The Ramsey Show - Don’t Let Toxic Relationships Keep You From Building Wealth

Episode Date: August 5, 2024

📱Finish today's episode for free in the Ramsey Network app. Dave Ramsey & Jade Warshaw answer your questions and discuss: The stock market fear is mostly emotional (so far), "My mom took out credit cards in my name," "Pause the Baby Steps to save for medical bills?" "My friend isn't paying me after a real estate deal" Support Our Sponsors: NetSuite: Free KPI checklist, visit netsuite.com/Ramsey BetterHelp: https://www.betterhelp.com/Delony to get 10% off your first month The Wellness Company: urgentcarekit.com/ramsey for 15% off medical emergency kit Zander Insurance: Go to zander.com or call 800-356-4282 for a fast and easy quote today. Next Steps 📞 Have a question for the show? Call 888-825-5225 Weekdays from 2-5pm ET or click here! 💸Enter The Ramsey Cash Giveaway for a chance to win $10,000! 📚 Shop the $12 Sale to get life-changing tools to help you make real progress! 💼 Get your business road map ❤️Get $100 off tickets to Money & Marriage Getaway. 💵 Start your free budget today. Download the EveryDollar app! 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. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host. Jade Warshaw, number one best-selling author and Ramsey personality, is my co-host today. Open phones at 888-825-5225. You jump in. We'll talk about your life and your money jade uh producer james has requested that we address current events which we seldom do on this podcast because we never know when you

people are going to listen to it because by the time some of you listen to this it won't be current anymore but current events are that the stock market is uh has dropped dramatically in the last couple of days um and um cue the whining screaming and gnashing of teeth that everyone's going to die and we're all going to retire and have to eat alpo routine not good for democrats if the stock market goes down and fears of a recession are looming not good economics um unseats more administrations than anything else in history so um those of you worried about other things anyway um the reason number one most of the time we just talk about stuff here that you could listen to it three years from now and it would still be the same answer and it helps you all the time it's called called modular or evergreen content and uh but anyway stock market's down and uh so far kind of a yawn except it hadn't

been down in a long time it's been a couple years since you all have experienced a downturn like 20 was pretty dramatic took a big old dive there's something going on in march if i remember of 20 and the old market took a dive. And the world was coming to an end, and we were all going to die. And, you know, then too. You remember? I mean, that's just like, God, I'm out of my head. What was it in March 2020?

I don't remember. But it affected my memory. But I've got PTS, Fauci. And so Fauci PTSD. But anyway, here's the deal. If the thing levels out sometime this week, uh,

it's not even going to make the top hundred worst days. It's pretty much a yawner as downturns go. This one's not really exciting. Now, if it continued to dive your day over day, over day, over a thousand points a day for four or five days, we'd

have something to actually discuss but right now it's more of your emotions that we want to address because here's why is the stock market going down dave why is it going down well because the jobs report came out and said jobs suck job worst jobs hiring worst hiring quarter in a long long time um more people unemployed nothing like the 80s nothing like other times when there was real unemployment but it's actually a downturn there there's some other indications the fed is screwing around again yeah which is a good way to get a president or a vice president unseated as well if you want to throw them out just screw with the interest rates boys that'll do it and um so they're gonna they're gonna screw around with

that apparently and uh you know everyone has declared there's a recession you one more time people you don't get to declare there's a recession there's a definition of a recession well have you heard people say vibe session have you heard that no it's the feeling it's the vibe that we're in a recession i'll go with that there is a malaise out there there is a cloud a fog whatever out there a vibe session i'll go with that but because you can define that as a feeling it's a feeling but a recession is not a feeling you got to go through economic fact gross domestic product gdp is the measure of all goods and services in the u.s has to contract be less than two quarters in a row what it was before that is the definite until it does that it's not a recession that's right i don't care why it feels i don't care you feel

if you want to call it a vibe session or what? A vibe session. That's right. A vibe session. A vibe session. It sounds like a session where you had vibes. But yeah. It sounds like an album.

But the album cover. An old vinyl from the 70s when drugs were good to your parents. And that kind of stuff. Anyway. But yeah. So. All right. Investors are running for the hills.

They're selling off crypto and especially tech stocks. So Bureau of Labor stats report the U.S. economy added poor jobs report. AI is still a scare. This article from CNN says, and it says recession fears are mounting overall. And so the Fed, and they're worried about the Fed. So AI, the Fed, the jobs report all pour into this idea that things are horrible and so the stock market is overreacting and and you might add that Iran and Israel might be we're getting about the dance so um not gonna be good for Iran just I've been to Israel several times not a group of people you want want to mess with. So there's a lot going on.

There's a lot going on. It's got everything screwed up and turned up. And let me tell you about this. Short term, the stock market going up or down is a bunch of drama queens. They run on a motion on a daily basis. Overall, over an annual period or four you know, four or five months, it runs on numbers. But on a day-to-day basis, you can, you know, you can just shout,

the sky is falling, the sky is falling, and Chicken Little will run. So what do you do out there when you see the stock market drop? I don't do anything i'm tempted to buy because i think it's on sale but i don't do anything because i don't day trade yeah i don't i don't buy and i don't sell based on this crap yeah i just keep buying all the time every every month i just keep buying dollar cost average gonna load my 401k up. Going to load my Roth IRA up. Going to load up my automatic draft on my checking account that goes into the mutual funds. And when it goes down, I'm going to smile because I just bought it on sale.

Because 10 years from now, you won't even remember this crap. 10 years from now, you won't even know who was president. You'll have to think about it who was quick who was president 10 years ago see i got you all right so anyway but that that's see what i mean it's just like you you you get all torqued out about this stuff you you know you mean there was a oh yeah i remember yeah do you even log in and check i i do not if i see this headline i came in and james said we need to talk about the stock market. And I said, what? And he goes, don't you watch the news?

And I said, no. I don't watch the news. I saw somebody post something about it on Instagram. And I was like, okay. But I think that the people who watch their accounts like that, that's where the temptation lies. Well, that's like a Dr. John Deloney anxiety producing event. Don't do it. If you check your accounts every morning,'re a spaz okay yeah you're gonna spaz out you're you

know you are asked if it's not a hobby that's just weird don't i don't even look at i look at mine once uh twice a year yeah and if i'm doing some kind of year-end final i'll say okay how did it do compared to the other indexes this year do I need to move anything but I'm just you know for 35 or 40 years I have put money in put money in put money in taking almost no money out and there's a lot of money in there well let's talk about that for a second Dave because we we both said I'm the type of person you know I set my 401k contributions. I set, you know, all my contributions, they're set. They happen automatically. I'm not thinking

about it. But for somebody who might say, well, Dave, is now a good time for me to throw in some extra money? I'm at 15%. Can I go in with a lump sum and buy more? No. Just because you don't want to build up the muscle of day trading and timing. You don't want to try to time the market. All the data, all the research tells us people who try to time the market make less money than people who steadily invest. There's like 15 or 20 serious research projects that reveal, mathematically, if you steadily invest over a 10-year period of time versus trying to jump in, trying to jump out, trying to catch it,

trying to, you screw yourself by dancing with the devil don't do it this is the ramsey show what does the future hold for business ask nine experts and you'll get 10 different answers economic growth or a recession business taxes will go up or down AI will help us work or it will replace us all. But there's no such thing as a crystal ball. That's why more than 40,000 businesses have future-proofed themselves with NetSuite by Oracle, the number one cloud enterprise resource planning system. Ramsey Solutions uses NetSuite and you should too. Whether your company's earning millions or even hundreds of millions, NetSuite helps you respond to immediate challenges and seize your biggest opportunities. With one unified business management suite,

there's only one source of truth for the visibility and control you need to make quick decisions. NetSuite's real-time insights and forecasting help you see into the future with actionable data. And when you're closing the books in days, not weeks, you can spend less time looking backward and more time focusing on what's next. And speaking of what's next, download the CFO's Guide to AI and Machine Learning at netsuite.com slash Ramsey. It's free at netsuite.com slash Ramsey. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host, Jade Warshaw. Ramsey personality is my co-host today. Javier's with us in Salt Lake City. Hi, Javier. How are you? I'm doing well. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? So overarching question is that my mom took out a bunch of loans in my name.

