The Ramsey Show - Build Wealth by Doing What Rich People Actually Do

Episode Date: June 20, 2024

💵 Start your free budget today. Download the EveryDollar app! Dave Ramsey & Ken Coleman answer your questions and discuss: "Is it ever okay to spend $50k on a trip?" "My dad wants me to pay for his life insurance..." "Should we buy a house if we're going to move in 4 years?" "We disagree about paying off our cars," "We make $400K but can't pay extra on debt," "I co-own a house with my girlfriend's parents..." "My employer wants me to stop my side hustle" Support Our Sponsors: Zander: Go to zander.com or call 800-356-4282 for a fast and easy quote today. Health Trust Financial BetterHelp: betterhelp.com/Delony to get 10% off your first month Next Steps 🏠 Selling Your House? Check out one of our Ramsey Trusted Real Estate Agents 📞 Have a question for the show? Call 888-825-5225 Weekdays from 2-5pm ET or click here! 🎟️ Reserve your seat for Summit 2025 today! 🚢 The Live Like No One Else Cruise is booking fast!  Listen to more from Ramsey Network 🎙️ The Ramsey Show   🧠 The Dr. John Delony Show 🍸 Smart Money Happy Hour 💡 The Rachel Cruze Show 💸 The Ramsey Show Highlights 💰 George Kamel 💼 The Ken Coleman Show 📈 EntreLeadership Learn more about your ad choices. https://www.megaphone.fm/adchoices Ramsey Solutions Privacy Policy

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. Thanks for joining us, America. Ken Coleman, number one best-selling author, host of The Ken Coleman Show on the Ramsey Networks, and Ramsey personality is my co-host today. As we talk about your life and your money. The phone number is 888-825-5225. Caroline is with us in Washington, D.C. Hi, Caroline, how are you? I'm doing great, Dave. Thanks for taking my call.

Sure, what's up? My question today is about spending a lot of money on a big trip for my family. Cool. Sounds fun. Yeah. Do you have a lot of money? That's the question. I retired last year, and I feel like I'm doing pretty well.

I guess the question is, if I don't have all the money saved, is it okay to take it out of retirement? We're going to Disney for my whole family and it's like 20 people. And you're paying for the whole thing. I'd like to. Okay. It's for my retirement. And how much do you have in your nest egg? Um,

about 1.1 million. Okay. And so you're going to spend what? 40, 50,000 bucks. Okay. And so you're going to spend, what, $40,000, $50,000? Right. I think I'll have about $30,000 saved by the time we go. And we live on my pension. My husband and I live on our pension and his Social Security.

So I haven't taken any money out of there, and I don't have any debt. How old are you? 62. Yeah, I think you ought to do it. You do, even if it's a lot of money? Yeah, it is a lot of money. But you have a lot of money. You're a millionaire. You're a millionaire.

I know. I just don't spend like that. It's really hard to spend. Well, that's how you got a million dollars, and I don't think you're going to do it again. And the reason I don't think you're going to do it again, I don't think you're going to do it again and the reason i don't think you're going to do it i don't think you're going to do this every year this is probably a one-time hit and um by the way your million your 1.1 million if it's invested in good growth stock mutual funds it should make another hundred thousand this year that you're not going to use because you live off your pension right right so it'll be 1.2 million so you're

spending some of your income okay you're not actually spending out of the nest egg does that make sense right yeah yeah well i mean it feels like if i'm taking it out of there you are i will end up taking it out of there some of it anyway i mean if you take 20 000 bucks out you save 30 and you spend 50 yeah that's a lot of people and a lot of disney but that's your that's your choice and your that you you live like no one else so that later you can live and give like no one else here you are living and giving because you're having your family go but it's something you get great joy out of watching all those little kiddos run around mickeyland that's right yeah that's right i took

the whole stinking bunch on a disney cruise one time the whole bunch the whole fam damley and yeah and they all they all they all loved it i hated it yeah but they loved it well it's a one-time thing yeah i just i well i just i was just my job was to pay for it and be quiet and let them enjoy it and not ruin it with me being a grouch so i but it was did you wear the uh mickey ears no i would have forced that on if i'd have been a part of the ramsay family but that's yeah it's just not my gig okay i'm sorry but that's um that's a lot of small humans may or may not have bathed well trapped on one boat okay that's all i'm saying and so um yeah including the ones we brought with us and so they're they're no exception but anyway it was fun they had a blast we've got great pictures with every freaking princess that ever was a princess or thought about being a princess and every character and rachel cruz was in heaven because disney's her thingy and so she probably instituted this

whole thing and talked me into paying for it i don't know but i promise you have fun have fun yeah you know have fun this is what you've worked for go do it enjoy it and don't think a thing about spending too much money because it's not too much that's right you probably don't need to do this twice a month but you're but if you do it once and you know it's a big one-time celebration you're going to be in great shape you've done a wonderful job handling money you're millionaires i'm so proud of you congratulations this is why you've done all that stuff to get to do this with all the grandbabies and the great grandbabies or whatever it is that all these old people all these people add up to be in your group there have a blast yeah i was just going to

say that i would stop thinking about how much you're spending because you've just walked through it with dave and this is a priceless memory if you make it to a grand old age and we hope you do this will be something that you will think about and reminisce about for a long time and i don't think you can put a price tag on it and i think this is a great decision go and have an absolute blast yeah absolutely get a couple extra toys it's why you do that well pay that pay extra for the yeah front of the line passes yeah do that what do you call that stuff uh fast pass is that i don't know it's there's actually a couple levels to that there's a fast pass take the the top level. Take the top level. If you're going to spend that kind of money, do not be inconvenienced by the other people that are there.

Yeah. Nobody wants to stand in line for the log ride or whatever the thing is. You and I are the worst possible people to ask these questions to. I promise you. It's too bad our resident Disney expert, Rachel, is not here today. We should have phoned her. We should have phoned a friend. Phone a friend.

Yeah. Phone a friend. Arnold. Phone a friend. Arnold's with us in Baton Rouge. Hey, Arnold. How are you? Hi. Better than I deserve. Good. What's up? I have a question. I'm 24.

I've been out of college for a year. My wife is 21, and we own a house. We're both engineers. I make 85, and she makes 93. And we got one of those FHA loans for our mortgage. And we put 3.5% down and I'm trying to at least get to that 20% ASAP to get rid of the PMI.

We're a little over $270,000 left, and we're putting in an extra $1,100 a month in principal only. Rock and roll. How can I help? So we're at 6.5% right now. I'm wondering, I hear these rumors that the mortgage rates are going to go down later this year or later on. And I know you can refinance, but, like, what's the rule or your guidelines for that? Just a break-even analysis.

It's a break-even analysis. And so let's say that rates dropped from – yours is a 6.5, you said? Yes, sir. Let's say you could get a 4.5. That's a 2% spread. And let's say you got 200200,000 by then still outstanding. So 2% of $200,000 would be $4,000 a year you would save. Right?

Okay. And if your refinance cost is $8,000, how long at $4,000 a year savings does it take to break even? Two years. If you're going to be in debt long enough to break even, then you would talk about refinancing. Okay. And you could do it on 1%. You can do it on a half a percent. But obviously at a half a percent,

it's going to take you seven, eight years to break even. It's probably not going to make sense. But anywhere from 1% north of their savings, you can start running the calculation. But it's simply take your savings annually and divide it into the closing costs or the refinance. And that's how long it takes you to get back to even for having refinanced. And then everything from there is gravy on the biscuit, right? That's a break-even analysis.

And that's how you would do it. That's how you decide. But obviously, we don't have to worry about that today. This is The Ramsey Show. I've been doing this show for over 30 years, and some of the saddest calls I have taken are from situations that are completely preventable. Yeah, and what's so hard is I feel like one of those, especially the ones that I'm like, oh, it's terrible, are people that call in and their spouse has passed away suddenly and they don't have life insurance when you have to think through how am

I going to pay my bills I'm going to eat next week yeah in the middle of all that grief like it's just it is it's terrible so life insurance is the one thing especially as a mom with three little kids that I'm like so big on for people to get because it's inexpensive Zander is the place that Winston and I actually get all of our life insurance and it doesn't cost much because Zander shops among a gazillion different companies. It doesn't cost much. You just have to admit that someday you're not going to be here. You got to say it out loud and you got to say, I'm going to say I love you to my family by taking care of them and taking the time to put this stuff in place. The cost of stinking pizza. To get a free quote, call 800-356-4282. That's 800-356-4282.

Or go to zander.com. Ken Coleman, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. Thank you for joining us, America. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Frankie is in Greenville, North Carolina. Hi, Frankie. How are you? Hi, Dave. I'm good. How are you? Hi, Dave.

I'm good. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? So I have a pretty straightforward question. I talked to my dad yesterday, and he wants me to pay for his life insurance policy. He said I should think of it like an investment, and he doesn't want to

actually pay for it himself. So I just wanted some advice on maybe how I can talk to him about paying for his own life insurance or should I pay for it myself? that's so weird isn't it yeah when you heard when you heard that you had to go say what i don't know if you said it out loud but you said it in your head didn't you frankie i did and i and he said it to my mom and he said you know because he's not going to be receiving any of the benefits i was like well i mean that's kind of the point um he was saying since he's not going to be receiving it i should pay for it since i can think of it like how old are you i'm 24 and how old is he 65 is he ill? Not necessarily. I mean, he has some health issues, but I mean, for his age, he's... But his death is not imminent as far as we know.

Right, yeah. Yeah. So you could be doing this for like 30 years. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's a hard pass. That's a big N-O. Nope. Nope. Let's just call pass. That's a big N-O.

Nope. Nope. Let's just call that. Let's check the box beside nope. Now, your question was, though, how do I talk to him about it? Just go, Dad, you know, I'm 24. I'm going to be doing other kinds of investing rather than in your death, and I don't think we're going to go this way, but thanks for the offer.

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, I think that. Pretty simple. You don't need to be snarky about it, although it's really tempting. But it doesn't serve any purpose to be snarky about it other than to make you feel just because it's just strange, and he knows it's strange. I don't know.

Your dad does stuff like this often,'t he yes yeah yeah he's got yeah quirky quirky quirky dude okay yeah i just i would just smile and say dad you know thanks for the offer i've kind of thought about this and i talked with my financial guys and they said i should just be doing regular investing rather than investing in your death and I'm just not comfortable doing that and so but thanks for the offer no and I really wouldn't go into a bunch of I wouldn't go into a long lengthy discussion about it it's just a two sentences and no well what I'm going to do is I'm going to play this back for him later okay that's fine you can tell him I said obviously he's quirky, because that's a really quirky thing to say to your 24-year-old daughter, dude. If you're going to play it for him, I mean, I wouldn't do that to my 24-year-old daughter.

