice if it sold, but I don't care if it sells. You're not desperate. It's the opposite. It's the opposite. I really don't care when it sells. You want to buy this real estate from a place that's strength. I just care what it gets.

That's all I care. This is The Ramsey Show. Thanks for watching. I'm Mike. I'm a fan of yours. I'm a fan of yours. I'm a fan of yours. I'm a fan of yours.

I'm a fan of yours. I'm a fan of yours. I'm a fan of yours. I'm a fan of yours. I'm a fan of yours. I'm a fan of yours. I'm a fan of yours. I'm a fan of yours.

I'm a fan of yours. I'm a fan of yours. I'm a fan of yours. I'm a fan of yours. I'm a fan of yours. I'm a fan of yours. I'm a fan of yours. Hey, George Campbell here. Listen, we need to talk specifically about Mama Bear Legal Forms. Allow me to paint you a picture. You plan a vacation, you make a budget, you book the Airbnb, you build a spreadsheet of activities because you're that person, you fire up the Maps app and boom, trip of a lifetime. So here's the question.

If you plan that carefully for a one week getaway, why are you just winging it when it comes to your will? Not having a will in place is like dropping your family off at a foreign airport with no map, no translator and no clue what happens next. So when you pass away, sure your family will be grieving, but they're also overwhelmed, stuck in court and letting the government decide what happens to everything you worked so hard for. All because you didn't leave clear instructions. So the good news is you can fix this in 20 minutes with Mama Bear Legal Forms.

I used them for my own will and it was fast, simple and gave me and my family peace of mind. There's no stuffy lawyer's office, no drama, just a few clicks and your family's protected. Listen, a will is too important to ignore It's how you love your people well even after you've yeed your last Haw as we say in the south so go to mama bear legal forms comm and handle this tonight Use the promo code Ramsey and you'll save 20% that's mama bear legal forms comm headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create actual amazing relationships. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host.

George Campbell is my co-host today. He's a Ramsey personality, number one bestselling author, and the co-host of Smart Money Happy Hour and the George Campbell Show. Two big hits on the Ramsey networks. Be sure and check them out. Phone number here is 888-825-5225. Gina is with us in Chicago. Hi Gina, how are you?

Hi, I'm okay. Well, how can we help today? I'm so nervous, I'm sorry. It's okay, we've never lost a patient, you're going to make it. So I'm a nurse, I made a bunch of emotional decisions with my money, um, along with dealing with mental illness between myself and my husband. Um, during COVID I was making more money than ever on during nursing. We ended up buying a home off of emotional decisions, um, that helped

keep, um, my stepson in district. Um, we were having this youth about his mother moving him an hour over an hour away, um, so we ended up moving in his district to help keep them, you know, in his school, um, so we were well over our heads with the, with the payments. And so we were well over our heads with the payments. Everything came to a head emotionally, dealing with mental illness between me and my husband. We ended up selling our house and paying off our debts and moving into an apartment.

Wow. Sounds like you all been through hell. Yeah, and so it was a two-bedroom apartment with three kids and two dogs. We ended up buying a small home again and I'm just kind of lost as to what to do next. I owe 318 on my house and 30,000 on a car loan that was upside down to begin with. And then- What do you make? I just took on a different position

to get a more stable income and to get benefits with my job and to work night shift to get an extra differential to make more money. I have two jobs currently and it'll be about 130. What's your husband like? Currently he's staying at home with the kids until school starts again and then we're hopefully going to get a part-time job. How many kids do you have? Two of my own and a stepson, so three. How old are they?

Nine, ten, and fifteen. Okay. What does your husband do for a living? He's a carpenter. Okay. He can make enough to hire somebody to take care of the kids. I know he ended up losing his really good job due to mental illness. Well you keep bringing up mental illness. Who's struggling with mental illness? Both of us really. In what way? What kind of mental illness? Bipolar. Both of you have been diagnosed bipolar? Or you've just been reading the internet about it? No, officially diagnosed. He had an episode that basically where he ended up leaving. He went manic and got fired.

Pretty much. Yeah, okay. If he's bipolar, that's a real possibility, if that's really happening. Okay. And he's not on meds. Are you guys not doing your meds? How are you working so much if you're bipolar? We're all on meds now.

We've dealt with that situation. Okay, so now he goes and gets a job again then? That's preferably when... And why is it part-time when he goes back? I mean, we just... I'm afraid of falling into the same situation before where it's just one thing. The job didn't cause that episode. The lack of treatment to the bipolar with bent meds and seeing the therapist caused

the episode. Well, I think that it was both. Working was not the problem. It was a little bit of both though. I mean, it's between both of us working long hours we both worked 12 hour shifts and then it was like we had somebody else raising our children. That's different than what you're talking about though. I didn't suggest 12 hour shifts.

I just said get a job. That's different than 12 hour shifts. I'm not suggesting exhausting yourself. You got to get rid of the $30,000 car payment and you guys got to get where you can breathe again. Okay. The thing about the $30,000 car payment, I've been, okay, so I don't know if we, we have no money to buy another car. Yeah. Well you don't have any money to buy another car because you keep doing

dumb car deals and you're drowning. What do you have a $900 car payment? We refinanced in a 570 for 8 years. Okay that's hopeful. Not okay so here's the thing what you guys have got to do is we have to put the things that are in the past in the past and learn from them. And so what we learn from this conversation is when we make emotional financial decisions, you brought that up four times, we make bad ones. Correct. Okay, so what we have to do is we have to put together cold and calculated logical decisions called wisdom and execute on those gradually and steadily while gradually and steadily working

and making money. And the gradual steady income, not 12 hours a day, not 18 hours a day, not 12 hours a day, not 18 hours a day, but the gradual steady income cleans up the mess and puts the mess of the past behind you. Yeah, I mean, that was half the problem is that I had a job. I basically took during COVID a job. Yeah, you probably were killing it, but you're also killing you work hours wise.

Yeah, but it was non-benefited to get the extra hourly pay. I don't care what the non-benefit it is if you're making 250k as a nurse okay and we had travel nurses during COVID making that so I don't give a crap if you got benefits or not if you're making a quarter million dollars a year so that's behind us though there's not COVID right now we don't have a problem with that. Today you're a nurse. You're very employable. You get to pick and choose what you do. You've picked because you wanted some benefits. Good. Probably need some benefits to keep both of your all's medications going properly. Agreed? Correct. And so I think that was a wise move, but let's steadily, carefully, not based on the past, but based on the lessons of the past.

The lessons of the past are when he's off his meds and he goes off on his boss, because he's manic, he gets fired. Well, duh, that happens to anybody that's bipolar. Okay? That doesn't make him a bad guy, but that doesn't mean it's a pattern that has to be repeated either. What was the key thing there? He was off his meds. And so you do your meds, you do the proper staging on that, and if you get that dialed in, in the bipolar world, you can be very, very functional. We know that. Dr. John Delaney has taught us that, and we've watched it in financial coaching for years, because bipolar really does struggle with money issues. Because when

you go manic, you make emotional financial decisions. That's your definition of it. And they're always bad ones. Statistics show that half of Americans don't have enough life insurance, or they don't have any at all. I don't understand this, John. Why don't people want to take care of their family? They think they're going to die or something? Well, I used to be one of those guys, I didn't even think about it, and one of my buddies

said, hey, the only reason to not have life insurance is if you hate your wife and kids. And I immediately went and got term life insurance. That's a gut punch. And oh you're telling me and for decades Dave I've sat across people who've lost a spouse, they've lost somebody important to them. Me too. And they don't know what to do next. Me too. I mean you're gonna have a crisis here and you know you got two options while you're sitting and talking to a young widow. She's concerned about how she's going to invest all this money properly and not mess this up or she's concerned how she's going to eat tomorrow. That's exactly right.