She's making minimum payments, but I'm trying to kind of get this whole thing sorted out and out of my name. How would you suggest that I approach her, the situation as a whole? How old are you? I'm 27. When did all this happen, hon? It started back in 22, I want to say 21, 22. It was after my divorce.

So I was kind of just starting caution to the wind and just saying yes to everything. Oh, so you agreed to her doing this? Yes. It all started because the landlord wanted to sell the house that I grew up in, but she's currently living in. And she offered us a pretty good deal. And my brother and I, we bought the house together for my mom, and now she's struggling to make the payments, and I'm just waiting for the day that I get a call that, hey, your payment's due, and my wife and I, we can't afford the payment ourselves,

so I just don't know what to do. Wow. You bought the house together for your mom. And then she took out credit card loans in your name, all with your permission. Yes, sir. So whose name is on the mortgage? Yours?

Mm-hmm. Yes, sir. But she's living in the house? Mm-hmm. Yes. Rent-free. And the property is titled to you as well, correct? Correct.

She's paying the mortgage. It's just that her credit was too poor to actually take the loan out herself. So going back to the other debt, the other loan, how much money are we talking about on the credit cards? Shy of $20,000. And what does your mom make a year? She's self-employed. She won't really give me a straight answer.

If you had to guess, what would you say? Not much. She doesn't work much. She sucks blood off of her sons. Okay. She's a parasite. It's a horrible thing to say about your mother. I'm so sorry.

Just an observation. What's your living situation? I am currently living in an apartment in utah and the house is in another state yeah all right and your wife is not happy with this situation i would assume she is not and i'm not either okay all right okay um and how old is mom? 55. Ballpark. Yeah. Okay. So, um, and what is the house worth that she's living in?

Uh, I would say three 50 to four. And what do you owe on it? I want to say two 20 to 50. I don't honestly know. Yeah. Is your brother also on the mortgage? Yes, my brother's on the mortgage as well. And on the deed as well, yeah.

What's your brother saying about all this? My brother wants to keep the house, and he's just happy to go along because he wants to keep it for sentimental value. I personally agree with your team, but it's just a house. We can get another one. Yeah. So, um, what would I do if I woke up in your shoes? This is going to be what is called a difficult conversation. My friend, your mom has gotten away with this misbehavior under producing under-producing and unbelievable asks of her grown sons rather than taking care of herself.

A 55-year-old woman ought to be able to build a sustainable life without sucking the blood off of her children, okay? Or man, for that matter, okay? So this is not positive positive your mom is not in a good situation mentally and spiritually because otherwise she wouldn't have done this to her own kids and of course you all aren't because you allowed it to happen oh no you straight up endorsed it so what what i would do if i woke up in your shoes is I would go, how long ago did you get married? My wife and I, we got married a month ago.

Okay. This is going to come down on your wife if you're not real careful from your mother. Your mother's going to blame her because she's the new thing on the scene, and about that time you evict your mom. So she's going to end up blaming your wife if you're not real careful. So your wife does not need to be anywhere near this conversation nor do you quote her nor do you even bring her up she's not physically in the room she's nowhere around because not her fault okay so you need to travel with your brother and sit down with your mom and say guys i can't do this anymore i'm looking at the future 10 year 10 years into the, and all I see is pain and trouble.

There's a problem here. You're ruining my credit. I'm waiting for the phone call when you don't pay the mortgage. And so what we're going to do is we're going to sell the house. We're going to pay all the debt off, and we're going to pay the taxes associated with selling the house if there are any there shouldn't no there will be because it's not a personal residence you may have some capital gains on this so you pay your taxes and then you say as for my half of what is left over equity mom i'm going to give that to you as a parting gift and you can go set yourself up a life with that and I'm not

going to do anything anymore in the future that's it brother you can do with your half whatever you choose to do if you want to help mom get a house with that that's fine I'm done we're selling the house we're paying off the credit cards and I'll give you my half of what's left over after that, after taxes. Do you anticipate your brother holding up that process? Or do you think that he'll go along with it? I think he would hold it up because he's not big on Ramsey. I found you guys because I found your book, Breaking Free Broke. Well, I mean, forget about the Ramsey part.

Just the idea of you cleaning this up because it's very messy that's the thing to do with ramsey's got to do with your mother screwing her own kids over yeah i honestly think he would not go along with it because he's seeing it as an investment on his then he can buy you out anything he can buy you out that's another option but honey we're selling the house. If he doesn't want to sell the house, then it's going to be a civil court action, and the judge is going to demand that the partnership be dissolved by the selling of the house. We're selling the house.

I'm not asking. We're telling you. This is what we're doing. Now, if you want to buy me out, that's okay. The way you need to think of this is this is saving your marriage, by the way. Yeah. Because your wife is not going to sit around and let your mom be the reason that she's not in her new house. You guys are in an apartment.

You've been married for a month. If this messes around and causes you guys the future that she's envisioned, you're going to have a much bigger problem on your hands. Yeah. Mom, I love you. And I've done more for you than I should have. And I put myself and my future family in jeopardy because of you. And you continue to misbehave with this.

My bills are not being paid. You're destroying my credit and my future. We're selling the house. Little brother, if you don't want to sell it, you can buy me out. You got 10 minutes. Ready, set, go. You're on the clock. Okay. sell it you can buy me out you got 10 minutes ready set go you're on the clock okay because

your little brother's codependent like you were until something woke you up and again this has got nothing to do with Ramsey don't you blame it on your ex don't you blame it on your new wife and don't you blame it on Ramsey it's not Ramsey this is you stood up I'm a 27 year old freaking man with a backbone and this is is madness, and the madness ends. It's not a sign of love to continue in codependency. This is not an act of love. There's no love in this discussion. You can be kind, gentle.

You don't have to be yelling and screaming, but we are selling the house. You can either do it voluntarily, or I'll have a judge make you sell the house. We are selling the house. So y'all get your heads around that, whatever flopping in the floor and foaming at the mouth you need to do, but get your heads around that. We are selling the house. It's not an option.

The only other option is, brother, you buy me out, or mom, y'all buy me out. Get me off the mortgage and pay off all the credit cards, and you got to do that in 90 days and you got it ready set go and if you're not going to do that we are selling the house the best thing for mom by the way sell the house put some money in her pocket tell her to get a freaking job self-employed for her is code for i don't work much that's what that is that's code this 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 the parts of yourself over time and start living an authentic life. Masks and costumes should be for Halloween parties, not for our emotions and our true selves. And if you're considering therapy, try calling my friends We'll be right back. at any time for no additional cost. Take off the costumes and take off the mask with BetterHelp. Visit BetterHelp.com slash DELONI to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp.com slash DELONI.