You've got other things you should be doing with your life rather than investing in your dad's death. And besides that, mathematically, it's a bad investment, because insurance companies make money on insurance right the probability of his death is and and the payout is less than the premiums that they think they're going to receive if they don't receive premiums equal to the payout before he dies they lose money on the insurance and if they do that often enough they go out of business so insurance companies make money on insurance which by translation means it's not a good investment it is a good purchase for those of you out there we had a debt-free scream yesterday i believe our day before yesterday that the young lady's husband was killed in a car wreck he was 30 something years old two months before they were debt-free, two months

before that, he had gotten life insurance and he had a brand new baby. Now that's a good time to buy life insurance. That's perfect. I mean, that family's taken care of because that young man was just a stellar dad and husband. But this is a completely different thing. It's not a good investment mathematically. It is a protection for your family in the case of a horrible event happening. But if your dad doesn't, he's 65, he may not need life insurance. If he's got enough money, he could not just not buy life insurance. I'm 63. I don't have any life insurance. I have a huge pile of money and no debt. If I die, Sharon's going to have a party. She doesn't need life insurance, okay?

And it'll be a big party. I guess not if I die. When I die. If I die before her is what I should say, right, Ken? Well, we will celebrate. We know that that's her plan, and I'm a little worried about it. Yeah, I mean, the data probably backs that up. I would just say this, that this is like common core math. It just doesn't make sense, and we already have good math.

We don't need to invent something. This is just a wacky idea. The minute I heard it, it's just wacky. Yeah. And you can't, by the way, reason with wacky. You just got to move on quickly. Yeah, I wouldn't. No, Dad, no.

You didn't have to deal with common Core math, but I'm glad, because it would have made the top of your head explode. It must have been what happened. Okay. Joel is in Chicago. Hi, Joel. What's up? Hi, guys.

Pleasure to talk to both of you finally. I have a question about a debt question. I just started listening to you guys a couple weeks ago. I've been watching your podcast or listening to your podcast like every day, nonstop. Me and my wife have been talking about this, and we're getting ready to start the baby steps. We have the $1,000 already set. The issue that I'm having is I can can introduce some quick numbers real fast. We're about 25 to 30 in credit card and personal loan debt. We have about 31,000 in two car loans,

122 in our mortgage, and we have a second home, which was our first purchase, that still sits at about 40K, and that's being rented currently. What's your household income? We make around $140,000 combined before taxes. And your question is simply how to start the baby steps? Yes. Okay. We get on an every-dollar budget.

You and your wife are in agreement that we're going to get out of debt, and we're going to sacrifice to do that, because if you didn't have any of these payments, you have a lot of money agreed exactly and that's the whole idea and so do you have any savings that's not in retirement um no um just just the 1k for the the startup you got the baby step one okay then we're going to list all these debts smallest to largest we're going to pay minimum payments on everything but the little one. We're not going to see the inside of a restaurant unless you're working there as an extra job, and you're not going to go on vacation.

You are broke people that make $140,000 a year, and you need to clean up this $70,000 worth of stupidity before you do anything else. It's stupid butt car loans and all this other mess you've got, and you've got to get disgusted about it and attack it and attack it and attack it to where your friends think you've joined a cult. I agree. The one thing I did want to mention is, like, the one car loan, we owe $2,000 on it, so that will be gone in, like, the next four months. Good.

No, no, no. It doesn't take four months to pay off $2,000 when you make $140. You do that the first month. Yeah, I agree. I totally agree with that. The second thing is the second car is our second vehicle, which is an SUV. That one's the one that's sitting at about 29,000. And I told my wife we need to just get rid of the car.

Nah. And that's where she's kind of fighting me on it. I wouldn't. I don't think. Okay. The best way to get your wife on board is not say, I want to sell your car. That's actually just like a weekend vehicle. I drive a personal, I mean, a work vehicle Monday through Friday.

Is that your car? She drives. It's kind of both our cars, but we use it because we have three kids. So it's a larger vehicle for the family. So you have a work car. Yep. That you own? It's a company vehicle.

Oh, okay. Oh, no. So it's a company vehicle. Oh, okay. Oh, no, so it's a company vehicle. Okay, and then she has a car. Yep, which is the one that's about to be paid off, and that's a community vehicle to work every day. And then the other one has $29,000 on it. Yep. Well, her car that she owns, carry your family?

Yeah, we'll fit. I mean, my oldest is about to finish high school, and the other one, the smallest one, is like 10 years old. So, I mean, we'll fit. I mean, my oldest is about to finish high school, and the other one, the smallest one, is like 10 years old. So, I mean, we'd fit. Not much space, but I told her, you know, something we could do if we really wanted. Yeah. The other thing you could do, what's the rental worth? I think about $120, $130.

Yeah. You could dump it and clean up the whole mess, but either one of those is fine, or neither if you want to just bust all the way through it. You're going to trade sacrificed lifestyle, scorched earth lifestyle longer. You're going to stay in the mess longer if you don't move one or both of these other items. And that's the decision the two of you can make together. This is The Ramsey Show.

You've worked, saved, sacrificed, and been gazelle intense with your financial game plan. But do you have the right defense in place, like the right health insurance? Look, you can't walk past a doctor's office these days without getting a massive bill. And if you don't have health insurance, a major medical situation can undo all of your hard work. That's where my friends at Health Trust Financial can help. They work for you, not the insurance company. So they find you the right health insurance and they save you money. Ramsey has recommended Health Trust Financial for two decades because they're the experts. And whether you're 19 years old or 90, you can trust them to do two very important things.

Listen to you, then find you health insurance coverage with everything you need and nothing you don't. Health Trust Financial is your one-stop shop for unbiased advice about affordable health insurance options. They could save you hundreds of dollars a month, so make sure you're not overpaying. Go to healthtrustfinancial.com today. healthtrustfinancial.com. Ken Coleman, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today in the lobby of Ramsey Solutions. And you can join us there anytime you'd like. The coffee is free and the homemade cookies are free.

And you can watch the show from 1 to 4. The coffee and the cookies are worth the price. The show is questionable. But you can come hang out with us. There's usually 50 to a couple hundred people sitting out here. And in the lobby of the Ramsey Solutions, right here we do the show is the debt-free stage and Andy and Tesla are on that stage. How are you guys? Good Dave thanks for having us. Absolutely. Tesla did I say your name right? You did. Good okay I'm making sure I didn't mess that up because I hesitated there for a second. All right and where do you guys live?

Dayton, Ohio. Oh fun and how much debt have you paid off? $134,100 in seven years. Way to go. And your range of income during that seven years? Between $80,000 and $100,000. We're just a little north of that now. Cool. What do y'all do for a living?

I'm an x-ray and CT technologist at a local hospital. And I'm a massage therapist at a local hospital oh wow is that where y'all met yeah no we met through high school we're high school sweethearts so seven years 134 000 in dayton ohio would that be your house this would be our house you paid off your house looking at weird people we're weird yeah how old are you two weirdos i'm 33 and i'm 36 you have a paid for house paid for house wow what's this house worth um anywhere between 225 and 250 excellent excellent job and how much have you guys gotten your retirement nest egg now um close to 200 we're hoping to hit that goal at the end of the year here yeah okay so you're

gonna you're gonna bump up about a half a million dollars towards the net worth, right? Yeah. Going to be millionaires soon. We're almost halfway there. Yeah. Way to go. I mean, easily by the time you're 35 or 40, you'll be millionaires. Yeah.

Way to go, you guys. Awesomeness. We're pretty excited about that. We're so proud of you. So what happened seven years ago that made you decide you could and should pay off a house yeah so um before we got engaged um he told me to read your books because he had already read them um and then we got married and then we did the financial peace course yeah and we we originally paid off 46 000 in 12 months in one week when we got married yeah and we we originally paid off forty six thousand dollars in 12 months in one week

when we got married yeah and those were on student loans that was in 2015 we got married in 14 so you're working to plan right up the baby steps we just did the baby steps and we had some hiccups along the way it wasn't it wasn't perfect but you know we did it to the best of our ability and uh when we got the house you know we wanted to have children and it was get a house we didn't want to have them in this little apartment sure and so uh that's where it got tough for us we couldn't have children easily and we didn't keep track exactly but we spent between eight and ten thousand dollars with fertility treatments over about a course of a year so we weren't we weren't focused on the house at that time we were just just trying to. That's fine. That's a perfect time to do it. That's exactly what we'd listen to your show and you'd advise others to do.

And then it was, we were told we could not have kids naturally, that we needed to go through IVF. So we were not taking out a loan. Nope. We weren't about that. No. So we saved up the money that we needed and we we were planning to do ivf july of 2020 and i got pregnant naturally with our first wedding so all the signing bonus it was fun

so all the money that we saved up went to our house as soon as we had the first one we wanted to make sure everything was okay with him yeah we had another one and we held on to it for a little bit there yeah and then right right after we knew we like you say have a healthy happy home we went ahead and did it and we were done so i love it way to go y'all yeah that's a great story yeah thank you thank you i think i know somebody else that happened too yeah it's exactly right our youngest daughter same situation doctor says it's not going to happen we pursued adoption and then adopted two kids adopted two boys and we brought the second one home he was 12 days old we found out Stacy was pregnant so so we went from one to three in nine months I don't recommend that at home but I gotta ask you this because this is a really unique

story yeah and I think it'd be fun for young couples couples your age some younger than you some your age why now on the other side of paying this house off i mean they hear us talk about it why should you pay off yeah why does it matter now what's it feel like there's two good reasons right there and our and our little sons there eli and isaac and uh you know it was just something we've kind of manifested as we got engaged and as we got married and something we've just always wanted to do and be in a situation where we can control our own destiny somebody else isn't controlling it for us yeah you make a hundred thousand dollars a year you got a no payment in the world yeah and then and then I hope she's okay

with this but she's getting her master's degree in September. Yeah. And so she's going to have a master's in healthcare admin. So what will that do for your income immediately? And then even long-term, do you have an idea? Um, right now I'm kind of staying put, but if something, you know,

opens up, it will just increase our income. It'll just be a nice cherry on top. And the nice thing about it is my work is very helpful. So, um, yeah, they've paid for most of it. So there just a two-year deal with that but you know that's taken care of even if she wants to leave we can pay for it right now so she got it there and it's just see okay here's what i want

everybody here you how carefree you are with going uh if it doesn't i do this and and see that the whole thing on this is freedom. That's it. That's the play. You guys can kind of just make your own decisions. I love that answer. That's what I want people to hear. Yeah.