These are the two options. Take care of your dad gum family, man. Term life insurance can replace income, pay off debts, cover funeral expenses, so your family can actually have the opportunity to just be sad, to just miss you. That's exactly what it's supposed to be. It's saying, I love you to your family. Term life Insurance. Jeff Zander and the team at Zander Insurance makes it easy and affordable.

I've used them personally for 25 years. They're the only people I trust. Go to Zander.com or call 800-356-4282. to Thanks for taking my call. Sure. How can we help? I kind of got a pension question. My company offers a pension of say $3,200 a month and the survivorship for my wife would be $2,400 a month. No question she outlives me. I'm 58. Is she plotting your death or do we know? No question, she outlives me. I'm 58, I'm desperate.

Is she plotting your death or do we know? No, but you know what? She knows. She knows she's going to outlive me. Sharon keeps telling me this and I just ask her why she's so sure, but that's what bothers me, so I'm just saying. Sleep with one eye open. So, okay, so 3,200 and 2,400 or lump sum of how much?

Half a million. Lump sum. Yep. Take the lump sum, roll it to an IRA in good growth stock mutual funds. Now, let me tell you, there's two reasons why. And you'll find this out as you crunch the numbers and I'm going to ask you to go do a formal answer with a good financial person. I'm going to teach you how to do that, okay?

But here's the basics. Your pension calculations by law, by regulation, have to be conservative to keep the pension from going broke. And by law, they're typically right now right around 7% rate of return. And so they calculated what your 3200 is worth based on a 7% rate of return. If you're in good mutual funds you can earn 11 or 12 on average. That's what the stock market's average since it Okay, and so a you would make more for yourself today if your money was invested in at a higher rate than 7% B when both of you die all jokes aside this money dies with you if both of you die and there's a half a million dollars

in a mutual fund it doesn't die with you. It goes to your heirs. Yeah. So you make more while you're alive and more a lot more when you're dead. So you take it. But that's it. And those are going to be the reasons. So if you made 10% on $500,000, that would be $50,000 a year. You follow me? Yep. Yep. That's about $4,200 a month without touching the $500. Okay. That's better than $3,400., better than 2,400. And by the way, that survives both of you. You following? Okay. I can roll that into my 401. No, no, you can't.

It would be a separate. No, I wouldn't do that. I would roll it into an IRA. There's no taxes on it if you do that. And it can sit there and grow tax-free. Now, rather than take a three-minute answer on a podcast, but that's how it works. That's the concept. It's a pretty simple concept.

More while you're alive, more when you die. If you take the lump sum, almost 99% of the time it works out that way because of the way the pension is required to do the calculation by law. It's an unfair thing. They can't really compete against this. So, and that's why there's very few pensions left anymore because they suck. And so anyway, go to ramsysolutions.com and click on SmartVestor Pros. There'll be several in your area. I know a couple of them in Charleston by the way. And they've been with me for years. They don't work for me, but I recommend them as people to sit down with and talk to about this and let them unpack

for you the two things we just talked about. That you'll make more with it invested rolled over into an IRA and good mutual funds and how old are you guys by the way? Four fifty-eight. I'd like to retire at 62 okay well you got you got to be 59 and a half for the start pulling on this money and you know so you got nothing until 59 and a half because you got to leave it in there okay rolling it to a without penalty anyway rolling it into an IRA but I would roll it to an IRA and get with our smart Vestor pros in the area and let them sit down a good thing about a smart Vestor Pro, Mike,

is they're gonna have the heart of a teacher and you're gonna have them talk to you like I just did, but they're gonna give you a lot more time and care than I just did. Yeah, and I crunch the numbers just for fun. And I guess generously that he's gonna live to at least 85. And you're right in that the lump sum wins in every case here.

I mean, you look at a 10% return, he would still have the same withdrawal over that time, same, you know, that he's going to withdraw that million bucks over that 27 years and still have 1.4 million left over to hand over to his spouse. Oh, so if he only took the 3,200 is the number to your rent. Yeah, 38 grand a year at that rate. Okay, instead of my, instead of taking all of the, at what rate of return? That's a 10%. A 10%.

And even at 8%, he still has an extra 700 grand sitting in that account if he died at 85. So, it just goes to show you. So if you take off your amount, not the survivorship of the wife, but the 3200 is what George ran, that's an interesting calculation. So apples to apples on the monthly, only we don't have to reduce it to survive the wife, and then let the money grow and it'll grow to 1.2. Yeah, 1.4 at 10% and about 700,000 at 8%.

We're gonna go a little bit further. And how old does he gotta be for that to happen? 85, so just live to 85 if you can, that'd be great. Yeah, that'll help us work out our math here. Really helps our math. And I do hope he lives even longer than that. Yeah, well I don't know what his wife's got planned. That's barring any other situation. And by the way folks lives even longer than that. Yeah, well I don't know what his wife's got planned, but yeah. That's barring any other situation.

And by the way folks, here's the thing. You and George, you know, average death age is 76. Yes it is, darling. It's 76 for males now and 78 for females now. It's not 85. But when you live to 60, average death age is 90. Okay, so, and he's almost 60. So average death age includes infant mortality, teenage car

wrecks and whatever, right? But if you statistically want to run actual data on somebody that's my age, 65 years old, I'm healthy, the high probability I make it to 90 in today's world. 76 is not the norm. And based on Dave's sheer willpower, I think we might see 100. I may still be doing the show. I'm just saying I could lose my teeth like somebody did on the Grammys. He'll still be doing radio. Rachel has made that clear. Rachel said she might give you a fake Ramsey show, like a little mock show for you. It'd make me think I'm doing the show. It'd make

you think you're on air. Once you're senile in your 90s, we'll just go. So, Gen 2 has a plan. Exactly. How to put the old man out to pasture and he doesn't even know he's there. You'll never know if it made it to air or not. It might just be for funsies. If the third caller's name is still Bessie, we're talking to the cows. Okay. Producer James is going to schedule a lot of great calls for you. I have nothing to do with this.

Not James' idea. Leave me out of this. Now, that's a plan only Rachel Cruz could dream of. All right, let's go to Cherry in Ashland while we still have time. Cherry, what's up? Hello, Mr. Randy and Mr. George. My question is, how can my husband and I go about talking to our boss about number one getting away? Good, okay. The way you do that is you switch shoes. Why would you stop? I go about talking to our boss about, um, number one, getting a raise. Good, okay. The way you do that is you switch, why would you stop? Just switch shoes. If you were

the boss, how would you want to be talked to about a raise? Um, I've listened to a lot of what Ken says and I agree with him asking for... Wait a minute, you're not talking directly into your phone. That's a bad way to ask for a raise. Hold on. You got your phone off somewhere else. We can't hear you, you're not talking directly into your phone. That's a bad way to ask for a raise. Hold on. You got your phone off somewhere else. We can't hear you. You can't hear us. Talk directly into it so I can hear you.