Jade Walsh, our Ramsey personality, is my co-host today. Thank you for joining us, America. The $12 sale is here through August 31st at RamseySolutions.com in the store. $12 books help you raise money, smart kids. That's right. The Smart Money, Smart Kids, number one bestseller by Rachel Cruz and me. On sale for $12. $12 books help you get out of debt, build wealth.

That's right. Baby steps millionaires. That's right. And, of course, you can get the total money makeover, $12. $12 books help you build a peaceful and joyful life. Dr. John Deloney walks you through the six daily choices you need to make and build a more peaceful life, building a non-anxious life. $12 resources help you find work that really matters,

like Ken Coleman's book, Paycheck to Purpose. All of these amazing deals, RamseySolutions.com. Mac is in Seattle. Hey, Mac, welcome to the Ramsey Show. How are you doing, Dave? Better than I deserve. What's up? So I am currently a business analyst.

I work remote, and I'm 28 years old. I have a fear of sooner or later becoming unmarketable, make a decent wage, but I'm basically working off a bachelor's degree. And so I'm trying to decide if it's worth taking a student loan out to also cut time from my current job to either go back in an MBA or an MBA adjacent or completely do a career shift into something that is a little bit more desirable, a little bit more fulfilling, but might even be a dip in terms of my compensation or who knows what a career would bring with that. It's kind of a question of, do I continue to do something I'm good at, but not necessarily something I'm stoked about?

Or do I kind of mix between doing that with an MBA or completely shift, you know, take the time now to shift into, you know, something completely different for the rest of my life, but also taking a financial risk with that. Well, I'm definitely not interested in you going into debt to further the education. And I'm certainly not interested in you going into debt for a job that you're not even really stoked about. Right. So that's the first thought. My second thought is, what would be the other thing that you would do that might, you know, bring less money, but you're happier doing it? What is what do you have in mind when you say that? So for the longest time I've wanted to be an architect, but I know that that market is a bit saturated, takes a lot of credentialing to eventually get to a point where you can make a decent bit of a wage and have a good healthy income.

Okay, you're making decisions based on a wrong assumption. Here's the wrong assumption you're making, that degrees or credentialing cause people to be successful. Nope, they don't. Degrees put tools in the belts of people who are going to go leave the cave, kill something, and drag it home. Credentialing puts tools in your belt. And so the reason some lawyers are successful and some aren't is not because of law school.

It's not because of passing the bar. It's because they chose to get it. They chose to get out in the market and climb and grow and be ambitious and read and continue their own growth curve and approach it and so the reason some architects you know anytime i hear the market's saturated i just think of lawyers they're freaking everywhere god we can't get rid of them. They're like roaches. They're everywhere. And yet some of them make 500 bucks an hour. You know, it's killing me.

Same thing's true with architects. There's always somebody that gets better at their job, you know, continues. There's other people can't seem to find a job making a living as a CAD supervisor, and they've got an architectural degree. But that's got to do with the person not the degree and not the space and not the credentialing you know i've been podcasting for god's sakes you know who's got a podcast every human on the planet has a podcast you know what's causing this to be one of the top five podcasts in the entire world nothing to do with

credentialing buddy i'll tell you that Nothing to do with credentialing, buddy. I'll tell you that. Nothing to do with my dadgum degree. Nobody even asked what my degree is. I got a PhD in DUMB. So what I want you to do is figure out what you want to do with your life and go be the very best at that. If you need to put some tools in your belt, fine. But don't sit at home doing remote work worrying about the marketplace. The marketplace

is always going to kick you in the stomach if you suck, and the marketplace is always going to fill your wallet if you're awesome. I think that we need to make sure you leave here. Ken Coleman has a really great book, Find the Work You're Wired to Do, and inside of it there's an assessment that you can take, and I think it's really going to help you figure out what it is that you want to do. And then the book is going to help you walk through the results of your assessment. So you can really narrow in and hone into what it is that you want to do. Because here's the thing. I don't want you going off spending a bunch of money when you have a bunch of question marks.

Exactly. And I do want you to go get an MBA if it's part of the tools for your belt. It's an excellent degree field but it's a horrible degree field for somebody that doesn't want to be in business that wants to be an architect so it would be a bad idea you know don't do that but hey and business analyst with an undergrad man I got a friend of mine's a 42 year old guy he's a great 43 year old guy he made 250 last year he's got an undergrad that's great he's got an undergrad in finance he's a business analyst and he's you know what but he's really good at it you know and he works really hard and he's good with people and he sees has common sense insights

when he's doing his analysis not just crunching numbers like some broke finance professor so you know that's the trick man don't believe this lie that because i got a degree i'm guaranteed something or because i go get another one that's going to be what opens the door to a fully saturated market you gotta add the secret sauce to it no no you boy parents teach your children that their cause of their success is them that's. Teach them to stand up straight, bathe regularly, shake a hand and smile. And brush your teeth. You got to bathe. And don't send your mother on your job interview.

Teach your children to have some moxie, some confidence. Teach them to do hard things and scary things. And teach them to persevere when they get a little bit scared, not collapse on the floor. Teach them to have some skeletal structure to their character and to believe in god who loves them and is bigger than them and will carry them through when they don't think they can get through teach them these things and then let them get a degree but quit worshiping it not not picking on you mac but it's just it's it's uh everybody out there quit worshiping at the altar of where somebody went to school nobody gives a crap where you went to school nobody ever asked their oncologist right after they got a cancer diagnosis now where

did you go to school nobody ever said that ever how many of you even ask your divorce attorney where he went to school you didn't care you just want get me out of this all you care is didn't they do their job do they know what they're doing and all you care is did you put the tools in your belt while you were studying nobody has asked my gpa ever once since i left school 40 freaking years i've been waiting for somebody asked for no one has ever asked me for my degree i don't even know where it's at you know how some people have you mean the little the little diploma the little paper that people put in a frame and like put behind their their zoom man i got mine i got mine like framed did you yeah i was so proud because i just barely got out i got out okay but no one no one cared no one ever asked me about it you know they they had that

little thing that's what you call the graduation ceremony uh-huh did you walk you didn't walk i walked to work i was working that day because i was hungry the idea of spending money and taking a day off from work when i had a buck 67 in my checking account that's what i walked that's the truth no oh man I you know oddly enough though my son graduated from business college I got a degree Daniel several years what 15 years ago 10 years ago 12 years ago whatever it was at the University of Tennessee same business school I did and they let me do the commencement exercise that is a full circle moment so I got to I got to walk that is very very full and I went up there like like a academic

type person or something with all the little hats and stuff. It was pretty cool. I had a full circle moment like that when I graduated with a music degree. The first cruise line I auditioned for to be a vocalist, I didn't get through the audition. But when we became talent agents, they were the first agency that we signed as working. So I was like, wow, this is a full circle moment. I don't know if you realize this, but when I auditioned, you said no. I wasn't good enough to sing for you, but I'll hire all your singers.

There we go. They'll remain nameless for now. It sounds like something cruises, yeah. CruiseLine, Inc. Yeah, that's right. This is The ramsey show you know my philosophy on planning and preparing being proactive is always better than being reactive we have a provider we recommend that can help you stay prepared for unexpected medical situations i have a medical emergency kit from the doctors at the wellness company.