And you're so relaxed, by the way, when you share all these options. I mean, it was challenging. It's challenging, but I mean, you can do it. When the brakes go out in the beater car and the KFC, you know, you're using the e-brake to get through there. You're like, hey, we got to get that next car, you can do it. When the brakes go out in the beater car, in the KFC, you know, you're using the e-brake to get through there. You're like, hey, we got to get that next car, you know? It's like, we don't want to be back in those positions. Amen.

That's great. Yeah, it's been a lot of fun along the way. And we laugh a lot. We argued. The other big tip that I listened to your show when we were in our apartment, we sat across from each other doing the budget. And was miserable and I remembered you here and saying you say about sit next to one another well we changed that it changed everything right now and in a hurry and put us on the same

page you know and that that was a big key moment in our journey there yeah way to go you guys all right what's your biggest tip to get somebody out of debt if somebody says how do you do that how do you pay off your house what's the secret to getting out of debt i think you just got to be on the same page like it's challenging but we went over numbers all the time and adjusted our budgets adjusted our budget we became very comfortable with talking about that amongst ourselves and then uh just having that why you know we want to be free we don't want people to control us we want to control you know our own situation and and then uh yeah we just we just couldn't be happier with it and how it's worked out and where it's projected so we're proud of you congratulations thank you

well done thank you all right let's bring the guys into the picture here. Come on, Eli. I can't come to you. You've got to come to me. How old are they? Oh, no. This is Eli. This is Isaac. He's one.

And that's Eli. He's three. Ah, okay. Perfect. Very good. Way to go, you guys. That's fun. That's as good as it gets right there.

This is the real deal. We've been there, brother. No worries. No worries with us. It makes a great video for you. All right. Andy and Tesla, Eli and Isaac, $134,000 paid off in seven years, making $80,000 to $100,000. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Three, two, one. We're debt-free! Yeah!

Yeah! And those two little boys don't even know how big a hero that mom and dad are. They've changed their whole family tree. I mean, they're going to be 35, 36 years old millionaires. They're already half millionaires and make $100. They have no payments in the world. They've set themselves up to take care of themselves, those little boys, and anything they need to do in the future.

So well done. Such heroes. People, when you take control of your own life in a culture that has told you that you are a victim for everything, when instead you decide I'm not going to be a victim, I'm going to be a victor. When you take control, we immediately at Ramsey label you hero. Because you're standing out, you're standing up in a culture that's lost its backbone. Stand up and stand out.

Do it. Time to be a hero, boys and girls. Got little boys like that that need heroes in their lives. This is The Ramsey Show. This show is sponsored by BetterHelp. This is the season for Halloween. It's October. We're wearing costumes and we're wearing masks. If you haven't started planning your costume yet, get on it. And while you're thinking about it, I want you to be honest. A lot of us hide ourselves. We hide our true selves behind costumes and masks all the time.

We do this at work. We do this around our friends. We do this around our families. We even do this when we look at ourselves in the mirror. I know because I've been there multiple times in my life and it's the worst. If you feel like you're stuck hiding behind masks and costumes all the time, if you find yourself hiding from your true self, I want you to consider talking with a therapist. Therapy is a place where you can be honest, where you can talk to somebody else and reflect and learn and you can accept all

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That's BetterHelp.com slash Deloney. Ken Coleman, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. Thank you for being with us, America. If you want to help us out, we could use your help. You are our best marketing agent. And you do that simply by clicking follow on the show or subscribe, depending on the platform you're on. And some of the platforms allow you to click a share button and you can send the show to a friend. And you ought to do that or just cut the link out and send it to a friend.

Or if you're listening on talk radio, tell them where you listen and, hey, that show's on at this time and send them over there. So sharing and subscribing and following following those change the algorithms and all these platforms and they make them push us forward and it's working because our numbers are way up and the number of you out there is way up so thank you thank you thank you and the five-star reviews help as well ken coleman we are going on a cruise that's right i've got my suntan lotion already the live like no one else cruise uh if you are baby step four or beyond that means you're That's right. I've got my suntan lotion already. The Live Like No One Else Cruise. If you are Baby Step 4 or beyond, that means you're out of debt and have your emergency fund, everything but your house. You're out of debt.

Then you're working on the, you know, you're in a different range there. If you're in those first three things, you shouldn't be going on vacation until you get your emergency fund and you're out of debt. We tell you that. So you don't go on the cruise with us. But if you're baby step four and beyond, we would love to have you. It's almost sold out. It is March the 22nd through the 29th of 2025 on a Holland America ship that is almost new. It's a fabulous, fabulous ship.

And we are really excited. We're going to Turks and Caicos, St. Thomas, Puerto Rico, the Bahamas. All the Ramsey personalities will be on there, including me, all week. Plus, we will have Grammy Award-winning, Dove Award-winning Stephen Curtis Chapman with us, and plus we will have Dina Carter with us. Remember Strawberry Wine, a famous Nashville musician? She'll be with us. Several comedians and other things hanging out with us remember strawberry wine a famous nashville musician she'll be with us uh several comedians and other things hanging out with us it's going to be a fabulous week we're going to

be doing events that are ramsey unique events this ship has never seen anything like you people and us when we get there we're going to take over the whole thing we're the whole ship is us nobody else going to be on it but the whole it's you're trapped with ramsey people the whole week it might be a way to kind of get a spouse going you know but you need to be on baby step four and beyond right wow so there you go all right i like that idea a little motivation yeah okay ramsey personalities it's the ramsey cruise the live like no one else cruise march 22 through 29 now cabins are rapidly leaving we've only had it up for sale for four or five weeks, and it's going to be sold out very soon. So if you still want to go, you can put down as little as a $600 deposit and normal cruise routine on all that. Just go to ramseysolutions.com slash cruise, and you can join us for Turks and Caicos, St. Thomas, Puerto Rico, the Bahamas. I promise you we're going to be doing a lot of fun stuff,

a lot of special events that are just with you and me and Ken and you and so forth on the show, I mean on the ship. So don't miss this. RamseySolutions.com slash cruise. I need a little whistle behind that. There you go. All right. Sarah's in Fort Collins.

Hi, Sarah. How are you? I'm good. How are you guys? Better than we deserve. What's up? Okay. So my question is, I'll give you the question and I can give you some context.

My question is whether or not we should look at buying a home next spring, probably a little after the new year, or if we should continue to rent. So we sold both our primary home and a rental property in January of this year to help us get out of debt faster. The original plan was to rent for the next four years while my oldest is in high school, and then we were going to move out of state. But now we're wondering if it would be better to buy a house next spring after we've saved up a down payment and just live in the house for the following three years. The oldest graduates from school? Yes, he will be a freshman this upcoming fall. And so you're willing to move the other kids, but you're not willing to move the oldest? Yes, so we would have a very tight window between the oldest graduating.

The reason we're not moving before is because I have shared custody of him, and we can't move. Oh, and so the other kids are with your current husband, and he's with a former. Correct. Ah, okay. Now logic is kicking in. Okay, because I couldn't figure out why we had to be why this guy was so special that we had to wait on him but no one else but now i get it okay well i know but he's listening he's a freshman so that goes with the territory now i get it though

it makes sense what you're saying is very logical okay uh the answer that is a math formula, and what we've got to try to guess at is what we think houses are going to go up between the time you buy it and the time you sell it. Okay? And Fort Collins, Colorado is a good market. I know the market. It's a strong market. And my guess is that if you said, okay, a a home in this neighborhood talk to a local Ramsey trusted real estate agent and say if we were to buy a home in this neighborhood what would we think the appreciation would be per year for three years percentage wise is this going to go up eight

percent a year ten percent a year four percent a year what do we think it's going to go up okay and they can actually provide you hard data on that you can pull up a statistics in a statistic in the mls a real estate agent can pull this up for you it says in this neighborhood the average appreciation for the past five years has been x percent for the past 10 years has been y percent okay and you can use something like that percentage now obviously the last five years have been wacky last 10 years have been wacky it's not a normal quote real estate market agreed agreed yeah so but but you can so you temper this information with the knowledge that hopefully the next five years is not as wacky as the last five years. But you look at that, and the second piece of data that you could look at is in that neighborhood for the last five years or four years or three years, what has been the average days on the market, DOM?

Okay? Okay. So let me give you two possible math examples. What has been the average days on the market, D-O-M? Okay? Okay. So let me give you two possible math examples to show you how you would use these numbers. All right? So you say the math, because they usually kind of correlate. Okay? If the houses aren't going up much in value, you probably take a while to sell them.

Agreed? Agreed. It's not a hot super hot market so you might hear like a 270 day average days on the market nine months average and it only goes up two percent a year if that's the number you get back you don't buy a house because it's not going to go up enough to even break even with expenses when you sell it after three years follow me that makes sense yeah and it's going to be hard to sell but the other side of that equation is what if it said okay average days on the market is eight days this is a white hot market and the appreciation rate has been 12 a a year. Well, in three years, that's 36%, right?

Yeah. Well, you're going to make some money, and you're going to be able to get out of the house. That market's super high. You're probably not going to be all the way on either one of those spectrums, but that's how the formula informs you whether or not to buy. It needs to go up during the three years at least 7% a year. Okay.

That's going to be 20%, and then you're going to have expenses that are going to be 10 to 12 when you sell the house. Yes. So then you're going to make a little money, but if it's not going to go up at least that much, you're not going to make money, and you're going to wish you didn't do this. You'd be wishing you'd rent it. You see how I did that calculation? I do, yeah, and that makes total sense. Okay.

