The Ramsey Show - What if You Could Build a Life That Didn’t Exhaust You?

Episode Date: November 22, 2024

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Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Ramsey Show where we help people with their money, with their mental and emotional health, with their work, with their marriages, with their lives. I'm John Delaney joined by my great friend George Campbell we are taking your calls live at triple 8 8 2 5 5 2 2 5 triple 8 8 2 5 5 2 2 5 on this incredible this beautiful cold Nashville day let's go out to Sheridan Wyoming and talk to Brett. What's up Brett? Hey, am I coming through? Yeah you are coming through loud and clear brother. What's up? Awesome. So I'm 24. I just took a new job and so after expenses and rents

and all that good stuff I have about $1,300 each month left to play with give or take. I currently have 30,000 in student loans but I do have a thousand dollars already saved up and I'm hoping in the near future that I can buy a house here and I was just curious it's like what money markets or mutual funds that you guys would excuse me sorry I'm curious as to like what kind of ways I should invest my money in to make this dream a reality, to be debt-free and to hopefully be a homeowner here soon. Love it.

Well, I'll tell you this, right now, you should be investing in your freedom. And that means getting out of debt as fast as possible, which then means the home dream needs to take a back seat for now. So that 1,300 bucks extra, I don't think it's plain money. I think it's get out of debt money. And we'll get to investing soon enough

because you got 30K in debt, what do you make? I make about 47, 48 a year. Okay, cool. So basic napkin math says you got 30 grand in debt, you're adding $1,300 on top of your minimum debt payment? says you got 30 grand in debt, you're adding 1,300 bucks on top of your minimum debt payment? So that 1,300 is just what I have leftover after all of my basic bills.

So you still gotta make your student loan payment in that? Yeah, so no, my student loan payment is already made. That 1,300 is like once every bit of my rents, Wi-Fi, groceries, gas, all that is paid for. Okay. So you're gonna be out of debt at this rate in about a year and a half. Okay, I like to under that.

And so, I mean, that's just if you do $1,300. If you can do $1,500, we'll clean it up faster. So that would be my challenge to you is how much faster can we get rid of this debt to get the fully funded emergency fund to then begin saving up the down payment. And if I'm in your shoes, if that down payment is going to be, you know, let's say you're going to save up for two years, I wouldn't put it in the market.

There's too much risk there. I would put it in a high yield savings account. Okay. How old are you, Brett? I'm 24 years old. What's your work that you do? I'm like a lower level project manager. Okay.

I'm telling you this 20 years older than you. Okay. I'm trying to think of something cool that happened to me when I was 24. I got married when I was 24. So that was pretty cool. But before that, I can't remember. I can't even remember a dinner I went to. I'm sure I did or a concert I saw. I'm sure I did. I don't remember it.

If you will do something for your 25 year old self, if you would go get a weekend job, or if you would leave your job and be exhausted and go throw boxes at Walmart from 6 p.m. until midnight midnight and you did that for six months you will owe nobody any money at the age of 24 or 25. Yeah see that's uh I was considering getting another job I've been looking around town for part-time work either something like early morning like uh I know like some of the local gyms here are looking for some morning work or at night too so there's some there's options

here that I was considering. Dude if you will do that 25 year old you will be free forever forever and I tell 20 year olds all the time work like crazy in your 20s the work you put in in your 20s pays dividends in your 40s. You have precious resources that age which is time and energy. Yes and strange, like superhuman way to rehabilitate yourself. I don't understand how 20-year-olds' knees don't hurt like mine do, but they just don't. It's awesome. I mean, mine can get pretty sore sometimes too, I guess. All right, well wait till you're 40, bro.

You think they do. But anyway, dude, yes, work three jobs. Work four jobs. Give yourself a bananas challenge. Like George just laid the math out. You can be debt-free in 12 months, just right now with nothing changing. Do the math and see what it would take to be done in six months. Challenge yourself. You're 24 years old. You'll know you're doing it right when everyone around you is like, you're crazy. You need to rest. Honey, I'm worried

about you. Yes, perfect. but then when you hit that 25 exhale relax like it'd be amazing and here's what I'm promised she's gonna happen you're gonna find some synergy at your work too people gonna ask you like man you're like getting stuff done hey I want you to come help me on this project like it just has a leveling effect that levels up every part of your life in a really strange, bizarre way, but it's pretty cool. Are you in? Am I? Oh, yes, absolutely. I'm in. I love talking to 24, 25 year olds who are like, dude, I'm ready to burn the ships.