And guys, let me tell you, you really should check this out. This is not a simple first aid kit. The medical emergency kit contains doctor prescribed medicines to treat over 30 common and serious medical conditions. Ivermectin, the life-saving medicine. Generic Z-Pak to shorten the duration of colds and flu you feel coming on, amoxicillin for infections, earaches, strep throat, and pneumonia, a medical emergency kit from the wellness company. It's like having an urgent care in your home. Order 100% online in minutes, then fill out the brief questionnaire in your email and your kit

ships to your door. Visit UrgentCareKit.com slash Ramsey and use the promo code Ramsey for 15% off. That's promo code Ramsey at UrgentCareKit.com slash Ramsey. Jade Walsh, Ramsey personality, number one bestselling author, is my co-host today. Thank you for joining us, America. Sarah is in Atlanta. Hi, Sarah. How can we help? Hey, y'all. How are you doing? Great. How are you? I'm doing great. Thank you so much for taking my call. My husband and I, we have three small children. We have a four-year-old, a two-year-old, and a one-year-old. And in January of this year have a four-year-old, a two-year-old and a one-year-old. And in January of this year, our four-year-old got diagnosed with leukemia.

And so I'm, yeah, he's actually doing super well. So, you know, it's not been quite as bad as we thought, but I'm calling because my husband and I are wondering if we should pause our baby steps and just save money, or if we should go ahead and continue with the baby steps. Definitely pause and save money. What baby step are you on? Two? Yeah, we're on baby step number two. We only have $7,000 left on a car, and we could actually pay it off today. It would just be kind of a big hit to our savings account. How much is in your savings? We have about $11,000, thanks to our community raising money for us when he got

diagnosed. What's the prognosis? Is it a situation where you're going to go through this line of treatment and then everything should be good on the other side? Do you have a timeline in mind? It sounds like you do. Yeah. So for most leukemias, it's three years of treatment, but the first eight months are like extremely hard. We're actually right at the end of that eight months. He went back to school today, which is super exciting. I know. It was great. And we're super blessed. We got something called Katie Beckett Medicaid. If you're familiar with that, it's a type of Medicaid that for families that make more than the Medicaid limit, and it'll come behind like a child and will cover the 20% that your insurance won't cover. So we're actually not

looking at massive medical bills. The scary part is that like at any point you could get an infection and we could be in the hospital for 10 plus days and I just may have to take FMLA. Okay. So that's kind of what we're dealing with. What do you like? My husband and I net about a hundred thousand dollars how much of that is you um i make about sixty thousand of that okay with the growth like i've obviously become less but all right not number one jade's right the very first and you've already done this and if i'm in your situation um we got grandbabies that age, there's job one, beat leukemia. No other job.

Total focus. Okay? Job one. If there's any crumbs left in our lives, emotionally, spiritually, financially, after we do job one one we can talk about doing other stuff but it's only if there's crumbs left okay so it's i i would never uh personally nor would i ever recommend you do anything except beat cancer that's it yeah okay period now uh it sounds like you're entering the second season which is lighter by your explanation i don't know anything about that but i'm going off of your explanation

okay yeah that's correct and and this this is more of a uh you've gone from very intense to a maintenance if you will is i'm using layman's terms i have no idea what i'm talking about that's what i think i'm hearing is that right yes it's actually called maintenance wow stumbled into it who knew okay and so um you know it's not you know in other words we've kind of gotten past a the panic that when you say that that c word over my child. And then we've also now gotten the other side of the tough medical, eight months of hell. And now we're going to put the finishing touches on the death of cancer, right? But that's going to be a little more gradual.

We've gone from a sprint to a marathon. Are these metaphors working at all? Oh, my gosh absolutely okay all right i'm just trying to understand i want to make sure understand for us so what i want to say is what we always say is when you're facing a storm stop your debt your baby steps stop your total money makeover and address the storm and so what you and your husband have got to decide is mathematically, financially, a month from now, two months from now, with the eight-month period in the rearview mirror,

do we feel like we're out of the storm? It's still raining, but the wind quit blowing and the lightning quit crashing. Do we feel like we're in a predictable, sustainable environment where we feel safe to go ahead and pay off the car safe to resume our financial plan without putting the cancer treatment process in jeopardy at all that that's the way i'd look at it okay when you feel safe yeah when you feel safe then you go again So like if you lose your job, which is nothing in compared to what you're doing, but it's still a thing. You know, once you get the new job and you get a paycheck, you push play again and you go. You're the other side of the unemployment storm, right?

Once you have a child, a pregnancy, it's not in the same bucket emotionally, but it is still a situation where we stop, we pile up money, mommy and baby come home, we push play again. So when we get the event, the situation, no matter how scary or negative or positive it is

in our rear view mirror, then we push play and we go. But we don't try to do uh we don't take it down to a thousand dollars and try to beat cancer in a four-year-old no no that's just stressful that that feels stressful yeah i think yeah it's just we've had some stints where he's gotten an infection and we've been in the hospital for a long time and i've actually we've both worked through it like working from the hospital and it's very hard emotionally yeah no well you're probably gonna do that anyway because you want to just keep careers you want to keep life moving but that's not got to do with hitting the total money

makeover baby step goal that's just got to do with we just got to keep this thing rolling we got to keep the wheels on the bus you know well yeah that's a different posture when you're working because you need some you because you need to keep working versus there's no money in the account. If I don't work, we won't be able to pay the bill. That's a whole different level of stress. How many of those trips has he had? When we first got diagnosed, it was seven days.

No, the infection trip. Only one so far. Okay, all right. Yeah, so hopefully no more. It's the only cloud. It's the worst cloud still hanging over this situation, other than we know we've got some discomfort, but nothing like we've had before going forward, right? Yes.

No, he's like 99% prognosis. Wow, that's awesome. That's great. It's honestly, when you live in the hospital as much as we do, you realize how lucky you are when this is all you're facing. So we've got a lady here named Shauna that came into my office 17 years ago, or no, 14, 15 years ago and said, my three-year-old has leukemia. And she worked in accounting, and you can't do accounting.

Your brain doesn't work when you're doing it so anyway we paid her and paid her through all of it and the ladies took care of meals and the guys took care of keeping the grass cut and then pretty soon we had a little ball headed three-year-old running around the office and we're celebrating with her and the other day we gave away Ramsey scholarships and she walked walked across the stage and gave me a hug. Graduated from high school. And I got to take a picture with her the other day. So there is a good ending to these stories.

Yeah, we have so much hope, and we have such a good community, too. So that makes all the difference. We can hear it in your voice. Yeah. You really can. You're very joyful. Attitude's everything here. it really is yeah it's a lot of it so hey we're with you if you need any more help you call us back but i you know just

use good common sense babe take care of baby first and then once we're clear of the storm don't let the worries of the world keep you from going and winning what might be but use good wisdom okay thank you all so much i appreciate it thank you god bless you sarah wow that's a good differential dave because in in her case yeah this this has the ability to be a three-year stint but it's not it had two two seasons that's right so thinking through okay do i need to truly be paused for three years or is there a point where I can say. I'm okay if you are. If you are, yes.

But in her case, it seems like there might be a point before that where they can put a foot on the gas again. Making $100,000, they got some money in the bank. They're only $7,000 away. They're not $107,000 away. It'd be nice to have that car payment gone while they're doing this. I'm sure. And it'd be nice to have that stability and so and guys just remember if you have an emergency come up and you have zero debt and twenty five thousand dollars

in the bank for an emergency fund sometimes not that kind of emergency but some emergencies are a mere inconvenience the drama starts to leave your life when you get your crap together i know that's right. Hello. So that's what these calls remind me of. She's a hero. What a great mom. Wonderful. Wow.