And you could call one of the Ramsey Trusted real estate agents off our website. They'll help you do that right now, knowing that maybe they can help you buy a house next spring, and you can tell them which neighborhood you're looking at. Perfect. We actually have one we use to sell our house. Oh, okay. Did they do a good job yeah they

did amazing it was such a smooth process since we sold two at one time it was it was a lot but they did awesome very good well that's what we want to hear i'm always dangerous to ask that on the air but yeah yeah no it's not because we vet those people so hard we know that they're very amazing yeah these real estate agents are amazing that we have on our in our system so folks that's the thing if you're moving into i'll tell you where that formula comes up for a lot of you out there is if you're military and they move you every two years that just means you're not buying because when you run this formula on a two-year very few markets are going to make sense it means you're renting if you're gonna if they few markets are going to make sense. It means you're renting. If the military is going to move you every two years, you're probably a renter. And that's okay. Just be

piling up cash to buy when you get out of the military. 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. Ken Coleman, Ramsey personality, number one best-selling author of the book Paycheck to Purpose, where he helps people do work that they love. He does that on the Ken Coleman Show, too, on the Ramsey Networks every day. He's my co-host today. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Thank you for joining us, America. We're so glad you are here. Laura is with us to start off this hour in Kalamazoo,

Michigan. Hi, Laura. How are you? Hi, Ken and Dave. I'm so excited. Thanks for taking my call. Well, we're honored to have you. How can we help? Well, my husband and I did our debt-free screen last June. We're on baby step seven now. And we have two working teens at home that they work because they know if they want spending money, they need to work hard and earn it. So currently, we're having them save half, spend half. I don't know why. That's just what we're doing. They don't have a budget. We haven't helped them with that yet. So I'm calling to ask, what are the best strategies to guide our teens in your principles? Very cool.

And how old are they? My son is 14, 14 and a half. He just got his first job as a bus boy and although he started a poop scoop dog poop scoop business last year um so he's a hustler and my daughter's 19 she's home from college and working this summer okay all right well all a budget is is we tell our money what to do before it leaves yeah okay so it could be as simple as a yellow pad and you put the number you're going to earn this month at the top of the yellow pad and you put down five or six seven things you're going to spend the money on until there's nothing left and that would include savings so if uh what would you say the 14-year-old would earn in a month? Give me a guess.

About $300. Okay, let's just put $300 at the top. Okay, and if you want him to save $150, you just take savings, $150, right? And then you say, what else would he spend the money on? Games? I don't know.

What's a 14-year-old spend money on these days? Oh my word. They buy cologneologne they buy food at the mall like you know okay well i mean so uh personal items food okay uh uh entertainment yeah movie tickets so uh if you want to go to a concert or a movie ticket or something like that and so just put three or four categories down through there and say okay what are you going to spend your money on i i really don't mind what he spends his money on as long as he does it on purpose yeah before it leaves because what happens is is that something will jump up in front of his 14 year old face or face or her 19-year-old face, and they'll go do that, and they haven't got money for something later like car gas.

Right. That's how adults that don't do a budget live, panic to panic. Yeah. Yeah. Is the 50-50 save-spend split appropriate? It's okay. You can do whatever you want to do. I don't care.

I would add a category. would say give yeah give save spend if you can teach kids to work and earn money and then teach them to give teach them to save and teach them to spend wisely and intentionally you have done a great job as a parent. I love that. That's really helpful. Yeah, that's what we do with Financial Peace Junior. That's what our high school curriculum, that's homeschool curriculum for teaching kids in depth about all the parts of money. But budgeting and working is certainly part of it.

And even the book. Let me send you the book. It was Rachel's number one bestseller, her first number one bestseller, Smart Money, Smart Kids. I did the book with her, and it was me as the dad and daughter, both voices in the book of how to teach kids

to be smart money, to be smart money, smart kids. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I'll send you a copy of that, and you guys read through it. It goes a lot more in depth than what we're doing, but the core principles are those four things, work, give, spend intentionally and wisely, and save. And if you can build those muscles in youngsters age appropriately from 3 to 23,

they can leave your house and they won't have to come back, except for a visit. Yeah. Yeah. Right. They don't end up boomeranging because they don't know how to live. Yeah, and Laura, I want to encourage you that one of the best things you can do is teach, model. So you speak to whatever part of the budget and your process and how you and your husband do it. But I would encourage you to just back away once you kind of do that teach and model.

And I just think one of the best lessons is failure. And I think we as parents, and I'm speaking from experience where I've stepped in and rescued. I would not step in and rescue because we're not talking about a whole bunch of money. But one of the best ways for a kid to learn budgeting is to screw it up and to be in a situation where I didn't plan that I mean we're going through that with one of our kids right now and he just blew through some money and he came to me and I went uh man that stinks and I'm not kidding you and I literally walked out of the room and it was really hard for me

but I'm just I'm just telling you that we forget as parents sometimes that failure is the greatest teacher because you've given context so that's my little encouragement is don't try to rescue remember their brains aren't developed like yours and so they're gonna think things about money and do things with money that seems just absolutely wild and wacky and by by the way, it is. They're wild and yanky. They're teenagers. One other thing I'll add to this, and if you want to take it even further,

it depends on how much you want to mess with this, but we had our kids at 14 and 15 years old open their first checking account, and they ran the money through the checking account. And I made them learn to write a check, checking account and they ran the money through the checking account now they they did i and i made them learn to write a check which it turns out was an archaic exercise that no one actually does anymore but um and uh because they they never wrote a check in their life i don't think i think they had debit cards then on those accounts and that's how they used all the money was through the debit card which is fine i don't but I want them to learn to keep up with

and reconcile, balance a checking account and manage a checking account because people run those things in overdraft, you know, like just, oh, I guess if I can keep pulling the card out, they'll just keep paying it. You know, it's like ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, and it runs up a bunch of fees. So, you know, and there's a fabulous story in the book when rachel bounced the check and i came home and there's nsf fees she's 15 years old laying on the kitchen counter oh boy i made her go her mother took her driver down to the bank and sit

with the bank branch manager and apologize for lying because she told that bank she had money in her account and she didn't and um the kid never bounced a check again i'll tell you that she's still in therapy but she never bounced a check laura's enjoying rachel's trauma way too much i love it but i, that's the kind of stuff we did. It's just, you know, you have to learn to do these things. If I can let you pay one or two NSF fees, and the guy

actually waived the fees because he thought it was so funny that she came into the office. I apologize. But you can learn this lesson and never bounce a check the rest of your life. That was valuable. It's well worth it.

You know? Valuable. This is The Ramsey Show. Ken Coleman, Ramsey personality, is my co-host today. Thank you for joining us, America. Tabitha is in Denver. Hi, Tabitha. Welcome to The Ramsey Show.

Hi there. How's it going? Better than we deserve. What's up? So I'm seeking some advice. My husband and I don't agree on whether or not to pay off our car loans. I'd like to pay them off, but he does not agree with that. He likes being in debt on a car? He tells me, and I quote,

paying off our car loans is like giving away free money based off of our low interest rates. So he actually believes that people build wealth by borrowing on their cars. I don't understand it, to be completely honest. It's something that we argue about pretty frequently, actually. Okay. Okay, so how can we help, do you think? Well, so I'm looking for ways that I can explain to him why it would be worth it to pay the debt off.

Okay. Can I ask a quick question, Dave, really quick? What's the interest rate on these two loans? So in total, we have $27,000. So $20,000 on one, and it's 3.49% interest, $7,000 on the other, and it's 2.94% interest. Okay. Well, let's address the theory that he's operating on first, okay? And then let me just tell you i don't think we can convince this guy i don't think he has any desire to be convinced i think he's already made his mind up but we will i will answer your question anyway okay is that in other words i don't think this is going to work

but i'll tell you so what he's what he's his premise is is that if you can borrow money at what did you say the interest rate was 2.7 percent right is that right one of them is 2.94 the other one is 3.49 okay so let's just call it three percent all right if you can borrow money at three percent and you could invest it in a good mutual fund that made 10 or 12 percent you're making the spread. Okay? However, he's not doing that. He didn't invest the difference. There's no $27,000 investment out there as a result of having borrowed on these cars. So his premise is 100% theoretical.

In other words, it's bull crap. Okay? Now, the problem with his premise, it sounds like if you invest money at 10% and you borrow at 3%, aren't you making a 7% spread? Maybe. But if you made a 7% spread, you have to pay pay taxes on it and you've increased your risk load your stress load and you've strained your relationships in your household and by the time you've done all of that you really didn't make any money so it's a bloody joke okay because seven percent on on ten thousand dollars is 700 bucks seven percent on thirty thousand dollars is twenty one hundred dollars okay no one ever

got rich on twenty one hundred dollars a year ever mathematically so again his premise is absolute bullcrap because the numbers break down when you tear into it another reason we know that is is that we have done we have worked with millionaires for decades and a couple of years back we did the largest study of millionaires ever done in north america we studied 10 167 of them i wrote about it in the book, Baby Steps Millionaires, and I'll send you a copy of it as my gift, okay? That might give us a chance at helping this guy, but I don't think this guy wants to be helped,

so I usually can't help people that don't want to be helped. But anyway, as we studied 10,167 millionaires, we found that 89% of them were not millionaires because of inherited money. In other words, they invested money, they handled money wisely, they lived on less than they made, they got their house paid off, they stayed out of debt, and they built wealth. And that's how 89%, 9 out of 10 of America's 24 million millionaires right now, that's how they became millionaires. Okay. As we studied Tabitha, 10,000 people who

are rich, not broke people with a car payment and an opinion, but people who actually are rich, the number of them that we found that became wealthy due to borrowing on their car at 3% and investing the difference, investing the amount instead at 10%, the number of people that did that to become millionaires out of 10,000 of them was precisely zero. None of them used your husband's plan to become wealthy. None of them. So what that statistically tells us is your husband is wrong, like you thought, okay? He loses the argument. Now, that still doesn't answer your question, how do we convince him? And I've told you three times already, I don't know if we can.

But I'm trying to tell you, you're not crazy, you're accurate, you know, he's kind of looking down like you're some kind of juvenile that can't do math and he has high math figured out. When it's quite the opposite, your women's intuition was way wiser than his screwed up half-butt attempt at mathematics yeah and i i would go so far as to say this is a cop-out this is a quick little line that he's kind of manufactured from social media or some social message out there or some car dealer who's sold him these cars and this is his quick heisman trophy stance to you like i don't

want to talk about it because i don't think he actually wants to it means you put your stiff arm out okay you might know what it means yeah the point is i know what it means thank you thank you thank you uh here's why i had to think about it oh okay i'm sorry that's okay uh so here's my point i think it's a cop out because he doesn't want to do the hard work that you're asking him to do to budget, to sacrifice, to pay these things off. That's my take. And I think I'd push in a little bit further as his wife and say, I don't feel safe financially carrying this debt. I think you've got to have a real conversation. I think it's a marriage conversation because he's not allowing for a financial conversation.