Let's go do it. So good for you, brother. Let's go. That's awesome. I'm ready to get rid of this stuff because they said I want to live the American dream best I could. Excellent. And at Brett's age, I didn't make as much and I had more debt and I did in 18 months.

So that tells me Brett's going to do it even faster and he's going to be going places because I was still a knucklehead at that age. I thought the American dream when I was 24 was a bigger truck. I had no idea. Like so good on you, brother. Good on you. All right, let's go to Justin in Seattle,

home of Alice in Chains. What's up Justin? Are you with us? John, you just broke up a bit. Oh what's up brother? I'm here. I think you're breaking up. We got crystal clear signal man. What's up? All right I'm 23 years old. My wife is also 22 and we're over here and we got a mortgage that we just bought on the house like you know 340,000 in February. We should have you know not have bought this house but we are now in it and now we have also car loans so I'm calling out of have also car loans so I'm calling out of getting a second opinion on some debts like how much money do you make Justin dollars how much money do you make right now $60,000 you have car loans a $340,000 house note and how much other debt do you have so 25,000 and car loans about $3,500 of that $25,000 in car loans, about $3,500 of that $25,000 could be refunded in a warranty

on the car that we just bought. Good. Gets us down to $22,000. Okay, what else? What other debt? So, that's all the debt. That's all of our debt is our house and the $25,000 in cars. And is your wife working outside the home?

No, not currently. She's trying to do some babysitting on the side because we just had a baby son back in South Africa. Fun, congrats. Thank you. But it's not fun because you're stressed and broke. Not fun. Diapers are $1,000.

They didn't tell you that, did they, Justin? What's that? Diapers cost a thousand dollars a piece. They're made of gold, I think. No, they didn't. Costco runs definitely help though. So how can we help today? We're right up against the clock, Justin, so get right to your question, brother. I have about $3,500 in a Roth IRA that I can take out in contributions and put towards this debt. I also have bonuses that I get each year, about $6,000. I would use the bonuses towards the debt.

I wouldn't touch the Roth IRA, and I would consider selling the car. If you guys are really up against this and that mortgage is more than like 40, 50% of your take-home pay, this is an on-fire situation. You gotta get your income up, you gotta sell the car in downgrade, and long-term, you might decide,

we can't stay in this house. And she's probably gonna have to get a job, and so not just fiddle around the edges with babysitting, but she's gonna have to open a babysitting shop in her house because y'all need income. This is the Ramsey Show, we'll be right back. Hey guys, it's Rachel Cruz. Just about everything costs more these days and health care is no exception. So if you're looking at your health care options during open enrollment, be sure to check out Christian Health Care Ministries. CHM is not health insurance. It's a biblically

based health cost sharing ministry that's helped hundreds of thousands of families just like yours with healthcare costs. CHM is affordable, aligns with your values, and gives you more options for your healthcare. And you can join at any time, including open enrollment. Find out more and join today at chministries.org slash budget. That's chministries.org slash budget. That's chministries.org slash budget. Welcome back to The Ramsey Show. I'm John Delaney joined by George Campbell, 888-825-5225.

We're taking your calls live. Our early Black Friday sale is here. Whether you're shopping for yourself or looking for that perfect gift to help someone get their money in order, now's the time to shop and get hardcover books for 12 bucks or audiobooks if you can't read like George for only 8 bucks a couple of books on sale money's not a math problem is on sale right now it's a great gift for

anyone wanting to pass the to get past the we ain't got no money mentality total money makeover is on sale You may have heard of that book If you haven't heard on that book, welcome to earth. It's good to see you total money makeover You should probably get it. It's a great gift to give to anyone go to Ramsey solutions.com Store to check out all the Christmas deals or if you're listening on the tubes or on podcast You can click the link in the description Let's go out to the 806 to Amarillo, Texas and talk to Sam. What's up, Sam? Hey, how you guys doing? We're rocking on to the break of dawn brother. What are you up to? Oh