This is The Ramsey Show. Do you ever feel like you're finally making progress towards your goals only to get quickly distracted by something else in your feed? Well, that's why we created the Ramsey Network app, your single source for content that keeps you motivated. The Ramsey Network app is designed to keep you laser-focused on reaching your goals. Loaded with over 7,000 hours of Ramsey shows, this free app is the best place for uninterrupted content and no distractions. Plus, you can search specific questions to get more personalized content in seconds.

So for the days you need some extra motivation, you'll have proven advice at your fingertips. It's time to get serious about your goals and shut out the distractions for good. Simply search Ramsey Network in the App Store or Google Play. If you're listening on a podcast, just click the link in the show notes to download our free Ramsey Network app today. 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. Jade Walsh, our Ramsey personality, number one best-selling author, is my co-host today.

Open phones here at 888-825-5225. Tyler's in Orlando. Hi, Tyler. How are you? Hey, I'm good. How are you hey i'm good how are you better than i deserve what's up hey i have a question about a real estate deal that i did with one of my friends okay all right so i gave him nine thousand dollars back in september and then as of he was supposed to sell the house, it was part of a down payment for a house that he bought, and he was supposed to pay me back by January, or I gave him eight grand in September. He was supposed to give me $14,000 back in January,

and then he showed me a picture of the bank account with all the money. Then I gave him $1,000 dollars more and he bought another house. He did a 1035 exchange to another house. And, um, and then he was supposed to pay me back, I think 25 K plus some extra for the taxes. And that was supposed to be due in April. Um, he's given me $2,500 back out of the right now. As of now, he owes me 29,500. Um, I have it all in contract and in writing and today's the date.

I actually made a new contract last month and said that he owes me the full amount 29 500 by august 5th which is today and if he doesn't pay me back that then he has to pay for all the court fees attorney fees and a thousand dollars extra per month in interest okay why has he not paid you extra per month in interest. Okay. Why has he not paid you? I don't know. I mean, he told me. Did the house sell? No, he said it.

He always says that it's going to sell. Oh, the house hasn't sold. So he doesn't have any money. Yeah. Do you think contracts magically make him have money? No. He doesn't have any money. That's why he's borrowing from someone like you.

Yeah. Have you seen the properties? Yes, I have. And right now... So the first one sold, right? He said it did, but it didn't. Okay. Okay.

Was the first one ever rented did he ever rent it out was it yes did it ever have rental income no no then it is not involved in a 1031 only income producing property can be in a 1031 flips do not qualify for a 1031 so he didn't and besides that if it didn't sell he can't roll it into the other house so that 1031 tax deferred exchange did not occur okay um so basically he owns two houses right now neither one of which have sold yeah and how old are you? 23. And how old is he? Maybe 30-ish.

Okay. And why did you think this was going to work? I mean, I was skeptical of it. I mean, I had the contract, so I wasn't, like, too worried about losing the money. Okay. Well, you're learning a very harsh lesson that I learned early in business, and that is that contracts don't make bad deals good. Contracts are simply pieces of paper that say what happens when everything blows up

and melts down. They don't make bad people good, and they don't make bad deals good, and they don't make money appear on the scene that's not there. But I have a contract is never a defense for getting into a really stupid deal so um you might end up spending thirty thousand dollars so the other house you could you probably lost your money but anyway let's play it through the the current property that we're we're waiting on both of them to sell right yes sir do either one of them have

$29,000 worth of equity? Yeah, yeah. Okay. Well, I guess if I were in your shoes, I would try this. I think this will be much more successful than suing on a contract because that's a three-year process. It's going to cost you $15,000, $20,000 in legal fees. Right now, you've got $2,500 of your $9,000 back. So right now, you're only bit to the tune of $6,500, right? Yeah. Okay. That might be the most expensive tuition that a 23-year-old's paid lately. but if you pay tuition to the School of Life and that's all you pay instead of $65,000, it's not too bad. But let's see if we can salvage this. It doesn't sound like he's a liar, except about the part on the first house selling

in the 1031. It sounds like he's a neophyte, doesn't know what the crap he's doing. He took some TikTok thing on how to buy real real estate and i kind of know that because he got a 23 year old as his financier who came up with a whole 10 grand okay this is not like a high roller here that's got like ultimate real estate experience so i think he's just dumb is what i'm saying okay yeah i don't think he's evil yeah i bet if the house is sold you would have had your money yeah yeah i think he hoped the house would sell and you'd have your money and you're you were naive that's being kind to think that a contract was suddenly going to make sure that money appeared contracts don't do that he has no money dude until the house sells so why don't you go to him and say

instead of suing you my financial advisor suggested that I take a second mortgage lien on your property and that you sign a lien for $30,000 on both properties. So now you have a $60,000 position. If he doesn't, and put terms to that, that that has to be paid on sale or within six months, whichever is first first and he can go refinance and buy you out okay okay now if he does not then you don't have to you don't have to sue you merely have to foreclose okay and foreclosure is a lot cheaper and more efficient than a lawsuit okay so go to him and say instead of suing you and instead of you and me going to court and all this, I'm waiting on the house to sell, you're waiting on the house to sell.

I'm either going to sue you this week, or you're going to give me a second mortgage lien for $30,000 on both properties. And then you don't screw him. Whenever you get your money, you release the other property. But whichever one sells first, you get your money. Okay. Does that make sense? Yeah, that makes makes sense and don't do this again did you learn your lesson yeah okay if you get out by the skin of your teeth don't act like you're a pro you just you just lucked freaking out if you get

out of this deal this is a deal where you deserved to lose nine thousand dollars if you get out of this deal. This is a deal where you deserved to lose $9,000. If you get out and don't get what you deserve, you can buy the T-shirt better than I deserve and learn your lesson and move on. Wow. He'll be lucky if he gets his money back. I have done so many stupid things that I deserved to lose money, so I can say that to you, son. Oh, my gosh.

Yeah, you just walked up on the thin ice and said, please crack, I want to be wet. But he had a contract. I know. I'm just joking. The ice promised me it wouldn't crack. Oh, boy. Yeah, when you're doing business with broke people,

please expect them to do broke people things. And we know the guy is broke because he borrowed $9,000 from a 23-year-old. Who knows if these properties are going to sell for what they hoped and if there's even going to be any profit. No idea, but it'd be fun to foreclose on it and see if you really want it or not. That might be interesting. This is The Ramsey Show. These days, it's not if your identity gets stolen, it's when. And the only ID theft protection plan I have ever recommended is from Zander Insurance.

It helps real people with real-life situations. Like the call we got on the show recently where a woman's abusive ex opened a credit card in her name and racked up over $8,000 in debt. Then the bank sued her, even though the charges weren't hers. What a mess. With Xander's help, she was able to get the entire nightmare cleared up, and now her family is officially debt-free. Listen, Xander's Identity Theft Protection is the best option out there.

They have all the cyber tools and monitoring services you need. They cover all types of ID theft, and they even include up to $2 million in stolen funds protection. In the end, though, you need an ally, someone on your side to take over the work and fix the problem. That's what Zander is all about. Go to Zander.com to learn more or call 800-356-4282. Hey, good folks, Dr. John Deloney here. Don't you think life is too short to hate Mondays?

Listen, you're worth loving the work you do and where you do it. So guess what? Ramsey Solutions is hiring. If you're ready to join an amazing team that's all about changing lives and spreading hope, we want to see your application. Right now, we're hiring for technology, sales, marketing, writing, copy editing, and creative roles. Check out all our job postings at ramseysolutions.com slash careers. That's ramseysolutions.com slash careers.