Yeah, and there's a lack of respect towards you that's just not okay. It's getting me riled up and giving you this answer. Because I kind of hear him sneering a little bit in this, like, oh, you just little lady. I think so. I had the same feel, like that little line he had in his holster, and he just kind of pulls it out, flings it at her, go it does feel dismissive i got this yeah it does yeah and and the hilarious thing is is he's a hundred percent totally wrong it's a hundred percent wrong and tabitha wins ding ding

ding ding ding ding now how to get him to do it tabitha i don't know and probably not all the snark that ken and i are employing it probably probably won't work, right? So you're going to have to be more loving and that, but I think if he needs to hear that, how important this is to you and he needs to hear that he has to respect you. Yeah. Now my wife and I can have a good argument about most anything, but I'm going to respect her opinion. And at the end of the argument, we may do one, we may do the other. There's no set rule that one of us has to, quote, win or not. But we're going to do it in a respectful way, meaning that I'm not going to be dismissive, and she's not going to be dismissive.

Like, you're just a man. You don't understand. And, I mean, she tries that sometimes. She tries that when we're, like, putting furniture in the new house. Like, I'm an idiot. Cause I don't know anything about decorating. Cause I can't even match my clothes. And so there's the problem is she's not an actual quote.

No, I mean, but that's basically the, that's basically the tone, right? Because it's also accurate. I have to think about my clothes a lot just to make sure something doesn't flash. And so, yeah. And like, you don't know anything. You're just a knuckle-dragger. You don't know anything about decorating, right? And I don't.

But I do know what I like, and it's my freaking house, so I get a say. You don't get to dismiss me. I agree. And I don't get to dismiss her. Her opinion, too. She lives in that house, too. It's her money, too. So we have to work through this.

This is called marriage, and sometimes it's earned money too so we have to work through this this is called marriage and sometimes it's um a challenge yeah tabitha roll it back on youtube and let him get mad at us that's why we do this i'll be okay i'm pretty good at pissing off reluctant spouses it's like a gift because they're wrong this is the Ramsey Show. Ken Coleman, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today in the lobby of Ramsey Solutions. On the debt-free stage, Cameron and Chelsea are with us. Hey, guys, how are you? Good. We're doing great, Dave.

Welcome, welcome. Where do you all live? State College, Pennsylvania. It's near Harrisburg. Love it. Welcome to Nashville. And how much debt have you paid off? We paid off $151,307.40. I like it. How long did this take? 42 months. All right. Good for you. And your range of income during that time? Our range of income was $71,000

to $171,000. Wow. What do y'all do for a living? I am an audiologist. And I'm a software developer and also serve part-time in the Army National Guard. Well, thank you for your service. You're welcome. How do you go in three and a half years up $100,000 in income? I graduated. Oh, there it is. And got a job. Oh, there it is. So the $151,000 might be student loan debt. It is. All of it? Almost all of it. Okay. What else? We have $12,000 in a car loan. Okay. And then the rest is student loans. Okay, so you got out of audiology school and immediately kicked the income in. Way to go. And you guys were looking at that going, uh-oh, but we also have $151,000 to go with this gift of debt. What was the plan? How did this work? How did you end up doing

Ramsey? So we go back a little bit further. Our story kind of started right after we got married. How long have you been married? Since 2018. Okay. Right after we got married, her parents actually gave us your Financial Peace University DVD box set. Oh, yeah. But we never opened it. Of course not. It actually sat in our living room for about two years. We never touched it. It makes a good little coffee table when you first get married. And then through an online audiology group,

shout out to Molly, somebody who messaged Chelsea, offered to sponsor us to take Financial Peace University online. And we took FPU. And then after the first class, we sat down, did our monthly budget, wrote down all of our debt and got really nauseous and realized that we had a problem. And then... Scares crap out of you, doesn't it? It does. Yeah. We realized we were spending about $500 a month on restaurants and other things that

we really didn't need at all. So it was kind of game on from there. We started and we were doing pretty good for about a year. And then in 2021, we coordinated an FPU class for a few of our friends. And we realized that we really weren't being gazelle intense. We didn't tighten down the budget the way we should have. And from then on, it was kind of game on. We realized we were doing it wrong, needed to make a change.

And we started listening to your podcast every day to kind of get that motivation going. And we started meeting weekly to talk about the budget and started working door dash we delivered food at night after we got off our full-time jobs and yeah that was kind of it it took a lot of work but worked your tail ends off yeah and then you get out of school and get a bigger shovel how long you been out of school two years two years okay so two years of this uh three and a half year plan so basically almost half the time you've had the

big shovel and prior to that you were just scrapping yeah yeah way to go guys way to go you got to kind of feel like accomplished you do it does it's a ginormous weight off your chest yeah you guys are heroes well done i'm just curious what was the greatest challenge for you two in this process? I think the working extras. I mean, we had our full-time jobs, but I think that, you know, the getting off at 5 o'clock and like... Pushing through. Yeah, deciding, hey, we're going to go out until 9, 10 o'clock and deliver food. When, you know, she had a doctorate degree and I'm working as a software developer, kind of delivering food just kind of feels not like something you want to do at night.

Well, is there a sense of pride there in a negative way? It's like, come on, what am I doing? And that really starts to play games with your head, doesn't it? It does. Yeah, it does. Yeah, that's very cool. I talked to a pastor one time who was leading financial peace, and he decided he was going to get an extra job, and his extra job was valeting cars. yeah that's very cool i talked to a pastor one time who was leading financial peace and

he decided he was going to get an extra job and his extra job was valeting cars and uh he said it was really rough when the guy that is in my congregation came up and i had to park his car he said that was a real pride knock it was hard yeah way to go y'. Way to go, y'all. Way to go. Was it worth it? It was. How do you feel now? Surreal, really. Free? Yes. Yeah.

Yeah. Well, a month before we paid off everything, we actually had our daughter, Katie. Oh, wow. So, we paid off everything, and then a month later, she arrived. Wow. Wow. We worked through all of that, too. And I'll just say, like, the feeling of sitting in the hospital waiting for your baby to be

born and knowing that you don't owe anybody anything is a great feeling. You didn't have to think about the money. You can just be there. She will never live in a house that has debt. Isn't that cool? Yeah, it is. That's pretty cool, y'all. You guys are heroes.

You changed your family tree. You did it for her. That's awesomeness right there. That's noble. Very well done. Very well done. All right. When people ask, they say, I've got $150,000 in student loan debt.

I'll never get out of debt. Don't they say that? Yeah. They say it all the time. Yeah. Sure hope the president will forgive it because I can't ever pay it off i'm stuck and uh you weren't waiting on biden or trump to take care of your life thank god and instead you said we're going to do this so what's the secret to paying off 151,042 months i I think definitely the budget and communication.

I think that was the two biggest things that we took away from this is our communication with one another too is completely different than it was three and a half years ago. Now, have you guys watched Debt Free Screams on YouTube? All the time. Okay. So you hear people say that exact answer all the time. Yeah. They say communication and budget.

And yet when you did it, it didn't feel like when you actually did communicate and you actually did a budget, it didn't feel like it did when you heard somebody else doing it. When they said, oh, yeah, of course, it's a budget and it's communication. But then when you actually do it, it's like, wow, that really is it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

When you can put the numbers on paper and actually see the progress, you kind of realize that, how would you do it without this? Mm-hmm. Yeah. Amazing. Very well done, you guys. Very, very well done. All right.

And Miss Katie was, oh, how old is Miss Katie? She is 11 weeks old. Oh, my goodness. That's a good enough reason right there to do all that work. Yeah. And you never have to work extra. She'll never know it. Yeah.

Wow. She'll never know those long hours. I like it. Well done. Well done. Beautiful. Changed your whole family tree. You guys are heroes.

Excellent job. Cameron and Chelsea and Katie. Right on cue. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania State College. $151,000 paid off in 42 months, making $71,171. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Three, two, one.

We're debt-free! Yeah! Three, two, one. We're debt free. Yeah. Can you imagine the audiologist covered her baby's ears? I saw that. That was a pro move. That's a pro move right there. Pro hack. Love that. Well done.

Well done. We've actually got little headphones for them in case their parents really want to scream because it scares some of the kids sometimes. But that's so cool. What a neat couple. Man, what rock stars. They just did it, man. They just did it.

I mean, that's hard. They did this on no money for the first half of their journey. And then when she starts making some money and they add the overtime to it and the extra jobs to it, boom. We get out of there and we're done, baby. We're done. Yeah. The thing I'm always inspired by when we hear these stories, and this is the latest example is these are men and women who decide that they're willing to do what it takes now to be able to live the way they want to live in the future. And at the end of the day, whether you're changing your life and your physical life,

your emotional life, your relationship life, you got to make that decision that there's some hard work that you've got to go through in order to live the life you want to live. And they're standing on the other side of this with a brand new baby. I mean, literally brand new. That's really cool stuff. Very neat. Very neat. This is The Ramsey Show. Ken Coleman, Ramsey personality, number one bestselling author of the book Paycheck to Purpose, is my co-host today. Our question of the day today comes from Travis in New Mexico. We are a family of six. My wife and I are both turning 45 this year.

Income-wise, we make about $400,000 a year before taxes. Wow. Five to 15% bonuses before tax. We're living paycheck to paycheck and cannot seem to get out of this. We're about $1.1 million in debt, including our mortgage. We spend more than $20,000 every month on expenses, leaving close to nothing to put towards extra debt payments other than vacations costing $15,000 to $20,000 every month on expenses, leaving close to nothing to put towards extra debt payments other than vacations costing $15,000 to $20,000 a year. It is almost impossible to cut into other budget items. We need help on a game plan. Yeah, you need a game plan, but the statement, it's almost impossible to cut into other- To live on $ hundred thousand dollars a year in new mexico yeah it

sounds like we've got some emotional issues with some poor decisions we've made because if you're living paycheck to paycheck on that spend every month you're just out of control yeah there's something really i mean everybody out there that's making a hundred thousand dollars a year and saving money is laughing at you right now that's just ridiculous okay so um yes the vacations need to go away and yes you probably have some stupid cars you can't afford and you may even bought a house you can't afford i don't know but i don't know what decisions you've made that eats up four hundred thousand dollars a year and you don't seem to think you have any room in that budget um and don't tell me it's because we have a family of six man and bull crap lots of families of six live on 50 and 60 000 all over america so um sorry i don't have enough information here to give an intelligent answer. That's right. But I don't.