Number one, if you're the boss, yes much better. If you're the boss and you own a company, when would you pay someone more? A, if you can't replace them, if they make $50,000 in the new person, you got to pay $70,000, that means you're underpaying what the market is and you would pay what you could replace them for. That's one time. The second reason you would give someone a raise is if they're adding great value and you want to be a blessing to them because you think they're bringing in more than they cost Okay, so how is that apply in our particular situation we do not we are not employed by like a corporate

Business we are employed by a single individual like a wealthy person and we take care of his property Same exact thing by him properties. Same exact thing. Same exact thing. Have you saved him a bunch of money taking care of his property by getting good bids on the work that's done? Have you done a good job of managing the property so there's not problems because you're there, you're helpful, then he wants to bless you by paying you more to keep you around. The guy that runs a lot of our properties and a lot of maintenance programs on our property makes really dead gum good money. But he's amazing too. Right, George? Yeah, there's a direct connection between the value you're bringing every year and your

pay. And if you continue to bring value, continue to show that, you continue to be grateful and humble, the raises will show up. Yeah. You just say, you know, if you want to get someone else to do this job, it's going to cost you more than you're paying us, A. and B, we've made you a lot of money and saved you a lot of money. By the way, we did these three things. We'd love it if you'd consider paying us some more. What would that sound like? And you just make a good case for that. My full time job is helping people make smart money decisions, but in my spare time, I'm a grill master. Okay, more of a semi amateur enthusiast.

But you know what makes me get one step closer to pro level? Shopping at Aldi. The other day, I threw some Simply Nature organic chicken on the grill and ended up with a meal so good that even my picky toddler Asked for seconds Aldi has become my first stop for groceries because they've got it all from the USDA choice beef to fresh organic produce everything you need to pull off a gourmet dinner without busting your grocery budget So stop paying more and just shop at Aldi where you'll say what the lowest prices of any national grocery store Find a store near you at Aldi.us.

Savings based on regional analysis of Aldi versus select competitors. Prices may vary by location, product availability, and the market. Thanks for being with us America. When tackling debt or building wealth people can often forget about the other side. There's the offense and the defense. Good defense makes you wealthy too and that's called the right kinds of insurance. Insurance is a tricky deal. Don't we all hate insurance? I pretty much hate insurance. It's like if your son became an insurance agent you wouldn't be like proud. I mean you know know, it's like we just hate insurance.

There's just something about it. It feels like we're pissing money away all the time, right? Because sometimes you are. That's why you feel that way. The insurance is not bad, by the way. And I'd be happy if my son was an insurance agent if he was selling the right kind because it's a good defense. Because you get the right kind of insurance.

I mean, you need life insurance to take care of your kids if you die, right? They need to eat. You need good car insurance. If a car gets wrecked, you got to take care of that. You need a house and homeowners insurance, so house burns, you've got to take care of that. But then there's all these ripoff insurances out there, and we get caught up in trying to insure everything where we never have anything go out. Well, that's going to cost you out the ear and the rear. Both. I mean, this is bad.

Ears and rears. Ears and rears. That's it. So anyway, what we've come up with is our guys in our protection section at Ramsey Solutions came up with the coverage checkup. Yep, for free. You can get your insurance looked at. You fill it all out for free. We will send you back. You're getting ripped off on this. You're not on this. You're underpaying on this, you're overpaying on this, this is a good deal, oh, you haven't got enough of this, and we'll give you everything you need to know. So good insurance is worth the money and is part of a good financial plan, even though we all kinda go icky, alright?

But bad insurance will get you ripped off and you'll never have any money because all you did is insure everything, and the insurance company got all your money right and so they got big buildings and you got a dinky butt house that's how that works right so we don't want that either and the guy calling to renew your auto extended warranty too. Oh gosh, you still get those calls. On a car you don't even own anymore. Yeah that guy yeah him too. So go to ramsaysolutions.com slash checkup take

the coverage checkup for free Click the link in the description if you're listening on YouTube or podcast This is all free and guys we we believe in the right kinds of insurance and we believe in not letting you get screwed on The other and we don't care which one you do Except that we like you and we want you to win You need the right Goldilocks level of insurance and this will act as your coach. It's the same types of insurance that Dave and I have. Just right. Just right.

Not too much, not too little. Thank you for that. Matthew is in Dallas. Hey Matthew, what's up in your world? Hey Dave, how are you doing? Thanks for taking my call. Sure. So, I've got some home repairs and some sort of pending medical dental issues that are going

to exhaust my emergency fund. I'm wondering if it makes sense to access some of the equity in my house to help to cover that or maybe even a loan against my 401k. Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope. And nope.

Nope. And nope. Nope. Don't want a loan on the 401k, don't want a loan on the house. Let's deal with this. So what I would do is I would break these things into, break the issues down into as many different events as I could. Okay, for instance, if there's five different things that need to be repaired on the home,

they don't all have to be done at once. Let's break them down and put them in order of what we would want to do first. What we do second, what we do third. Same thing with the dental. Is the dental all one thing or can it be done in two different things or what period of time can it wait? What is involved? What is the dental thing, by the way? Well, my wife is at the dentist right now and I think she's got a bunch of implants she's going to need.

They're talking $30,000 to get all that done. So happy life, you know? Yeah, happy dentist. No, I'll tell you what we're going to do there is we're going to get what's known as a second opinion, and a third opinion, and a fourth opinion. Is she in the chair right now? Well, she's doing a little bit of work today, but yes, she'll come home with the with sort of the you know, the Prognosis and let me know what we got to talk about. Okay

the vast majority of dentists in America do a really good job and Some of them are semi con artists. Yeah I understand. So we're going to get a second and a third opinion and figure out what the treatment plan is for implants because I'll be honest I've been doing this show 30 years the number of times I heard anybody say anything about dentistry that was 30 grand was close to zero. Hmm just boggles my mind. I don't know anything about dentistry, okay? I take a lot of calls from people. There's something about that. And so again, I am not mad at dentists. I have one. I have friends that are dentists. A lot of them do a great job. We help people that are in dentistry all the

time. It's a good field. But what we've got to do is it's a very emotional thing, and we need to stage this out. Now, what home repairs have you got? So it's one monolithic repair. It's foundation that's settling on the house, and it's causing damage to the property. I've had about three different contractors come out, and I've got quotes from 10,000 to 31, come out and I've got quotes from 10,000 to 31,000 and I'm trying to assess all the Perfect. Okay, and you have how much in your emergency fund? I've got three grand. I

Had I had I had 15 but I spent it all on baby step number two So you're at you're in debt still I Got about seven thousand in credit card debt. Yeah, in credit card debt. What's your household income? $190,000. Okay, and you need $60,000 to clear all this? Yes, sir. Max. First dental bid and worst foundation bid is $30,000 and $30,000.

Did I get those numbers right? Yeah. That's 60. You make 190. I think we can work this out this year. Yeah, that's what I was looking at. I was forecasting it about cash flowing this stuff over the next... Yeah, you may have to stop your 401k. Have you done that yet? No, you haven't. I have. You have? Yeah. When? Yeah. I stopped the 401k probably a month or two ago. Okay. All right. All right. But you're bringing home 11 or 12 grand a month? Yeah. And how much of that can you put away toward all these savings goals? Maybe five. So your expenses are seven grand a month just to keep afloat?

Yes. Yes, sir. I think we need to look into cutting some of these expenses. Well, I'm, you know, I'm paying off debt. I'm getting rid of... You said you had seven grand in credit card debt. Yeah, I've paid the...over...yeah, currently I've paid a lot of it off over the last few months.