So I've learned so many silly little sayings from other generations because I'm on the air with the cool people around here. And I, so I learned that like when Biden forgave the student loans, that that was sus. Oh yeah. Suspect. Yeah. I didn't know what I had learned what sus was. So there you go. And I learned about FOMO. FOMO. Yes. Fear of missing out. That's a real thing. apparently motivates people to do really stupid things with money facts sometimes and uh other things too uh i'm going to give you a fear of missing out and it's not a stupid thing to do with money and you should not be doing it if it is a stupid thing i'll help you with this the live like no one else cruise is almost sold out we have the entire ship on holland america march 22nd through the 29th the jade warshaw will be with us um all of the ramsey personalities will be with us

sharon my wife and i will be on there for the entire seven day cruise uh plus stephen curtis chapman who uh not only is um emmy award winning 67 doves or something like that but last week steven got inducted into the uh uh grand old opry that's great yeah he was telling me about it he was at the house monday night with a bunch of guys and um he was uh last week and just tears in his eyes it was a huge huge honor for him because he he grew up of course singing country music and he's one of the world's best renowned christian artists as you know and so anyway we're going to turks and caicos saint thomas puerto rico the bahamas we'll be doing events and things and performances and talks and whatever else you want to call it on the ship the entire week it's

going to be a blast um it's almost gone you can still get uh you can still get a room, a state room, but you need to get your deposit of $600 down before the cabins are gone. You don't have to pay for the whole thing up front, but you don't need to go on the live like no one else cruise unless you are baby step four and beyond. Yeah, for sure. We don't tell people to go on vacations when they're in one through three, and that includes vacationing with us. I heard George was going to be bouncing at the doorways. Bouncing what? You know, the bouncer. He can't bounce anything.

George was going to be security checking. George the kit bounced, but he's not. Was he at the daycare? Checking the baby steps cards. Where's he going to be a bouncer? Where's George going to be? That's not even funny, y'all. That's just insulting.

Oh, man. So, hey, this is a chance for you to celebrate your process through the baby steps, a milestone in getting to baby step four or beyond maybe seven maybe you do your debt-free scream with us maybe could be the world's largest debt-free scream at c because if it's the only debt-free scream at c it by definition is the largest debt-free scream at c so we're going to do that for sure well maybe we need to get the guinness book and give people give them a room or something on there so ramsey solutions.com slash cruise get signed up we'd love to have you go with us matt is in new york hi matt how are you hey dave doing great how are you better than i deserve what's up uh so just a quick question

i'm getting married next year i have a full-time career in the military as well as two part-time jobs. Just opened up a Roth IRA and put in an initial $2,500. I'm looking to see how much you suggest I put into it either on a monthly basis or an annual basis, being that I'm also trying to save up for a home as well. Good for you. Are you debt-free? Thank you. Yes, I am. Good for you. Are you debt free? Thank you. Yes, I am. Good for you. How old are you? Thank you. I'm 24. Thanks for serving your country, sir. Thank you for your support. I appreciate it. Yeah. So if I'm you, you've already paid off your debt. Do you have three to six months of expenses saved up? Yes, I do. I have about maybe $8,500 to $9,500 saved up. Okay, good. So yeah, officially you're in 3B or 4, whichever one you choose. And what I would do,

so you're investing 15% of your income. So if that allows you to max out that Roth, I would max out that Roth. Now, most people would say 15% of your income every single month until that's gone, until you've maxed it out, right? And then you could move on to another investment vehicle. So do you think you can max it out? Yes, absolutely. Because I'm also looking for it. I mean, I'm definitely money hungry to put it in the easiest way. So i'm trying to find you know all sorts of multiple side hustles and everything everything you can yeah i heard you say you have two other part-time jobs so you max out this roth what other uh what other things do you have available to you

through the military that you can put money into tsp tsp thrift savings plan yeah okay yeah so i i A TSP, Thrift Savings Plan. Okay. So what we want you to do at Baby Step 3B, 3B is saving for a house and or investing for retirement. Obviously, the more you put into retirement, the less you'll have to save towards a house. Agreed? Correct. So the most you would put in at your stage would be 15% of your household income, your total income, until you're married.

Once you're married, the total income of the household needs to go into retirement, a maximum of 15%. Some people back the 15% down a little until they get their down payments saved. Some of them do the whole 15%. We suggest not doing more than 15% at this stage. Instead, put it all toward the rest of everything else towards the house. But if you want to do 10% or you want to do the Roth, and that represents 8%, I don't know what your income is and all that, but, you know, whatever you guys want to do and then start saving towards that house, that's great. Who's paying for the wedding? My fiancé and I had actually, our parents offered to help us uh immensely but

my fiance and i both felt like uh you know we would feel personally more more accomplished if it was paid off ourselves uh so we are we're paying for the wedding ourselves wow what's the budget uh we're looking at we're looking at about $27,000 right now. Is that money already saved? Yes, it is. We have about $46,000 in a joint account as of now. Okay. No more joint accounts until you're married except the wedding fund, okay?

Yes, that's exactly. And no buy house with somebody you're not married to. Yes. Okay. Absolutely. I appreciate it. I'm curious why you felt like you should not have mom. Yes. Okay. Absolutely. I appreciate it. I'm curious why you felt like you should not have mom and dad pay for the wedding. That's a traditional thing.

It doesn't mean you're like a deadbeat if your father-in-law pays for the wedding. No, absolutely. I mean, and like I mentioned, they did offer to pay for it. I don't know. I guess it's something personal, you know, personally that I feel. Just being able to say that, you know, I paid for something myself. I saved up and I paid for something myself. How'd they take it when you told them? Were they a little disappointed? They were taken back that we didn't want help, but they're going to wind up giving us a huge gift in exchange.

Okay. All right. I guess we can use that towards the house. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And with the military benefits, we don't have to put a down payment on the house, but I'm not sure. I haven't looked into it that much um but being that we don't have to put a down payment i'm not sure how exactly that works um oh you do you do need to put

down a down payment don't use a va loan va loans are more expensive than conventional okay so you need to do a fannie mae with a traditional down payment and above your emergency fund and above your wedding so there you go very cool very cool that's interesting i have not you know that's um from a generation not him but that's from a generation doesn't want to pay their student loan well everybody's not like that i know everybody's not like anything but the um and i paid for both my daughter's weddings, and I did not think poorly of my sons-in-law in the least. I had no expectation they would do that. That's what's kind of like I'm an old southern dad, and that's what I did.

Like here's the budget, and y'all do it within that, and don't ask for any more. That's it. But if they had said, you know what, Dave, we got it, would you have been like, oh, man, or would you have been like? I would have been a little bit taken aback like he was. And I was like, huh? Yeah.

I mean, it wasn't like I'm going to give him. Yeah. Oh, well. Yeah. It's there's nothing wrong with it. It's just different. Yeah. It's not an expectation of character or lack of character, folks, if you're in-laws pay for your wedding.

I'll say that out loud. I don't think that's true. So if they don't, there might be something else going on there, though. You think so? He didn't say that. But if there's a lot of strings attached, you don't want to activate the mother of the broadzilla. You don't want them to come out of their cave and all that. There's all kinds of stuff that you might want to do that for.