We spend more than expenses leaving close to nothing. It's almost impossible to cut into other budget items. So my only guess here from 30 years of doing what I do is that one of you, either you, Travis, or your wife, is an absolute child. One of you is a princess. One of you gets everything they want, and the other one is afraid of them, afraid to tell them, you're a're freak you're out of control we're stopping this you're a nut we're not doing this anymore and you're afraid of them to say that yeah so i don't know which one of you it is i kind of think it's you

travis the way this is worded but you could just be scared of your princess wife. I don't know, but somebody here has put the emotional barrier up that this is reasonable and no one in America listening to this right now thinks this is reasonable. Even people in Washington, D.C. who can't balance a budget if they had to look at you making $400,000 a year and say there's nowhere to cut and don't think that's reasonable. Even a congressman would look at your budget and say that's not a reasonable statement. That's a bold statement. Wow, I don't know if it's true, and you're always right. I mean, it sounds like a congressional budget where essentially, you know what I'm seeing here, and all joking aside, I think you actually put your finger right on the nerve of this deal.

Just because you say we want the country club membership and we put it in the budget doesn't mean it should be in the budget. It doesn't mean you need to be in the country club. That's right. But it's where our family – oh, shut up. We eat there every Sunday after church, yeah, and you're broke, and you make $400,000. Shut up. Yeah, I don't know what it is.

We have some excess in the budget. Our children are all – have you seen the thing? I saw it the other day. It's the funniest thing on travel baseball. Oh, I think I know what you're talking about. I guess it was a reel. Somebody sent it to me. Congratulations, your son just made the travel

baseball team that means that you will have no weekends for the rest of your life it will cost you twenty six thousand dollars up front an additional hundred and twenty four thousand dollars a year in travel and expenses and when he graduates he will never play ball again yeah so true congratulations you've made travel baseball we can't cut that out though yeah i mean it's like yeah that's right so yeah this is um it's kind of falls in that like this there's an emotional barrier to cutting it not a reality barrier that's what i'm smelling absolutely because it's nothing else there's no other explanation for this ridiculous statement so travis is stupid man you're gonna have to do something different you keep doing what you've been doing you're gonna keep getting what you've

been getting that's the definition of insanity continue to do something different. You keep doing what you've been doing, you're going to keep getting what you've been getting. That's the definition of insanity. Continue to do the same thing over and over again, expecting a different result. You have to change, and change is hard, but it's not as hard as being broke and making 400K. I hope I'm shaming you into doing this. It's kind of a spiritual gift of mine. All right.

Ralph is with us in Phoenix, Arizona. Hey, Ralph, what's up? Hey, how are you? It's great to listen to you. Thanks, man. How can we help? Well, I have been struggling to keep my head above water for quite a long time, fighting with $75,000 in credit card IRS debt.

Wait a minute. Which is which? You have $75,000 in the two. How much IRS? $44K. Okay. And so $30,000 in credit cards? Yes.

Okay. All right. The credit cards are in a debt management plan. I'm paying $700 a month on that. Okay. And the IRS, I'm still negotiating with them. I expect I'm going to have to pay them about $500 a month. You're negotiating them on the payment amount?

Yeah. Okay. And how did you end up owing the KGB, I mean the IRS, $44K? I took some money out of my 401k and didn't pay taxes on it. Oh, there's that. Okay. Where'd that money go? Where'd that money go?

Uh, it went into a house I built and then sold and I lost the money. I got scammed and a couple of things. Yeah. I've had a real run of bad luck and bad decisions and I'm just determined that I'm not going to spend the rest of my life like this. Yeah. What's your household income? Well, I'm on social security and I'm working part-time, so I'm probably making somewhere around 50K. How old are you? 67. Okay. And so you're going to put

the IRS on a payment, you got the credit cards on a payment how how can we best help you today well i'm so tired of living like this and i've had this thought that maybe i should sell my house take the equity and pay off all my debts and just downsize and start over uh what do you owe on your home 250 what's it worth? Four and a quarter. Okay. So you would be free, and you'd have $150,000 minus $75,000, so you'd have $75,000 in your pocket. Right. And you're going to buy what?

I don't know. My credit score is 673, so I don't know what I'm going to get for a mortgage. You're not. Yeah, exactly. is 673 so i don't know what i'm going to get for a mortgage you're not yeah exactly what i've been fantasizing about is buying a nice fifth wheel rig and living in that somewhere no we don't want to die in a trailer no that's not that's not a retirement plan dude um i don't like it either yeah you're just trying to what you're after is freedom, but that's not going to get you what you want. No. How's your health?

Knock on wood, good. Are you married? No, divorced a long time ago. Okay, all right. Yeah. Now, if you sold the house today, you would be free, and then you rent something as inexpensively as possible for two years and let your credit score heal because it will heal over time when you don't have any payments and you get rid of the irs right now it's not healing as long as the irs is sitting there your credit score is going to stay down

period now okay so you're going to be renting for two years you're going to be 69 and you're going to be buying something at that point during that time however you will not have any of these payments and if you can keep your health up and continue to bring in the income, you can stack some cash on top of that $75 or $80 we got left over, right? Mm-hmm. So your purchase would not occur for two years, though. Yeah, I just don't know what I could rent. I'm at house payments $1,900, and what am I going to rent for close to that? No, you need to rent for less than that even,

and you're probably going to move away from where you are right now in order to do that. You got any buddies that are single that need to rent and cut their costs? Maybe time to go back to the roommate situation, my friend. That's right. I've given that a lot of thought about getting a roommate. I have a friend of mine's family that has been cat-sitting for me. I think I'd do it the other way around. I think I'd be the roommate, sell this house and clear the debt. Yep.

That was Ken's idea. That's a thought. It's not a bad thought. And you got a tough one there. This is The Ramsey Show. 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. Ken Coleman, Ramsey personality, number one best-selling author, is my co-host today. Thanks for joining us, America. We're glad you're here. John is on the line in San Francisco. Hey, John, how are you?

Hey, Dave, how are you doing? Better than I deserve. What's up? Hey, I'm seeking advice on how I can get my name out of a house loan. I purchased a home in 2008. I was valued at $200,000 under my credit with my girlfriend at the time. Her in-laws offered $40,000 to help us with the down payment with the promise that we'd pay them back when we refi in a year.

The girlfriend at the time and I broke up months later. I wanted nothing to do with the house. I left. We went to a UPS notary place to get my name removed out of the title, and the in-laws' name got added on the title. The loan, though, stayed in my name with the promise of getting my name out of the loan after a year or so.

I've tried countless times to initiate a refi for the house, but it never works out with the in-laws. Either they didn't get approved or the credit at the time wasn't good or they did not turn in paperwork, et cetera. 16 years later, the house loan is still under my name. The title is under their name. There's now renters in the house managed by a rental company. Uh, he has a equity of about $400,000 at this time.

I recently re-engaged with them with a new mortgage loan advisor in the picture two weeks ago to re-attempt another refi to get my name out of the loan. And it's taking them two weeks to just send back documents to get the process going. So I feel like it might end up to be another unsuccessful attempt. So my question is, what can I do in this situation? My ultimate goal is to get my name out of the loan this summer. I want to move on with my life with my new family. And I also want to ask if I have any rights to the equity of the house whenever it gets sold.

You want the equity out of the house. Is there a place for that? Really, my ultimate goal is just to get my name out of the loan. Yeah. And out of my credit. That's my number one priority. Okay. All right.

So you're a case study on what not to do. Don't buy a home with your girlfriend. Super don't buy a home with your girlfriend with her parents putting down the down payment and super duper don't do all that and then later deed the home over to them without getting your name off the mortgage that should have been done simultaneously or you should have kept your name on the mortgage you shouldn't have done any of this to start with it's a disaster it's why we tell people never buy a house with someone they're not married to. You even refer to them as the in-laws, and yet you were never married.

It's just a girl. It's your ex's parents. It's your ex-girlfriend's parents is all it is. They were never in-laws because there was no law involved in this. No, never were married. So, okay. What do you make? I make about $150,000 to $200,000 a year.

Mm-hmm. Okay. All right. Have you sat down in person with them, or has everything just been by phone or email um i was in person with them i want to say three weeks ago for a graduation uh you know i had a daughter with a girlfriend oh there's that so this is the grandparents of your daughter right yep and the plot thickens yes it does okay um and she just graduated from high school yes wow okay um

um well i i there's a lot of stuff you can do here, and none of it's going to be pleasant if you want to get rid of the mortgage, okay? So one is obviously what you've been doing, and if they go get a new mortgage and get it out of your name, then easy. That one's going to be pleasant, and if you can persuade them, assist them, even write a check for them to be able to get the loan i would do that because of the fact that they are the grandparents of your daughter um right uh before i heard that i was going to go more scorched earth but um

because these people have been dragged button along for a long time uh right now if they won't do that your options are uh aggressive that's your only options that are left i assume there's nothing in this whole stupid deal written down is there no okay no partnership agreement of any kind no transactions or anything else okay all we've got's uh what you said and what they said he said she said so um you know uh uh what i would do next if you want to get this aggressive is sit down with them in person and say i really have to get this loan out of my name i need to move on with my life our our my daughter has graduated from high school she's moving into adulthood uh you guys need to make this come to an end for me

if you don't we need to if you can't we need to figure out something else. So one option, folks, is for you to sell the house so that you can pay off the loan and get it out of money. That's an option, and you can do that voluntarily. Folks, if you don't do that, if you want me to buy you out of the house, I will give you a few thousand dollars. I don't know if you got any money at all. John, have you got any money? Yeah. How much money if you got any money at all. John, have you got any money? Yeah.

How much money have you got? I want to say we have at least saved up $50,000 for emergencies. So if you bought this house for $50,000 back from them and they deeded it to you, that would be a deal because it's got a lot of equity, right? Right. you that would be a deal because it's got a lot of equity right right so i'll buy i'll give you guys 50k and you deed it over to me if you don't want to sell it but they'd be smarter to sell it and put the money in their pocket right right okay those are two options folks if you don't want to do that then i'm going to ask a judge to rule on this situation because you're taking advantage of me and i have to stop it and so the judge is going to require you sell the house and that's going to involve

me suing you and i really don't want to do that it's going to be very expensive it's going to be long and drawn out you're going to hate it i'm going to hate it everybody's going to end up mad but the lawyer who's going to cash our checks and um so i don't want to go that way but if you guys are just going to sit on your thumbs i'm going to have to you're going to force me to do that now that's pretty aggressive and you can file a lawsuit over this, in air quotes, partnership dispute. And you'd have to talk to an attorney about the basis for that. But basically, you're forcing them to liquidate the asset to make good on their promise in this partnership that's gone awry. And that's the legal basis for what I'm talking about. But you're going to end up suing these people if they won't voluntarily go get a new

mortgage or sell the property or deed it over to you. And any of those proposals are fairly aggressive, but it's time somebody get off their thumbs here. And that somebody is those people. The grandparents of your daughter. This is the Ramsey

Show. grandparents of your daughter. This is the Ramsey show. Ken Coleman Ramsey personality is my co-host today. Thank you for joining us America open phones at 888-825-5225. We're so glad you're here. We appreciate you hanging out with us. The best way to make the most of your money is to make your money behave. Tell it what to do instead of wondering where it went. That is called a budget. People who plan things are the ones that execute the plan, and they're the ones that win at anything. No one accidentally gets to Florida from Tennessee.