Yeah, but currently you shouldn't have seven grand a month in expenses is George's point. So okay, we're going to tighten the budget. We've got $12,000 a month to work with. We need $67,000 to be debt free, dental free, and foundation free. And we make $12,000, we make $144,000 take home pay. That's a one year set of goals. We just force rank these, decide when we're doing what, and we save into them. First you clear the seven, we figure out what the two stages or three stages are on the on the dental,

and you get another bid or two on that for real. I'm not kidding you. And then you decide maybe it's not the thirty thousand dollar foundation, maybe it's the twenty, and so maybe it's a twenty and twenty. Maybe we have a forty thousand dollar problem and not a sixty thousand dollar problem you can do this you can cash flow this in a year you're not going on vacation by the way and you're not going out to eat every night by the way and we're unplugging prime from your little Amazon button by the way and whatever else this money is leaking to because you have some serious stuff you've got to put money to. You have to completely focus your cash flows

on 7,000 plus foundation plus teeth. You get those things out. But you don't go borrow your way out of this mess. That's how you got in the mess in the first place. And you did call us, by the way. Yeah, you called the wrong guys if you're looking to take out a HELOC. I don't know how long you've been listening to the show,

but there's other options. And we just showed you. You have an amazing income and you don't have a lot of debt and so now we can clean this up. You start throwing six, seven grand at this a month we're done in less than a year. This whole thing clears in a year. But you've been staring at it as one giant pile all at once and that's very overwhelming. You're not doing both of these things by Friday and you you don't need to, by the way. So get that priority list down, like Dave said, of what needs to be done, when does it need to be done, let's get bids on all of it, and then make the smartest choice from

a place of strength and not desperation. And if a contractor needs to go in there and shore up the wall with some temporary stuff so it holds four more months in order to get the job four months from now? Oh, I bet he'll do that. Can you tell I've asked for that before? Yeah, I own a lot of real estate, seen a few foundations fall. This is the Ramsey Show. I'm going to be a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a

little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a Thanks for being with us America. Landon is in Fort Collins, Colorado. Hi Landon, what's up? Wow, I thank you guys for taking my call. It's an honor to speak to you guys.

Sure, how can we help? Yeah, so my wife and I, we have three boys under the age of three. I've been a stay-at-home dad for the last three years. So my question is, should I re-enter the workforce if it means I spend more time away from my family? Three boys under the age of three. Yeah, we have 19 month old twins and my oldest is three. This is so exciting. Man, it's been a lot.

What are you going to do with the kids if you go back to work? You're going to have to put them in, what, daycare or something? Yeah. So I've been watching them full-time during the day while my wife is at work. She's a foster care worker out here in Colorado. She's a what worker? And I've been working in foster care. Foster care, okay, good.

Yes. And what did you do before all of this family explosion? Well, my background is in church ministry as a worship leader, but I also have a lot of restaurant experience. So I've been working in restaurants for the last several years in the evenings and on the weekends while my wife stays home with the kids. Okay. All right.

And what's driving you to want to go back to the workforce? Well, beginning of this year, as you can imagine with three boys and diapers, it's been a lot on our stream financially. And God just gave me a wake-up call. We got our finances back in order. Got sick and tired of being sick and tired. And so here we are being on budget for going on seven months now and- But that's you taking those evening gigs, right? So is that what you mean when you say enter the workforce? You've already done it Well, I've been I've been working on the weekends at night. Yeah, but I'm talking about full time. Okay, if you go back full time What are we doing with the kiddos? So that would be well the closest family we have is three hours away

So that would be well, the closest family we have is three hours away. So there was talks of us moving closer, but that looks like that plans on the off the table for now. We also talked about splitting time, watching the kids while I was doing like a work from home day, one today, one day a week or just absorbing the cost of a nanny and getting more serious about finding just jobs that pay more than anything would cost anything above that would be profit and day cares not on the table I don't think so it's just we've looked at the child care costs out here and it's just insane you can hire a nanny. Yeah, probably can come out.

Yeah. Okay, so your question is, I'm trying to figure out what is your wanting to do? Well, I want to. Well, I'm being considered for a part time church position right now. But that will be a match of about 20 hours a week. What would that pay? Finding another partner would be about at the very most would be a mass of about 20 hours a week. What would that pay? So either finding another apartment. It would be about, at the very most, it would be about $29 a year. And what does your wife make right now? She makes $65.

So you would change careers is what you're talking about. Well no, I did that prior to us having kids. And even like while we've had kids I've been a worshiper. No, no, I mean, I mean, okay, you're not talking about a $29,000 and that doesn't afford a nanny. Well, no, that's just for 20 hours a week. It's basically a part-time gig, kind of like what I've been doing, but I'm talking about getting another part-time if not another full-time position on top of that. I'm tired of being this broke. Okay, alright, that's where we are.

Okay, alright. Well, 100% of the time that we go to work, we're away from our family. Everyone. Men, women, babies, teenagers at home, 100 percent. And so perpetually, ladies that are working outside the home get guilt tripped about not being in the home. Ladies in the home get guilt tripped about not being in the workplace. Men working in the home get guilt tripped, or men being at home with the kids get guilt

tripped for not being in the home, get guilt tripped, or men being at home with the kids get guilt tripped for not being in the workplace. And I get this call, or you're in the workplace and you're going, we're farming out our three kids, you know? And so there's, I think the trick is to achieve a balance called parenting. And the balance is that, you know know when you're there you're there you're not watching Netflix and and that you arrange your schedules in such a way that the amount of time that one of you or the other is not there is minimal and then if you've done all of that you don't have you are working you are

earning some money, I'm tired of being this broke, we are cleaning up the mess, and we're not destroying our children in the process. Okay? So lots of families, both parents work in America. Most families, both parents work in America. And now, not every family has as many tinies as you got. You got a bunch of tinies. You got a circus going on over there, man.

So you're at a prime time for crazy. Man, it's wonderful. But our youngest granddaughter is getting ready to turn one next week. And so we've had these littles running around our ankles for the last few years, and we're just watching them parent them, it's a mess. And I'd forgotten how much dad gum work it is. But so, you know, you're a freaking hero, been doing what you're doing. I admire you. Well, it feels like some days I forget too, but I think that's the sleep deprivation talking.

Yeah, well, and the fact that you've not had the English language spoken in front of you all day. You're doing great on this call so far. I'm impressed, Landon. But it's going to be harder for you because you've been around them 24-7. And so it's going to be more difficult for you because this jump is a little bit further. So if I'm you, which is the way, you know, if I understand your question properly, I am going back to work under two conditions. One, I make enough to justify the nanny's hours that does need to be there. Two, we figure out how we can adjust all of our hours to where one of us is there a lot

of the time, where we're not both going straight up nine to five every day. You know what I'm saying? And so if she's there a lot of mornings or she's there, she works from home on Fridays. And you know, there's a, so their kids are with a nanny five hours, six hours a day, four days a week. And you guys can accept that for a period of time. And you are making enough to make that money,

make enough money to make that worthwhile, then you've got two things working. You've got a good touch point on the kiddos, and we're not messing up the kiddos, and we don't have to be freaked out about that, because you're gonna get judgment, you know that, from outsiders, but they don't get a vote. You and your wife are the ones figuring this out.

So if I know my kids are okay, and I haven't just completely 9 to 5 left them, which is a concern from your point emotionally, and that's a fair one, and I'm making enough to justify the nanny's hours that is there, then I'm doing this. But it may take a while to line up all those stars. And you probably need to go make $, 70 grand to make this make sense. You have a take-home pay of four grand to pay a nanny or an even day care. Yeah, absolutely. And that's the other thing I've been kind of with this shift away from being a stay-home

dad. I'm wanting to start pursuing a career in the trades, but the hard part about that is just the distance from our local union is like an hour's drive away. There's trades that aren't union. Yeah. I'm just looking at like with like electrical trades. Lots of electrical trades that aren't union. Yeah.

In Fort Collins, freaking Colorado. It's not exactly a union hub. Yeah. The only true like thing that's in this area is a private... But yeah, there's two unions, predominantly in Colorado. Dude, if you want to be an electrician, you can go to work for a guy that's wiring houses right now and start learning. Yeah.