But, oh, well, okay. Cool. This is The Ramsey Show. Hey, folks, there's a lot of half-baked investing advice out there. But here's what you can do to get more confident about this stuff. Check out the SmartVestor program. SmartVestor connects you with local financial advisors who have the heart of a teacher. They'll help you level up your knowledge and build a retirement plan based on your goals, not theirs. Go to RamseySolutions.com slash SmartVestor to get

connected and get more confident about your plan. That's ramseysolutions.com slash smartvester. Ramsey Solutions is a paid non-client promoter of participating pros. Learn more at ramseysolutions.com slash smartvester. Jade Walshaw, Ramsey personality, number one best-selling author, is my co-host today. Thank you for joining us, America. I am Dave Ramsey, your host. Katrina is with us in Salt Lake City. Hi, Katrina. How are you? I am fantastic. Thank you so much for asking. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? All right. So I am going through a divorce and it's really hurting me financially. So I'm wondering if I should take money out of my business account

that I'm actually trying to sell because of the divorce and use some of that money to buy things for my primary job. What is your primary job? I am a school teacher and tomorrow I go back to school and the kids come back next Tuesday, but I need to buy some supplies for the students to come back to school. I'm sorry they don't furnish you supplies for the classroom like they should? Well they give me which would make you every school teacher in America? Well yeah thank you they give me five dollars a student but I've already spent that I bought glue sticks and colored pencils and um pencil pouches for the students and so what are you talking about spending

I need paper hand sanitizers folders um and journals what are you talking about spending um I'm thinking I need about two hundred dollars what type of business do you have? What's the nature of it? So, um, so in the, in the evenings I run an escape room. Um, but I'm, I have to sell it according to the divorce decree. I have to sell it, um, so I could pay, um, back some of the equity that I owe to my soon to be ex-husband. Do you take you take you take a payroll from the business um i don't it doesn't make enough money so i just i run it um and and then like it pays for okay if two hundred dollars changes your life you have other problems well right now i mean i just i'm i'm barely finished baby step number one i've been been using your EveryDollar app. If you have to choose between you eating and buying your children hand sanitizer, you eat.

Okay, I get that. Okay. And so if you're down to nothing, if you have no money and $200 is a huge amount to you, where you get it from doesn't matter. It's where you spend it that matters you don't have the option to be this generous to these students contact a local church and ask them to help you with they've got some journals laying around and maybe they've got some hand sanitizer they can give you from the children's ministry and help you fund this

help you get the thing set up without you spending the $200 at Target. And, you know, let's go that route because it sounds like this $200 is a lot of money to you. Yeah. And you've got, you need to work on the other side of that. And that's the overall income. I think I'm tutoring instead of running a game room. Escape room. Yeah. Today's question of the day is brought to you by WhyRefi.

If private student loan debt is taking away your peace of mind and you don't see any way out? You need why refi. That's why the letter R-E-F-Y. They refinance defaulted private student loans. If you have one, they'll refinance it for you. Nobody else will touch it. And they give you a low fixed rate that is built for you on a term that makes it work for you so you can get your loan paid off and get it current so it's not trashing you every month. Go to yrefi.com slash

Ramsey today. That's the letter Y-R-E-F-Y dot com slash Ramsey might not be in all states. All right. Today's question comes from Nora in Pennsylvania. She says, I've been married for almost 30 years and my husband and I have adult children. My husband runs his mother's family business. He will inherit the business when she passes, but he says that the business is not going to be mine if anything happens to him. He says his will is going to state that our children will get the business and that he will not be providing for me. I've explained to him how upsetting this is and that I shouldn't have to go to my children for help when it is his responsibility to care for me. I live on a fixed income.

My adult life as a stay at home mom. What can I do to protect myself legally? Wow. you can't so you have a you have a marriage problem my goodness you don't have a legal problem you're married to a jerk um that's a problem yeah i thought this question was going in one direction and then it turned left and went off into the ditch. It sure did. So, honey, you need to go see a marriage counselor, and he's not going to go with you because he's right about everything. He doesn't need any help if you ask him.

And, of course, everybody else listening to this knows he's the one that needs the help. But you need to go to the marriage counselor, and the marriage counselor is going to explain to you that your marriage is over if you don't get some serious work done on it that rattling you're hearing under the hood means the engine's about to blow kiddo and um this does not describe a loving home where the husband is gentle kind and serves his wife i didn't hear anything like that in here no so sad nora i'm sorry but yeah you need to go see a marriage counselor today tell tell him that he ought to go with you but he won't and then the marriage counselor will give you words to speak to him that lead to either him coming to the table

or the end of your marriage you can't go go forward with this. And after 30 years, he still chooses his mommy. Wow. After 30 years, he's still a mama's boy. Old men that are mama's boy are kind of pitiful. That's the worst. Mama's boys are pitiful, period, after four years old. But old men, mama's boys, seriously pitiful. And he's going to be one even after 30 years that means this guy is in his 50s yeah he's an old man mama's boy you can title the

thumbnail on youtube old man mama's boy there you go i thought she was going to say something i you know as i was reading and i thought okay this is a his mom's family business it's going to pass to the children maybe she didn't want to run the business you know what I mean because there's part of that where it's like I don't want this responsibility but that took a hard left turn oh gracious yeah yeah mamas don't let your boys become Leave and cleave. Choose carefully, my darling. Choose carefully. Choose a man who loves his mother from a distance.

I know that's right. Mom, I love you. Over there. Listen, I say that, but when the day comes when my son gets old enough where he has to go over there, I'm going to be sad. I think it's one of the hardest child developmental things i've ever witnessed as we raised kids girls separate from their mom but boys when boys stay right there until they separate when they separate it's brutal and it usually comes somewhere around 16 or 17 years old for people that become men oh man but boys who are mama's boy at 50 they never did cut the cord and so they're still tugging on her apron strings mommy mommy mommy i want the business

mommy mommy mommy mommy would you take care of mommy mommy i want to make sure you love me mommy oh brother i think i'm gonna puke oh gosh oh no i want we do have a manhood crisis in this country for sure wow i mean what this is not masculinity it's not toxic masculinity it's just a child yeah and a controlling child a very controlling jerk of a child yeah goodness gracious and here's the thing nora's husband if you happen to end up listening to this if you're not who she says she you are you need to understand how screwed up your marriage is that your wife wrote this letter to a nationally syndicated show that has hundreds of millions of people downloaded every month so if you're not this and she sent this in you got stuff going on dude so you still deserve bus tracks over your butt so we threw you right in front of the bus still that's what happened

maybe he'll write in a letter next i hope so i wish he would just come on the air and let us talk to him how fun would that be that would be compelling podcast material. Oh, man. Wow. Ouch. Here's what's interesting. The number one thing that will keep you from building wealth is screwed up relationships. Bingo. That's so true. When you can't handle screwed up relationships and put reasonable gentle kind

strong boundaries in place and keep the screwed up people at a distance and the right people up close and you can't function with other humans you're going to struggle building wealth period this is the ramsey show if you own a small business and you like The Ramsey Show, then you're going to love the Entree Leadership Podcast. Almost 200,000 listeners tune in every Monday to hear me take calls from real business leaders and give tactical advice based on my 30 years of experience leading. This is not a podcast about business theory. It's real insight from a practitioner who actually does this stuff. Find it anywhere you listen to podcasts.

Or if you're listening on YouTube or Podcast Now, just click the link in the description. Jade Walsh, all Ramsey personality is my co-host today. Nathan's in Philadelphia. Hi, Nathan. Welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hey, Dave. Thanks for taking my call. I've been listening to your show for a while and never thought I'd have to call in, but

life kind of threw me a curveball. Okay, cool. How can we help? So, I have started dating a girl, and I have found out recently that she is close to $150,000 in student debt for a doctorate degree that she does have, and she's been working for a year with that. A doctorate degree on what? Physical therapy.