It requires a plan. You don't just wake up and go, huh, I wonder how that happened. No, I mean, you got in the car, you got on a plane, you had a plan, and you executed the plan. Same thing's true with your money and building wealth. It never happens by accident. No one ever became a millionaire and went, I wonder how that happened. No, they do it on purpose, and that's by giving every dollar a name. That's why we call the world that's by giving EveryDollar a name.

That's why we call the world's best budgeting app EveryDollar. It'll help you to budget out every single paycheck. It'll help you work the baby steps, and you can download it for free in the App Store or Google Play, and you can go to EveryDollar.com and download it for your desktop for free, and you can upgrade it to the premium to hook to your bank and get a bunch of other coaching and things involved and help you a whole bunch here. So check it all out. Every dollar in the App Store.

Kelly is with us. Kelly's in Raleigh, North Carolina. Hi, Kelly. How are you? Hi. Good. Me and my husband are huge Dave Ramsey fans, so we're really excited to be on the call. Well, we're honored to have you.

So me and my husband have been doing really good at budgeting we've been following dave ramsey plan um and we actually finally had some wiggle room in our budget um to put extra debt payments um we've sold some assets and stuff um but then he lost his job last week so now now we're back to the point where you know we're trying really hard not to use credit cards um and we were looking at he didn't get any severance uh no it it was a small company and it didn't end on good terms so um no unfortunately no we were just kind of high and dry just dumped dumped. Yes. And what do you make? Well, I'm self-employed.

I started a bookkeeping business, and I've been doing it full-time for about six months now. But we're making about $10,000 a month gross. What are you netting? I'm paying myself about $45,000. No, I didn't ask that. I asked what you're netting you make ten thousand dollars you run a small business you have a net profit per month what

are you netting on ten thousand dollars what are your margins you're a bookkeeper um about about five thousand it's pretty good profit yeah so why can't you live on five thousand dollars a month well because we've made stupid mistakes and we lived above our means. We know that. And so we have $100,000 in debt. Not counting your house. Right, not counting our house. On what?

Which is $88,000 is our house. No, I said not counting your house. Right. You have $100,000 not counting your house or counting the house? Not counting the house. Okay, what's the $100,000? What kind of debt? Credit cards, consolidation loan from medical debt, things like that.

How much is cars? Actually, we have two older vehicles, so they're paid in full. Okay. So it's all credit cards and debt consolidation from other credit cards? Yes, and medical stuff, too. $100,000? Yes. Okay.

All right. That's pretty close to about $5,000 a month in payments. Yeah. Okay. And what was he making? I mean, that's pretty close to about $5,000 a month in payments. Yeah, okay. And what was he making? About $4,000 a month. Doing what? He was a generator service technician.

He works on generators? Yes. Okay. Like commercial, obviously. Yeah, like whole house generators yeah so we're talking mechanical work yes okay service repair maintenance how long ago do you get laid off a week ago a week towards the end of last week, yeah. Oh, not even a week. Okay. Ken? Yeah, I got to jump in and say he needs to be getting busy right now doing as much freelance mechanical work until he can get another mechanical job. I can tell you in his particular talent field,

I know he's specific in that generator field, but with his ability, he should be getting as much work as he can until he lands another gig, at least completely replenishing what he was making. But this is not a, oh, we're trying to avoid credit cards. No, no, he's going out and he's working like crazy, fixing stuff everywhere. I mean, your area of where you're at in North Carolina, fantastic job economy. If you're anywhere near Raleigh, North Carolina, we're talking about a booming economy, a lot of people, a lot of cars breaking down, a lot of machines.

He is getting after it. Two jobs, three jobs, if these are part-time jobs, like I said, just like filling in at a garage where, hey, we need a couple of extra hands around there. It's intensity, intensity. He has such a transferable skill right now to where per hour he should be making really good money and quickly. Yeah. You know, bottom line is someone who knows how to turn a wrench regardless of what they're turning it on. Someone who knows how to analyze something like a generator breaking down and diagnose that can work on a lot of different things.

That's what Ken means by transferable skill. And what we want to encourage him to do and you to encourage him to do is to get over the shock and the pain of having been fired and dumped out on the street with nothing get over that anger as fast as possible because the best revenge is success right well and so he was helping me part of our gazelle intensity was uh he was helping me bookkeeping at night. And because I'm very small, we were considering letting him, you know, try to help me grow the business because I could use an extra hand. Does he know how to do bookkeeping?

He can help me with some of the more basic things, yes. Yeah, but that's extra. He's been working with me. Sure, at night, that's okay. But he's not going to be able to, you're not going to be able to pay him what he could make out in the marketplace, are you? No, not immediately, no. But it's kind of one of those hard situations where I can't really grow the business. You don't have the ability to invest in your business right now. You have to have the money now.

He has to go get a work. That's right. Him working in your business right now is an investment that you don't have the money to make. He has to go create an income right now. Like by next week, I want him working somewhere doing something. And to keep the wolf away from your door so that you guys get where he needs to bring enough you guys can eat and pay your payments. And then we can start talking about, you know, building up the business, working at night, working weekends. Maybe he shifts and goes a whole other direction with his career even.

I don't know. Is there something else he's talked about doing that's fun? Yeah, I mean, he's pretty talented. He's pretty well versed at a lot of different trades. And you're well aware right now that the trades are just a boom. It's the best thing to be in because you can just get hired in 20 seconds. That's why Ken and I are sitting here encouraging you to do that. Kelly, just to show you, I just Googled mechanic jobs in Raleigh, North Carolina.

And I'm looking at three right here. One just says maintenance technician. I haven't clicked on it. It's $25 to $35 an hour, full time, no degree required, includes health insurance. I mean, you understand this. You understand it. Okay. So this is just about, let's move on.

He can make $40 an hour. Absolutely. Well, we're a little over an hour away from raleigh that just was the closest city yeah um yeah but drive your butt over that direction and get a job hello yeah i get it right i get it but there's lots of things in your area where people need someone today's point that can turn a wrench yeah and your husband knows how to do that he can he's talented he can do a lot of stuff and then continue to grow your business. And if he wants to quit and join that business someday,

when you guys can get large enough to justify that. But you called me in a crisis. The first thing we have to do is put the crisis to bed. Yeah. With the triage. And then we can come back later and talk about investing and growing your business. That's the first thing.

Don't get the two confused. Yeah yeah and your husband's very marketable and once he gets past being pissed off or being fired so he needs to go do this today move today urgency this is the ramsey show ken coleman ramsey personality is my co-host today in the lobby of Ramsey Solutions on the debt-free stage. Mark and Stacey are with us. Hey guys, how are you? Hi. Hey, we're doing good. Welcome, welcome. Where do y'all live? We are outside of Annapolis, Maryland in Odenton. Oh, fun. Welcome to Nashville. And how much debt have you guys paid off just under ninety three thousand dollars all right and how long did this take do you remember 19 months 10 days love it okay and your range of income during that 19 months we started off

at 178 000 and last year we ended over $200,000. Good for you. Well done. What do you guys make? I mean, what do you do? I'm a licensed esthetician. And I'm an IT professional. Awesome. Very cool. Good job, guys. What kind of debt was the 93? Okay, well, I have a list because it's a lot. Okay. the irs money we had three credit cards two cars four cell phones two personal loans peloton and a 401k loan and a partridge in a pear tree yes you guys were normal pretty much yeah we borrowed on everything in sight that's pretty much normal wow so what happened 19 months ago what was the wakeup call, and how did you get tied into Ramsey? So I discovered the podcast and started listening to that, downloaded every dollar.

We have two teenagers, so realizing that we had no money for college was kind of a driver. Yeah, scared the crap out of you. Sick and tired of not having enough money. Sick and tired of being sick and tired. So you start listening to this crazy podcast, you come home and Mark said, what? She's definitely the brains of this operation. I mean, she listened to you guys endlessly. I heard your voice constantly in our house. So I knew we were in good hands.

Like a fingernail down a chalkboard. Yeah. She is endless, but it's great. But he paused his 401k. Oh that was huge for him wow he did not want to do that yeah yeah and so you went along for the ride i did at times uh begrudgingly but you did it that's good good for you guys well done well done thank you very fun so an endless podcast absorption which gives you a lot of instruction, a lot of little nuanced ideas on things to work on. And what did you guys do from that point?

Really just work the plan. I'm a purist, but we worked with what we had. Yep. So what do you tell people the key to paying off 93 in 19 months is? So the things that I wrote down that were important to us were um well actually hold on just making the decision i mean it's that simple um i had heard your podcast before but it didn't stick um but once we decided um following your steps as prescribed exactly don't question it and then um combining accounts we were married 19 or well 20

years this year and we just did that wow so was that kind of weird does it feel real awkward yes it was a little bit but totally worth it yeah and then six months later you go why don't we do this earlier yes pretty much yeah yeah that's why most people experience it yeah i mean you kind of had your own deal for 20 years and then you slam dunk together right it's like there's a culture there's a chakras through your system you know but then once you get a new rhythm it's like wow that we should have been doing this all along right and being flexible because things always change so yeah they do even even in 19 months they do yes yes that's very cool very true very true way to go y'all thank you you've been married 19 years have you ever been debt-free

during the 19 years no no we've never not had a car payment wow yep always a car and i have said i will always have a car payment sure that was permission to get a new car if you were going to pay one off. Mm-hmm. As soon as we get paid off, we can't live without a payment. We got to go get another one, yeah. That's it, yeah. That's the way the mindset of the American works now.

But not you. You're weird now, officially. No, yeah. And the best kind of weird. Yep. Yep. Well, when normal's broke, you don't want to be normal.

You know, it's that simple. Way to go, y'all. Yeah, I have two questions. The first one's a quick one. Do you still have the Peloton, and do you use it? We do still have it, and I use it every day. All right, all right. That's huge.