And you can make really good money non-union. Yeah, the hard part is I've seen that it's just low for the first couple of years, and so you actually... Maybe or maybe not. Yeah. Depends on where you are, sir. I know the long-term benefits are worth it. No, not necessarily. If I had more than my wife would.

Not necessarily. There are guys that are blessed in union situations and there are guys that are trapped in them too. Yeah. It's not apples to apples. So don't let that be your limiting factor. Trades are starving and they pay well, whatever the trade is, electrical or otherwise. They're starving. They need you. And they

pay really well and they're probably going to be pretty flexible. Because you probably could start at sun up and be home by 3.30. And that starts to adjust the schedule like we're talking about. You spend hours researching before making a major purchase like a home or car, but it's also a good idea to put in the work searching for the right insurance coverage. To protect your biggest assets, I recommend using Ramsey Trusted Pros. Whether you're looking for car, home, or any other type of insurance, Ramsey Trusted providers have been coached and vetted to serve you

like we would. Find what you need at ramsysolutions.com slash insurance. 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 actual amazing relationships. Thank you for joining us America. George Campbell, Ramsey personality, number one bestselling author and host of the George Campbell show on the Ramsey Networks. He's my co-host today. Maya is with us in Switzerland. Hey Maya, what's up?

Hi guys, thank you for taking my call. Sure, how can we help? So I started listening to you all a few months ago and I think that I am doing everything roughly in the right order, but I'm stumped on the one point about saving for a down payment. And the reason is I live overseas, as you heard, and my parents basically have set me up

to inherit two homes. So I'm not feeling like it would make sense to save for a down payment when I stand to inherit homes pretty soon. So I'm focusing on investing instead, but I wanted to check that with you guys. Are they in poor health? My mother passed away actually two, three years ago, and my father is 85. So I'm actually helping him manage all the logistics with respect to the homes. So they're effectively under my management at the moment.

Okay. Are you going to be in Geneva permanently or is this a short stay or what? I've been here for four years. I like it here, but I don't think I'm going to retire here. I'm 30, so just to give you an idea of where I am. What do you do? I'm curious. I work for a nonprofit. Okay, cool. I've been to Geneva several times and Switzerland is one of my faves. It's just fabulous. So I'm a little bit jealous right now. It is absolutely beautiful. And the best train system in the world, man. It's unbelievable. Trains run on time. Swiss time by the way. It's great. Anyway, sidebar. I don't blame you for wanting to stay. The point is you're not going to be there permanently and if you're investing in good mutual funds, there's nothing that keeps you from when you're 40 liquidating the two houses and some of your investments to buy a home that you want someday.

The likelihood of you living in one of these two homes until you're 80 is probably zero. But selling one of them to buy your home is probably pretty high. One of them is fully paid off. It's worth about $900. The other, we owe about $500 on it still, but it's rented at the moment for more than the mortgage, and so I put all of the rent towards the mortgage. And then there's a third condo that we have to sell for various reasons in the next year. And so I'm expecting to get about $150 from that.

To throw at the rental now. And I'm planning on putting that towards the mortgage. Yeah? Yeah. I'm planning on putting that there. But let's pretend for just a second, just mathematically that the, there's no emotional connection to any of these. You're going to have a million five in real estate pretty soon.

And if you liquidated that and bought whatever you wanted three years from now, you haven't lost any ground at all. So or 10 years from now, I don't care. So you're fine. No, you don't have to save for a down payment quote unquote. But when you put money into an investment, if you decided the name of that investment someday was add to the down payment, you could. You could do that if you wanted to. But it's not messing up your baby steps. You can just

invest. That's fine. Are you are you're debt free? Yeah, I'm totally debt free. I have about $75k in high-yield savings, and I have about $50K in a Roth and $35K in a brokerage that I add about $3,000 to a month. Yeah, I just run this like you were in Baby Step 7. I agree with you. Okay, that's super reassuring. Can I ask a second question since we're all here? I was basically wanting to know, I'm thinking about changing careers sometime in the next year or so, and we're generating rental income from the U.S.-based properties. I have solid savings, as you've heard.

Is there anything that I need to keep in mind in terms of keeping myself financially okay if I had to, for example, get another degree and potentially start over in a new line of work? get another degree and potentially start over in a new line of work. Would you not work during the school? As long as you have the income to support both things, I'm fine. Okay. Like if you took a year off and went to school full-time? Probably. That kind of thing?

It would probably be a year to two years or if I decided I really wanted to do a radical switch I would get a PhD and that would take several years. I Probably would do that while working Okay, and see if you're a lawyer. I would go to work for the university And be a TA and get your PhD for free You would say that I should work even if we are netting somewhere between 6 to 7 K on the rentals a month, and that's just money for me to take. Like my father is... Yeah, I don't want you sitting around working on a PhD doing nothing.

It's not a full-time job. PhD is a process. We take calls from perpetual students, and what it turns out is it's usually a distraction from something else, and they're just sort of in school to keep busy. What would you be get your PhD in? I'm actually considering retraining as a psychologist. It's an area of super interest of mine and again there's different ways to do that right? So you would have to get a minimum of a masters in order to get

you don't have to have a PhD but it's nice to have doctor in front of your name for doing that but yeah but yeah again that is, yeah. But yeah, again, that's something you can do while doing some other things and build that up. That's just a decision you gotta make. But no, I wouldn't take five years off and live off of the rental income

and work on a PhD exclusively. No, I think you probably put your hand to the plow a little bit will be good for you in the process. And be sure you do some practicum stuff around that. Get around some of the counselors and things that you think you want to do and make sure for you put all this time and effort into it that you do really want to do it. Not just I'm intrigued by it. There's a lot more money and effort than that to get a

PhD. So, might get a master's and get open my practice and get started and then work on your PhD while you're doing that. It might actually help your dissertation. So if you're actually, we're doing something in the real world. Might. I don't know. We'd have to ask Deloney. He's the one around here that collects PhDs. He's got two of them. Yeah, I know. He's got two more than me and you put together.

Yeah. That's okay. We all have the same job. So what does that say? I have a PhD in DUMB. It's worked out. I graduated. And you graduated from that school debt free minus a few zeros. Maya, I think you got a good plan. You're working smart.

Keep it up. Lean into that and think it through. Sidebar for everybody else, George, we don't recommend buying real estate for a home, A, when you're in debt and don't have any savings, and B, we don't want to be perpetual renters for 50 years, but it's okay to take to not own real estate at certain periods of time. Especially when you're living internationally. As an example, yeah. And so, but you don't want to, you know, you don't want to miss out on the appreciation of the real estate market for 40 years. You don't want to miss out

on the savings that you have in the cost of living by not being a renter. Because rent goes up every year, but payments don't. House payments don't. Yeah, if you get a fixed rate loan, that payment's gonna stay the same outside of your property taxes and insurance. And then you get it paid off, and then all you've got is property and taxes and insurance, and you know, that... It becomes part of your wealth building plan to be an owner in real estate. So we love real estate, we think you ought to buy real estate, we think you ought to be a homeowner, but there are certain times when you take a break and don't do that. Yeah. The military folks, this applies to them a lot

They're moving around every two years Do not go and buy a home and then just up and leave or worse Rent it out and have a little rental empire across the country You got to deal with of houses that are in debt so you became a landlord by default on That would be a nightmare right there. I was sick and tired of being sick and tired, bankrupt with a toddler and a brand new baby at home, scared doesn't even begin to cover it, but I got mad enough to change. I started using God's and grandma's ways of handling money. That journey became the total

money makeover, a plan everyday people can use to take control of their money. Millions have changed their lives following the plan in this book and found hope. Start your makeover today at ramsysolutions.com slash store. If you're tired of living paycheck to paycheck and feeling like you can't get ahead, join one of our free Every Dollar trainings. These are new trainings every week this month, and they're hosted by one of the Ramsey personalities like George! I did one this week. I had a good time. Did you? Was the Q&A good? I can't speak for that part. I'll have to ask the audience to see what they thought of it.