Man, let me tell you the last few years of my life has been Some people would call it easy Street and I I would have agreed with you told me ten years ago But now I'm struggling to find purpose, I'm struggling with being fulfilled. What does easy street mean? Well I was in the military, I did 8 years in the US Navy and I came home, got a full year degree and I made the decision that if I meet my eventual wife while I'm in college, then I'll settle down, I'll start a family. If I don't, I'll go back into service as an officer and you wouldn't say you just have it. The Lord blessed me and I found my wife and we've been married

now for six years. She is a family medicine physician and board certified surgical obstetrician, so she makes all the money and we have three beautiful babies. I love my babies. I love them so much. But the Bible makes it very clear it is not good for man not to work and I just I feel like the pressure is on even though I don't need it for financial purposes. I just feel like I'm not doing anything of value which I know is a lie. You know raising my kids is the greatest value that I can have as a human being. But because they're gonna leave the most lasting impact, you know. Money's only gonna go so far, but my kids can make a lasting impact on their communities.

But I just don't see the return on investment right now, and that's where I'm struggling. So you... Man. If you're here, if you and I were just sitting sitting if we met up in Lubbock we were just sitting Down in the shadow of the stadium having a drink. I would get up right now and I'd walk around the table and I'd give you a Hug Here's why for some reason You believe that your value is

Economic like that's it and for reason, you have backed yourself into this corner of either or. And none of us make good choices when it's either I got to stay home with the kids or I've got to leave everything and go do like you have backed yourself into an either or you're going crazy. So take all clear the clear the deck, clear the whole table. You can snap your fingers you got a four-year degree you got a you got you got someone that you says a great wife who's also super talented and her talent actually makes a whole bunch of money my wife was incredibly talented but she was a

schoolteacher right so very different but your super talented wife makes a jillion bucks. Forget all of that. What do you wanna do? Well, I say that's the part of this equation that makes me feel kind of overwhelmed. You know, like I'm an experienced writer. Obviously my full degree was in network engineering. Hold on, Sam, Sam, I don't care about that crap you're saying. What do you wanna do?

We're impressed by your LinkedIn, I promise. Yeah, it looks great. What do you want to do with your life? What I want to do, honestly, is I want to get into IT. I want to grab that bull by the horns and I want to take it for a ride. What's your four-year degree in? Network Administration. Why are you not working in IT?

I was, but then when my wife said... Sam, why aren't you working in IT? I'm sorry. We didn't have child care until like three months ago. And now I've been trying to fill application after application and I'm just, I'm getting emails or phone calls back And it's really starting to kill my my drive. Okay So what you're finding out is you want to do a thing and the road you're trying to take isn't working cool Can you find some folks at your local church there or over it at WT and go sit there and have coffee with him and ask them about IT

opportunities in Amarillo, Texas? I could probably talk to someone for sure. I don't know who that someone would be, but I could start asking questions. All you want to do is take someone to coffee. Do you know anyone that works in IT, even Facebook friends? I gave it Facebook like 10 years ago. Okay. Well, you need to find some people who are in that field. Bro, you got people that you got people you're in the service with that are out scattered across the country. They are actually and I tried getting help there and they tried to help me get jobs but even even there I came up short but I have admittedly I have not dug in I haven't dug as deeply locally as I

probably could have and I'm not even from here that's part of my hesitation I'm like they're gonna be like who's this guy this nobody I don't dug as deeply locally as I probably could have. And I'm not even from here. That's part of my hesitation. I'm like, they're going to be like, who's this guy? This nobody. I don't know who he is. No, they're not. That's bull crap. That's a story you're telling yourself. And again, it goes back to you.