Okay. So she got a PhD and she's a PT, okay? Correct, yeah. So I don't have any debt. I've been kind of proud of that, and I've been finding that as I'm going through this relationship, that that's been a big deal for me, I think. So I'm just trying to figure out how much do I factor that into the way I, I guess, pursue this relationship.

And then two, how do I talk to her about it? Have you asked her what her philosophy on debt is going forward? Does she plan to utilize more debt? That sort of thing? Have you asked her what her philosophy on debt is going forward? Does she plan to utilize more debt? That sort of thing? I think that I've made my position somewhat clear as far as like I don't like debt. So I haven't straight on asked her how she feels about it going forward. If I were you, this is just what I would do.

I'd want to do a little bit of undercover detective work. So I'd probably ask her a little bit more about her views before I reviewed all of my views. Because I would not want her to say something to appease me. Okay. Yeah. I'd want her to, I'd want to know the full business. And then I'd say, well, here's the way I feel. You know, and then see where the conversation goes from there. Okay.

How long have you been dating? About four months. What do you think? She might be the one? It's a little early. No, I like her. I feel like our relationship outside of this has been really good and I appreciate getting to know her. But it's one thing I feel like it's really taking a lot of my,

it's been adding stress to my life just thinking about it you know finding my debt yet so like i'm trying to figure out if i'm overreacting um because i think i mean with our combined income assuming you know i'm lying obviously a lot of things have to happen but i wouldn't not continue a relationship with somebody because they had debt but i would not continue with a relationship with somebody because they had debt but i would not continue with the relationship with someone if they had an opposing view from that point going forward okay yeah like if she said oh i hate this uh if we if we ever got together and we're married we would throw everything at it and get it done like that guy does on the radio i'd want to do it that way if she said something like that she's a keeper dude but if she says oh no i plan to keep this debt and pass it to my grandchildren i think debt is wonderful then she ain't for you i think that her yeah i think her expectations of how much how quickly she can pay this off is different than reality just based off of what

that's different expectations are just information and that's a big point of this you know what dave said is is so true a lot of this is information you got information at some point that informed you that debt's a bad idea living in debt you know continuing to go into debt is a bad idea that's information she may not have come across yet in the way our culture is it's just telling you car loan student loan that's where so if she if she comes in contact with the same information that you've got that led to your life change let her you know have that moment as well and that that has that has to do with all of it not just so instead of making i think what jade's saying and i think jade i thought that was really wise a lot of questions, don't make a lot of statements.

And just fish around a little bit. And then, you know, you can kind of open it up. Because honestly, what you're trying to ascertain, I think, we think, is not whether she has $150,000 in debt. Is that a deal killer? That is not a deal killer, we think. But what is a deal killer is someone who's going to mishandle money and be chaotic and stay in debt the rest of their life that makes for especially for someone like you you've told me like six times how you hate debt and this has got you stressed out can you

imagine a whole life of being that stressed the rest of your life no you're not marrying that woman that's a hell on earth that'd be awful especially for you now if someone loves debt and they think just like her then they can get married and they'd be just fine in their chaos but um but you know so being in agreement and being aligned on money is the number one cause of divorce and so the inverse of that is true. It's the number one area of happiness for couples that stay together. Because when you agree on money, you are agreeing on your value system. Jesus said your treasure is where your heart is. You're agreeing on your dreams.

You're agreeing on your fears. You're agreeing on what stresses you out and what doesn't. And these things matter. Even if you're a spender versus a saver. You can still be aligned on the values of the subject, and I think that's what you've got to fish out. But you need to run like your hair is on fire if this lady intends to stay in debt the rest of her life

and she thinks this is wonderful because it will destroy you, Nathan, especially you because of the way you outlined this whole thing on the air. That's a big deal. you, Nathan, especially you, because of the way you outlined this whole thing on the air. Yeah. That's a big deal. That's a good differential between the philosophy of how you view money in debt versus just personality characteristics. Exactly. I tend to be a saver.

I tend to be a spender. But if the philosophy at the core is the same, but we still avoid debt and we still don't go into debt, then you're okay. Yeah. So Nathan, if you said, um, uh, I, we would say that, that someone who said, uh, uh, along those lines, uh, okay. Um, I'm not going to date anybody who has debt. So if you want to keep dating me, you got to get out of debt. I would call you a Pharisee. Yeah. That's not, that's not the right thing yeah you know but and and you know you made this mess you figure it out well then i wouldn't

want my daughter to marry you right you know uh but we did teach our kids that they weren't going to marry anybody who was perfect and that they aren't by the way because they learned early on in the ramsey house that the axis of the world does not run through the top of their little head. And so the inmates don't run the asylum. That's not how it works at our place. So, um, even when the grands come to visit Papa Dave, we still have a certain level of, um, reasonableness in the house. So, and, um, yeah, yeah. And so that's not, there's nothing wrong with that. That's a good, so you want to be aligned on where we're going and why we're going there. Absolutely. That's the big thing, the going forward.

You're looking into the future. And, you know, in a sense, there's a lot of things that we do in our lives that are that way, like a job interview. Are you a cultural fit? Right. Do you align with the values of that organization and what they're trying to accomplish if they run perpendicular to who you are then in 20 minutes after you get there you're going to be going oh this is a toxic workplace well yeah it does it's not toxic you just joined a group that don't think like you joined it does you no favors to change

your answer in order to get the thing exactly it's like then you're just going to be like you said set somebody up to change their answer to get you that's right that's a bad thing hey guys big announcement right now everybody tune in hold your breath listen listen listen listen listen turn up your radio turn up your podcast listen we're changing things at the Ramsey show. Oh my gosh. They're shit. Yes. So this show is a three hour talk radio show.

When you guys get it on a podcast without the commercials, it's about 38 minutes or 39 minutes or whatever. And on, uh, and same thing on YouTube, right? And there's tens of millions of you on all these different formats, literally. So the third hour, the third segment of the talk radio show that is on podcast and on YouTube and all that kind of stuff, the third hour after starting today is now going to be on the Ramsey Network app for free. You could consider it like the after show or something. So the only thing it costs you

is your email okay so jump on and download the ramsey network app in the app store or google play and you can get the third hour of the youtube or the third segment of the youtube whatever we want to call it i still think in hours because the whole thing started on talk radio right and the third uh it's three hours i'm sitting here jade and i are sitting here doing this with commercials and everything okay so anyway third segment on youtube and all podcasts is now on the ramsey network app as of today it's completely free but the podcast folks are the podcast world is wanting our show to be shorter so it is just now started right now, okay?

And those of you in talk radio, you're going to get what you've always gotten, okay? We're not changing a thing. So if your station carries all three hours of the Ramsey show, then you get all three hours. We're not turning nothing off there, okay? But the apps, you're going to the Ramsey Network app in the App Store. It's completely free. It's going to be great because there's a bunch of other stuff that's in the app that we built, like searchable. Very good.

So you can search a whole subject and get all the calls around leasing a car or all the calls around the debt snowball. It's a cool app. So it's completely free. Ramsey Network app. You're going to still get everything you've always gotten. Check it out. Hey, you're still here? What are you doing? You do know that the rest of today's show is playing right now over on the Ramsey Network app, right?

All you got to do to finish the episode is search Ramsey Network in the App Store, Google Play Store, or just click the link in the show notes to download the app for free. Yep, you heard me right, for free. Then right there on the home screen, you can watch the rest of today's show. Bada bing, bada boom. All right, I'm getting out of here. Enjoy. We'll see you on the app.