But I thought it went- No, I mean, did you did you get good questions? Oh, really good. We actually put them on audio. We say, say hey jump on there and we get to hear their voice like the Ramsey show so it's a lot of fun okay that's cool it's all free and you go to every dollar comm slash webinar and we're gonna show you how to stick to a budget and find nine thousand dollars worth of margin using every dollar that's the average we're seeing with every dollar users that do it the way we teach and we're learning to teach you inside the app how to do it and we are going to accentuate that app experience with George or Rachel or Jade and they're

going to teach you how to do it and nine thousand dollars for the margin is that like a month that is a total margin created so that's if you sold stuff money freed up every month. Okay, so total amount. Reorganizing the existing situation to put it towards the baby steps. Exactly. It creates $9,000 worth of oomph.

Hey, that's pretty cool. Serious. It's called like a head start. That's breathing room right there. Did y'all ever do head starts when you're like racing as a kid, the little kid gets a head start? That was always me.

A $9,000 head start, that's pretty cool. I'll take that, I'll take that. Where I come from, that's right. I love a head start. Did you get a head start. That was always me. A $9,000 head start, that's pretty cool. I'll take that, I'll take that. Where I come from, that's right. I love a head start. Did you get a head start, George? Always. Always. Did you ever win? Occasionally. Sometimes.

I'm faster than I look. I think you're probably a little gazelle going there. A little feet, but they're quick. A little gazelle going, I'm just saying. You ever seen a lizard move? It's impressive. Yeah! That's exactly what I look like running.

Just, yeah, I've seen, there's, no, I can't, okay. Quinn is in Houston. Hey, Quinn. Hey, how are y'all? Better than we deserve. What's up? Hey, so long story short, my question is kind of, am I the financial abuser in my marriage or is it actually my husband?

Whoa! Okay. Harsh words have been spoken. Yeah. Yes. Okay. Harsh words have been spoken. Yeah. Yes. Okay. Why are you the financial abuser, does he say? Okay. So basically, my husband earns about $140,000 a year. He is also applying actively for positions and has a good chance of getting a job that pays like $165,000 plus a 25% bonus every year, so roughly $200,000 a year. He's a software engineer basically. I, on the other hand, I make $50,000 a year at my job and I do get a little bit of child support from my ex, but it's not consistent.

I'm also in graduate school. I still have two or three years left. He claims that I'm the financial abuser because he says that I have more money in my bank account. The reason that I have more money in my bank account is because I actually sold my vehicle because it was going to cost more to... Are y'all married? We are. We have separate bank accounts. It's a whole thing. It is a whole thing. I think we found the problem. Yes. So we basically had separate bank accounts from the time we moved in together. That was his decision. I wanted a joint, you know, even before we got married. We were living together when we were engaged. But he insisted on having separate for the time being and

he claimed that, you know, we would look into getting a joint. But now you're married. How long have you been married now? Two years. Okay. So you're an abuser because you have more in savings? Just more in general. So he claims that he has to use all of his income that he makes.

He has about maybe 10,000 in savings and his checks are roughly 7,000 a month. So he makes 200,000, you make 50,000, and he has to pay more of the bills and that makes you the abuser? Yes. Well, right now he's not making 200, but he has a potential. I know, I know. He's going from 144 to 165 plus a 20% bonus. I know the story. So you transferred all of your money to his account now he's the abuser because he has more than you? No, I didn't transfer my money to his account. It's an example. I'm saying it's I don't understand how that's abusive to have more money and I count than someone else

I agree. I agree and he claims that he has to use all of his money Basically to pay all the big bills he went and got a very expensive car payment before we got married I advised him not to do that. I told him he should get a used vehicle Okay, let's stop stop. The problem is that you guys have done this all wrong there's no abuse here it's just stupidity no one's yeah it's that was harsh George sorry sell the pony oh my gosh going tit-for-tat and scoreboards and you have more than me this month and so yeah okay, number one, this is not abuse by either one of you and that is not a word you should use about your spouse.

Okay, unless there's some extreme emotional or physical harm being incurred, then there's not anything like that going on here. If he takes all of your paychecks and gives you an allowance, we would call that there's some financial abuse. If he wouldn't let you buy food or something, then that would be abuse, okay? But that's not going on here. This is just an argument

because you guys have two separate lives and you can't decide with your roommate who needs to buy the mustard. Right. Yeah, and so if you cannot sit down in the next few weeks and have adult discussions about having a real marriage which is a combined income where we change our names we don't have his income and your income we have our income we don't have his income and your income. We have our income. We don't

have your savings or my savings or your car or my car or your debt or my debt. We have our problems and our opportunities and our savings and our income. And then you combine everything and you do a combined budget to go reach towards the goals that we both believe we want our future to look like which would include paying off his stupid car or selling it it would include working a plan to get out of debt and have an emergency savings it would include having some money set aside to do some fun things with it would include generosity that these are decisions as a married couple that we are now making together because you are no longer roommates

Mm-hmm if you cannot change your language and the spirit of this discussion do that kind of combat combination That the two of us are going to join arms and it's us against the world and we are going to go win together Then you will need to sit down with a marriage counselor. Right, and we are in marriage counseling now, but he's been actively plotting divorce with his mother who does not like me. Now we're getting to it. So there's no financial abuse going on. We have marriage problems. And we have mother-in-law problems.

Oh yeah. She was determined from day one she did not like me. Did he tell you that she's plotting divorce? He's given me access to his phone. He told me I could go through it any time I want because there was a past of porn addiction. So I found emails that were between his mother and he where he was claiming that I am coercively controlling him, that I'm financially abusing him, and she was talking to him about how she's going to pay for his retainer for his lawyer.

Okay. She even recommended his lawyer that she... Listen, if you guys don't have marriage counseling, both of you going to a good counselor to begin to work through this and carving his mother out of the discussion you're not gonna make it. Right. So all of the other stuff doesn't matter then? Right. Yeah. That's kind of where we're at is that he is he claims that he because we agreed to go no contact with his mom because of some things she's been doing. Yeah and then he violated that and he's he violated that. And he's, you know, you guys are not working together. He's developing a plan to leave.

If that is not truncated, he's going to leave. Right, and he claims that he only does that because he's upset. No, that's not true. He's a child. He's being a little boy and he ran to his mommy. Yeah, that's what I've been telling telling him and it makes me feel incredibly isolated. And so I'm kind of, I don't know... If you do not both start going to marriage counseling, the net result is you're not gonna make it six months. Right. We've been doing it on and off. We got a new one recently. I think she's good.

He's not going. Yeah. If you, listen to me, if you two are not together in a marriage counselor's office soon and regularly, you're not going to make it six months honey. You don't have a language to talk to each other right now. Right. All this is, every time you look at him it's a battle. Every time he looks at you it's a battle. There's nobody working towards something. We're all working away from everything all of your language has been that since you've been on the phone Separate accounts do not solve problems

They just conceal them join accounts don't solve problems But it does expose them and that's a good thing gets to the root of the problem in the marriage And that's it, you know, the whole discussion started out as a separate account discussion and turns out that wasn't the problem. It was masking the real problem. Real problem is mother-in-law. Well, that's never happened. I had a nickel. That's never happened. Why is it that when warm weather hits, people start losing their common sense?