It's good use. That's big. And this is for you, Mark, and you're a hero in this, too. So this is actually, I think, would be fun. I'm not in any way calling you out. But as the reluctant spouse, I mean, we've seen that on you, and you're hearing the story you know uh what would you say to other spouses who right now their spouse is eating up the podcast they're on youtube they're listening on radio they're just talking

about it all the time and it's very similar situation that you were in uh because i think you have a unique perspective here what is the key when you're the reluctant spouse and you've got one that's on fire? You just have to be patient with it, suffer along through the process. That's good. I mean, like I said, she's the brains of the operation, so I followed her lead, and I started paying attention to the things you guys were saying

and just cooperating with her and trusting the process, of course. Even when you don't agree necessarily, you're not 100% bought in? Is that what you're saying? Correct, yes. One of the big things was eating, and we didn't get to eat out a lot. Right. And we just had to have specific things that we ate right but i see a little trauma there mark you're like there's some food items that you

don't ever want to eat again there's some good news is the food scene in nashville is incredible that's right so you're gonna be able to find you some great restaurants while you're here now that you're dead free well yeah that's true that's so good you guys thank you i completely agree with that and um i don't want to put words in your mouth but the way we're those of you listening only you're not seeing what we're seeing with mark but it looks to me like as i'm watching you you said she's the brains of operation two times but i kind of think you went along with this just because it meant a lot to her and you love her that is true yep it looks like not necessarily had anything to do with you liking

it it just this she's really fired up about this and i love her so i'm going with it yep yeah that's cool thank you there's nothing wrong with that that's a good thing you're a good man that's a good man yeah well done well done you guys are incredible thank you heroes you changed your whole life you changed your whole family tree permanently i hope it's permanently yeah well done well done you guys are incredible thank you heroes you changed your whole life you changed your whole family tree permanently i hope it's permanently yeah well done never going back man never going back now that we're free now that we're combined it's all on game on game on game on very cool and now we can actually send these kids to college and pay for it yes that's right because we got a couple hundred thousand bucks a year and no payments ding ding ding ding proper college choice good choice on uh what we're going to study to make it worth it and both of you got those fields both of you got great fields that you're in

so uh very cool very cool so much all right bring up the kiddos introduce them let's hear their names and ages so this is sadie she's headed off to a community college in maryland all right and she's 17 and this is chase and he is 16 and he is a junior in high school all right way to go you guys very cool i love it i love it excellent job all right from annapolis or just outside annapolis, Maryland. Mark and Stacey, Chase and Sadie, 93,000 paid off in 19 months, making 178 to 200. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Three, two, one.

We're debt-free! Yeah! Yeah! Buy that man a steak. yeah right and a couple appetizers i love it congratulations you guys that's powerful yeah that is powerful it is interesting uh the dynamic that goes on when one spouse gets fired up and what you've got to work through and that was fun to watch and mark's a really good sport but a good guy obviously as well and so uh because there wasn't a stop and stacy once she got on it you can tell she's a dog on a bone man she's

getting it you know so uh that's a lot of fun and they did it they did it they did it 93 000 paid off in 19 months and i think about about that, guys. That's a lot. Some of you are sitting out there going, I've got student loans, and I'm stuck, and I'm a victim. Shut up. Roll up your sleeves. Suck it up, buttercup. Look at what those two just did. They proved it.

They're heroes, man. Their kids are going to college now. And you know why? Stacey looked up and said, I don't have the money. That scares me. I feel like a bad mom. I'm not doing this. Yeah. You know, doing this. Yeah.

You know, they happen to life. Instead of everything happening to them, they just decided we're going to happen to this problem. And that is just inspiring. Yeah. Pretty incredible. Way to go, heroes. Way to go. This is The Ramsey Show.

Our scripture of the day, Psalms 101, Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked, or stand in the way that sinners take, or sit in the company of mockers. Sit in the company of mockers. Al Bernstein says, Success is often the result of taking a misstep in the right direction i'll go with that i can resemble that folks selling a house the ramsey way makes home buying and home selling a blessing instead of a curse the ramsey trusted program is the only way to

find an agent you can trust that we trust to keep you on track with what we teach here at Ramsey and get the best offer on your house or find the right house for you. We send some of the top agents, we send you some of the top agents in your area and we have vetted them and that's the only reason we trust them. Many of them we've worked with for decades. We interview them, we decide which one you want to work with and then Ramsey, you decide which one you want to work with. Then Ramsey Tr, you decide which one you want to work with. And Ramsey trusted agents have years of experience. They know how to get a house sold. Check them out. Find a Ramsey trusted real estate agent for free at Ramsey solutions.com slash agent. Kyle is in Memphis. Hey, Kyle, welcome to the Ramsey show. Hey, Dave, thanks for taking

my call. I appreciate it. Sure, man. What's up? Hey, so I'm currently trying to decide if I should quit my day job and pursue what is currently my side hustle. I have a degree in landscape design. I really enjoy doing it. And what I do is I build custom outdoor living spaces, patios, pergolas, big kitchens, and stuff like that. That's your side hustle? That's what I did full-time. My wife is in dental school.

I'm sorry. What's your side hustle? Doing that. Oh, okay. What's your job, your day job? I'm just a project manager with a commercial construction company. Okay. And how much are you making on your side hustle? Your day job. I'm just a project manager with a commercial construction company. Okay.

All right. And how much are you making on your side hustle? Well, right now, I've grossed $100,000 for the year right now, and I've netted $48,000, $49,000, something like that. What do you make in your day job? $60,000. So we're really close, right? No, you already made $48,000 already made 48 yeah i know but he's making 60 i'm saying he's close to no no no he made 48 in six months in six months i'm sorry annualizes 100

all right i'm making more at your side job than you are at your day job that's right so yeah interesting why would you stay oh well the kicker is we're only in memphis for another 18 months my wife is finishing up dental school in just under two years and we don't know where we're going to go but neither her family or my family is from memphis and we're definitely getting out of there during during the during the 18 months that you're there you have the ability to make a hundred thousand dollars a year working on your own right yeah or you can work for the other people and make 60 yeah or you could do both well i that that's kind of the kicker so i approached my current boss and wanted to make sure i was in the clear because we're a commercial construction company.

What I'm doing is all residential, but it is still construction. So I wanted to make sure I was up front and that there was no compete issues. He gave me the green light. I guess he wasn't aware of the scale of the projects I was doing and how efficient I could be at doing them, you know, doing, you know, do a whole project like that on the weekend. Um, so he came back after about two months and said that he had changed his mind and he would only allow me to do it.

Um, if I brought him my lead database and all the customers that I had run demographics on to advertise to let him pick through them, run the leads he wanted to sell and then give me the rest. And I mean, he doesn't sell them in that market you're saying exactly so now he wants to get into the market um no i think it's more of a pride thing no i'm sorry he wants to sell to your leads that's correct but they don't currently have a product line in that segment, you said? That's correct. So now because you're successful, he wants to open up in your segment?

That's correct. Yeah, he's taking authority he doesn't have. It's not his call. Yeah. Bye-bye. Yeah. Yeah. And can I just jump on what we said earlier, Kyle?

Because Dave's right, you're making more money in the 18 months that your wife is finishing school, but you don't have to leave right away. And this is a transition plan for you. You're making more, which means you're saving more. And now if you and your wife figure out where we want to go in the great United States, wherever you want to go, well, guess what? You're still working for for yourself you take some time and figure out all right I've got experience I know how to build this business where is the best place to go I just think that it puts you in the absolute best position short term and long term to go ahead and cut ties and work for yourself is there something going on at, or at the current place that I'm missing? Because you painted this guy up to be a complete opportunist crook. He's, he's been with the company for 40 years. Everybody knows he's kind of a problem, but they can't really get rid of him because he's been there so long. They don't, he just, he's a problem all the way around

and so um so um i don't know if you want to stay i would i would uh jump above the chain of command i'd go above his head and say look here's what he told me and now here's what he's trying to do and so i'm going to quit if you guys don't if you guys enforce what he wants me to do i'm gonna put it i'm gonna put his head on the block okay well i mean you'll be honest i was kind of hoping kind of hoping you guys would say that because i was yeah you have nothing to lose what are they going to do say no we're going to keep him he's been here 40 years he's a problem you're screwed fired and then you go do your thing you don't lose anything in this conversation you can kind of swagger in there with the take this job and

shove it attitude that's right i mean you don't have to be a smart ankle but but i would go to his boss and say listen so-and-so told me this on this date you don't happen to have that in an email or anything do you no i did it all in person okay no that's fine that's fine i would have followed up with an email for cya but uh especially if you know the guy's a potential problem but anyway too late now doesn't matter because you're you're going to keep doing the side gig the only question is whether you're going to continue to work at this place if you're if you're doing what if you're taking our advice that's what we're advising you to do so i if you want to just walk out that's fine and go do it that's fine if you want to keep both potentially but have an adversarial relationship with uh said goober then uh you

probably jump over goober's head and you sit down with his boss and go, look, he told me this. Now he's telling me this and I'm not going to do that. So he's, so, um, now you guys have to decide, are you going to allow me to do this or am I, are you going to force me to quit? Yeah. I quick follow up on this, Kyle is, what do you think that his, his boss is going to say to you? You got a gut?

Um, yeah, I. Real real quick tell me what you think what's your gut telling you that you're gonna fire you or is he gonna work it out i think he'd tell me you need to quit or you're getting the boot yeah and okay so i've got a quick dave i want to run this by dave real quick kyle i gotta i gotta i want dave to take on my on my second thought i think i call this dude's bluff. I think he's a bully. I think he's a bully who's been somewhat successful. We see this all the time in small business,

and they're scared to deal with him because they perceive value in him, and I think he's a bully. And if that's true, I wouldn't go above his head because of that very reason. I'd just look at him and go, hey, man, all due respect, I don't have to give you any leads at all, and's not what you told me i'm just going to keep doing my thing and just just be respectful like dave said not be a jerk about it but call his bluff see if he's got you think he'll fire you uh he might but my kind of like you said and what my whole logic was. So what?

Not that big a deal. Is he a bully? Am I on to something or am I wrong? I don't mind being wrong. Cowardly? Yeah, I think it's more of a cowardly thing. He's not a people person. He's very detail-oriented.

Are you taking time away from your current job to do your sad hustle? No, sir. I strictly do it evenings, weekends. So you're not cheating them in any way? No, sir. I'm with Ken. I believe I'm going with Ken on this. Call his bluff or just walk out.

One of the two. Either one's fine with me. That's right. Either one's fine with me. There's nothing fun about this whole thing. I'm probably just leaving. I don't want to deal with that crap but yeah life's too short kind of category that puts uh this hour in the books we'll be back with you before you know it in the meantime remember there's ultimately only one way to financial peace and that's to walk

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