They swipe credit cards left and right saying, I need a vacation. I deserve this. But by August, they're stuck cleaning up a mess. Listen to me carefully. You don't need to spend five grand on beach trips and theme park tickets to make family memories. Here's the deal. Instead of having the summer you deserve, have the summer you can afford. That means planning ahead with the Every Dollar Budget app. It helps you track spending and give every single dollar a

job. That way you make sure the essentials are covered and have some fun without making a money mess. Look, you got to start bossing your money around or else it'll always be the boss of you. Download every dollar today. Music Taylor is with us in Fresno. Hey, Taylor, what's up? Hi George, hi Dave. Hey, how can we help? So I'm wondering if I should go to Italy while I'm saving for a house and for a car.

Sure, as long as you don't want to buy the car or the house as soon. Exactly. Because it's kind of like that math trade-off thing, right? Yes. Italy's cool. I mean, I want to find out, so. How much is it going to cost? About $7,000.

Okay. So how long does that delay your goal on a house? I'm planning on saving $200,000 just to get in that 25% of my take-home being my mortgage. So probably only by six months. So you're only saving $1,000 a month? So an Italy trip costs your house purchase six months? Say that again? If you go to Italy, you buy the house six months later that again? If you go to Italy you buy

the house six months later than if you don't go to Italy. Yes. So what are you gonna do? The reason why I am really questioning it is just because I've been trying to be intentional about like where my money's going and what I'm saving it for. You are being intentional. Then I'm taking the money that I was like saving for a house and a car and now I'm spending on Italy. That's why you should separate your goals out. But you're intentionally doing it and you're thinking about it because we're making you

look at what the tradeoff is. And if you can accept the tradeoff and you still want to go to Italy that bad, then you'll go to Italy. If you don't, you know, is it worth seven months delay in purchasing a home? Okay, what do you make I make about 98 how old are you I'm 37 who's going with you It's a good friend and a group a group Okay, yeah, so somebody else pulled the trip together

correct and in an interjected it as an interruption to your plan. Well, I mean... It is. Yeah, it's an opportunity and I do want to go... No, it's an interruption. It's an interruption. Yeah. And that's okay. See, the thing about intentional is you weigh out the differences. When you're not intentional you go, woohoo Italy! It bedammed the question, right? And you didn't do that. Which means you got your freaking act together. I'm proud of you. Well, it's because of you, so thank you. You said I can do this but it's gonna cost me. Which is like an adult statement rather than a child statement of I work so hard and I've always dreamed of Italy. Bull crap.

We all work hard and everybody's dreamed of Italy. Shut up. And most people put it on a credit card and worry about it later. You're actually feeling the full cost because you're paying cash for this thing. I'm not sure I would do it because you could go to Italy anytime. They're not moving it. It's still gonna be there Yeah, I think I'd miss out on the opportunity of having like a group to go you'd have miss out on the opportunity of having this group Correct. There'll be another group I've been several times. It's still gonna be there on six months of building equity in that home and appreciation as well So there's always another side either one's okay, but don't act like that this is, oh God, there's only one chance. No, that's not true. It's not true. To get to go this particular time at this particular

moment with this particular group is going to delay you. Not, it's my only chance to ever get to go. If I don't go now, they're going to close Italy. They're not. They're still going to be there. They're not. They're still going to be there. Okay? So don't get into that drama mode. Keep yourself above this like you started the conversation and then you'll make a good decision. I'm okay if you delay it as long as you do it on purpose and you've weighed out the problem and you did it without a fatalistic thing like they're closing Italy. They're not. I'm currently keeping my savings in a CD. Do you recommend that? Because before I just had it in a regular savings account. That's fine. High yield savings probably make as much or more than a

CD with no penalties for polling. I'd probably look at that. Is that what you do? I just do high yield savings. How long is this home goal savings plan? Is this two years? Seven years? Yeah, I just do high yield savings. How long is this Home Goal savings plan? Is this two years, seven years? I at the end of this year, I'll have a hundred thousand and I can save thirty-six thousand a year. So I would think it would take me three more years. Okay, here's the thing.

You said you were saving thirty-six grand a year? Yeah. So that means that this Italy trip is not costing you six months. That's true. Like two months. Well, if you're saving three grand a month, it's about a two month delay. Yes. So now I can stomach this a little more when I actually put the facts around it and go,

okay, it's going to take me two months to save it. I missed out on the $100,000 until now. That's also very impressive. So I think you need to go. Yeah. So honestly, I have all this money saved. Yeah, so honestly I have all this money saved. Yeah, I think I would go. I'm planning, honestly because of you Dave, because I started listening to you like four years ago.

Yeah, but I think I would go. I think the trade-off is not bad at all. Okay. If this was consumer debt baby step two, we'd say no, you need to be intense. But you've moved from intense to intentional once you get out of baby step three. And you've done that so well. So we're not here to tell you don't go on vacation. You're not broke.

You just need to be okay with the trade off. And maybe you make up the difference. And you go, you know what? I'm gonna work a side gig to make up that six grand over the next year. So that I don't feel as guilty about it. You do you. But I just make peace with whatever decision you make.

Okay, so you have made really good decisions. I wanna recap only one part of the conversation, okay? The one thing everyone needs to avoid, including Dave, is the idea that there's only one time to do something. There's this one tiny opportunity, and if I miss that, that's almost never true. It might be true of a wedding, you might miss the wedding or something like that, okay? That's possible.

But, you know, a group going to Italy, there's not only one time in your life. You can go a lot of different times and you might find a group you like better later. It's possible. So you don't want to trap yourself into this one-time thinking because that adds drama to this and it adds too much weight to the Italy trip. The Italy trip is not a bad idea and a two-month delay in your home purchase, especially as good a job as you've done overall because you're like killing it girl. I mean you're doing really good, I'm so proud of you. Given all of that, I think you should go.

If it was me in your shoes, I would go. You know how rare Dave Ramsey greenlights a trip to Italy for $7,000, Taylor? You just hit the jackpot. Just go. No, I mean, it's where she is. She's there. Don't you think? Yeah.

She's done such an impressive job. It's impressive. Yeah. Most people that want to go to Italy are whining and they're going to put it on credit and we have to talk them off a ledge. We're trying to convince Taylor to go because of how good of a job she's done. Well, she's gonna go, but.

And if it delayed the house purchase by a year, I'd say, whoa, that's a lot. Two months, she's gonna be right there and she'll probably get a raise as hard of a worker as she is and make up the difference. But this all comes down to opportunity cost. We talk about this a lot. What is it gonna cost me?

If I go buy that car, that means I can't fund this retirement account, and so you just gotta weigh the options. And none of these are bad things. Trade off, if you spend all your money on interior decorating or purses or guns or whatever it is you spend all your money on, then you don't have any money.

It's kind of a math thing. Or travel, it's kind of a math thing. I will tell you guys this on Sharon and I are at this stage these days to where we are really enjoying living like no one else on the travel stuff and We've always done some travel always throughout our lives, you know, except when we were broke broke But I, once we got to where we could afford it, we've always done some. But now we're at the stage to where the live like no one else thing is kicking in. And I strongly advise that you, you know, it's one of the benefits of working your tail end off and saving

you so that you can go enjoy some of it. And that's for after your baby step seven, you know, you're moving on. Live like no one else and give like no one else so that later you can live like no one else and give like no one else. So, but if you blow it all and say, well, hang on, I'm 24 and I have to go to London. No, you don't. London's going to be there. They're not closing it. It doesn't close up. What's that FOMO and the friends and the pressure and I'm gonna miss out and I'll see the Instagram posts and... If you do what your broke friends do, guess what you're gonna get?

Broke. That's it. Pretty simple. I'd pursue the JOMO and said the joy of missing out. Because you know you've got your plan. You've got your goals. You're doing you. Yeah, I think Taylor's going to Italy and she's gonna enjoy it. Send us some photos, Taylor. I think she's gonna buy a really nice house when she gets back, by the way.

Both and. Yeah. Both are possible when you follow the Ramsey plan. This is the Ramsey Show. So Our Scripture of the day, Proverbs 14 25, a truthful witness saves lives, but one who breathes out lies is deceitful. That seems redundant to me. If you breathe out lies, of course you're deceitful. Sometimes the obvious must be stated.

Back in the Bible days, you really came around. I may have to go look up a different version to make sure I understand that scripture, because apparently I don't understand it. A truthful witness saves lives. Now, I do understand that, because when you tell somebody the truth on this show, sometimes it sounds harsh. Yep. Like, that's not abuse, that's stupid.

But we're trying to save you. But you're, you know, that saves lives because they- I'm not breathing no lies. We get to the bottom of what's really going on, right? Rupert Murdoch said, I'm not an economist and we all know economists were created to make weather forecasters look good. That's good.

My line, Rupert, is weather forecasters and economists are the only two people that can be wrong most of the time and still keep their jobs. That's my line. So true. But I've been using that one for a long time on Fox and other things. They're like, Dave, what do you think the economy is going to do? I'm like, oh, weather forecasters, I don't know. That and talking heads, which are economists.

There we go. There we go. There are those. Brian is in Raleigh, North Carolina. Hey, Brian, what's up? Hey, Dave, how are you doing? I'm twenty thousand dollars in credit card debt. I am currently renting and I'd like to

pay that off and save for a home. Good. And I don't know where to start. Well, getting rid of the debt would be a great start. What do you make? So, take-home after taxes for my job is about $4,700. Did you say $2,700? $2,700 for my job and then I get about $2,000 a month in VA disability for a total of $4,700. Thank you for your service. Well, I appreciate that. Thank you. What caused the 20 grand in credit card debt?

I was unemployed last year and kind of blew through my savings and was living like I had a job on a credit card and savings and it's caught up to me. I'm treading water with my floaties on but if they pop I'm kinda. Are you single and 26? Excuse me? Are you single and 26? I'm not married, I live with my girlfriend

and my brother. Okay, so you're single and how old are you? Yeah, 30. Okay, you got close, okay. All right. Is this split up amongst a bunch of credit cards? It's currently on two credit cards that are almost maxed out.

What's coming out of your check? Right now, about $510 a month. I have a Discover card that I've put a hold on. And they've given me- What's coming out of your check? Taxes, health insurance, 401K? Oh, yes, taxes, health insurance, 401K, all that stuff. So you got money going into 401K? Yes, sir, I'm at a new job.

How much is going into the 401K? The bare minimum that they- Automatically signed you up for, 3%. Automatically signed me up for right now, yes sir. And then every year they do a profit share at the end of the year. That's real nice if you weren't broke. Okay. Yeah.

So we're going to stop the 401k. Okay. And we're going to take anything else off that check except health insurance and taxes and make sure you have the right amount of taxes and the right amount of health insurance and everything else needs to come home. We're going to get on a detailed written budget. And you're going to increase our income. So what can you do to make more than $2,700 a month?

Well, I'm in a sales job. So I do have some commission that comes in. Great. What are you selling? Construction supplies. Great! Awesome, because it's getting ready to boom. Get ready. Ah, there's another forecast from the economist. Yeah, I still think it is though. All right, so we're going to do anything we can to increase our income. We're going to do anything we can to make the income behave. We're not going out to eat and we're not going on vacation. And we've got $4,700 a month, probably closer by the time this is all done to $5,000 a month, and we need to pay off $20,000.

So $2,000 a month of that 5,000 going to credit card debt, you will be debt-free in 10 months. Okay, question. How much is your car payment? I don't have a car payment I've got a paid off vehicle. That was a trick question. Okay. What was you getting ready say sir? I'm interrupted you I've got a paid off vehicle and a company truck, but that vehicle is about to need some maintenance Okay about about a thousand dollars in labor. I've got all the parts good good. That's not a problem Okay, so how much can you throw at the debt currently

based on your expenses? How much margin do you have? Do you have 2,000 you could throw at it? Once I rein it in, yes, at the end of the month I do. My current problem is my finances are kind of skewed because I guess I would call myself head of household. I pay the rent at the beginning of the month and then my brother and my girlfriend pay

me as they get paid later on. So I come out of pocket pretty heavy on the first. They need to get ahead of that and they need to pay their part on the first. I know. You're the landlord. You set the rules. The payments come in on the first part on the first. I know. You're the landlord. You set the rules. Payments come in on the first. That's it. I know. Yeah. They're pretty typically pretty good about it but because I am in a little bit better position. You're not in a better position. You're

deeply in debt. You maxed out two credit cards. Yeah. I don't want to know what their situation is if that makes you look good but we got to this up fast, and I'm thinking this takes less than 10 months if you get serious about it. You cut some expenses, you increased that income, this debt is gone. I want you to list your debts, smallest to largest, the credit cards. What's the smallest credit card? About 10 grand. Ten?

Yes. You only owe 20? Well the next credit card's 11 grand, give or take. So you have two? I have two. Two credit cards, yes. Okay. Okay.

All right, so we're going to attack the 10 grand, 2 grand a month, five months it's gone. Yeah, freeze up that payment. So apply that plus all the margin you were throwing at it to the next credit card. That one's gone another five months or less. Wait, does that mean I stop paying on this one? No, you pay minimum payments is all. Interest rate is not your problem. Your problem is cash flow.

And so we're going to get all the cash we can pile up every single month by tightening everything down to nothing. No going out to eat, no vacations, no luxuries. You have a freaking mess you're cleaning up and you're very intense and intentional. When you do that you will get out of debt. You cannot fix this with math. It's not a math problem. It's a sacrifice, live on beans and rice, rice and beans problem. Can I, one question for you, what it like what if I was to balance transfer all of that and then really hammer

that one card? It don't matter. It, uh, it would, same outcome? Yeah. Yeah. Cause the interest rate, the interest rate over 10 months on this is not, is not relevant. The actual interest, okay, let me show you what I'm talking about, okay? 10% in a year on $20,000 is $2,000.

Okay? You're not gonna be in there a year. You're gonna be in there an average of a half a year. And so we're talking about $1,000 in interest. $1,000 does not fix a $20,000 problem. And worse, that balance transfer will cost you 3 to 5 percent of the balance and make you think you actually did something Do you get comfortable and go well zero percent now so I can kind of take my time with it I want you to feel a fire when there's 29% AP on that card

You're going I got to get out of this and never touch it again You just sell so much stuff the kids think they're next the dog is hiding and your roommates considering moving out That's your girlfriend. So that's extra awkward Yeah I mean you're really you need to get with it and roll up your sleeves and get pissed off about this and get rid of this debt. And when you do it, when you get that kind of attitude about it, the math quits mattering. If you're going to keep the debt for five years, then I can't help you, but a balance transfer might. But that's a dumb way to do this because you're going to

be in debt the rest of your life screwing around with it Instead this incredible focused intensity like you're running for your life And then you cut up these stupid cards, and you never touch them again for anything That'll get you out of debt and keep you out of debt sir Yeah, George And I will sign you up for every dollar including financial peace University And we're gonna put you think put you in there and show you how to handle this and then if the girlfriend becomes a wife, it'll become a good thing and the two of you can learn to work together at that point. Until then you're not working together, you have a roommate and that's the, better keep

everything separate brother, you're going to have a problem if you don't. That puts us out of the 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 peace, and that's to walk daily with the Prince of Peace, Christ Jesus.