That's why I would have come around the table and hugged you. Because the cancer here is not that you haven't found an IT job. The cancer here is you have lost purpose. You think when you checked out of the military and married an amazing woman that there was a period at the end of your sentence and that's wrong. It's not true. It's a lie. And so when you go looking for a job you're going looking for a job with one foot. You're just sending out a bunch of LinkedIn profiles and you're not that's not how

people get jobs. And you also I know you'd eight years in the service you somehow convinced an amazing Physician to marry you And by the way, you didn't convince her you're probably a pretty amazing guy You went knocked out a four-year degree route and you got home You've got all of these qualifiers that tell me that you're a hard-working good man The only person in your world who doesn't believe that is you. You're not the first person that's revealed that to me. Okay, but here's the thing, you can't manifest that belief. You have to go, you have to stand on a series of concrete steps that can

only be stood on if you take action. only be stood on if you take action. Okay, so what... So this is you going to Sunday school this weekend and you asking for prayer requests in your Sunday school class and say, hey I'm a military veteran, I've got, I really want to get into IT work, I don't even know where to start. If anyone has anybody, I would really be grateful if, I would love to take someone to coffee and learn about what's going on here in Amarillo, Texas. Or if anyone has a connection down in the multiple small startups that go on in Lubbock, Texas, I want a connection there.

And I guarantee you somebody will call, we'll talk to you after class. Go ahead, George. And just do your homework and research and go, what are all the jobs that I really want? What are they saying must be true for me to get this job? Okay, let me make sure I have that so that when I do show up for the interview,

it's not a dud. I know exactly what they're looking for. I've done my homework. I know the company, I know the mission. I know the skillset needed. And then on top of in person, go scour the subreddit threads for IT and see what people are doing,

how they got the job they're doing. Do they enjoy what they're doing? You've got a lot of homework to do. And think that will get you get the fuel going again, get the fire lit. Do you have any men there in Amarillo that you hang out with regularly? No, that's part of my problem. We moved here five years ago and I never really kind of ingratiated myself in the social circles. Okay, that starts today. The most common conversation I have with former veterans is you more than anyone else on planet Earth. Veterans know more than anything what it's like to be in a relationship

with somebody, stand shoulder to shoulder with somebody who will die for you. And it's almost impossible then to come home to unhook from that level of community and connection and come home and sit next to some Ned Flanders in a coffee shop who's like, you know, it's really hot. And you're like, dude, shut up. I know what real connected friendship looks like. And what veteran after veteran after veteran that I talk to does, they just circle up and they stay inside their house and Netflix says, I got the next show for you just stay

there and so your mission right now brother is to go find a group of men you can go do something with go mule deer hunting go hiking out in the canyons go do some stuff with other guys and they're gonna say no you're gonna ask again and they're gonna say no you're gonna ask again you can ask again you're gonna find a small little gang out there even if you can find some folks who used to be in the services and now they're retired out to West Texas. Great, man. But your mission is to go find a group of men, one, two, five, 10, I don't care,

who will do life with you. And I promise you there will be connections into IT. Make sure to call my brother. We'll be right back. One of the questions I get all the time is, which life insurance company should I use for my term life policy? A valid question since there are hundreds of companies out there with rates all over the place and riders and add-ons that are simply a waste of money. You need to get this done and make the right decision.

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Welcome back to The Ramsey Show. I'm John Delaney joined by George Campbell. Let's go out to Panama City, Florida and talk to the great and powerful Jason. What's up, Jason? Hey, how you doing? We're just partying, brother. What's up, man?

So my question is that I have a little bit of money for my inheritance and I'm wondering if right now is the right time to invest or if I should wait a little bit for the economy to do its thing. What does that mean? What does do its thing mean? It's been doing its thing. It's got extra dividends. Well, it's low and it's right now it's starting to pick up.

What economy do you live in, brother? We're at record highs every day. Are you waiting for it to crash and then get in? What economy do you live in, brother? We're at record highs every day. Are you waiting for it to crash and then get in? Well, you know, I don't know what's going to happen with the whole election and I've seen it happen. It happened. With it happening, but I'm worried that it, I've already invested some money for my kids,

for my inheritance in the trust fund, So they're taking care of, as far as them, but I'm concerned about me and my wife's retirement. How much money did you get in an inheritance? I got about a hundred thousand dollars. Who passed away? And I put about, I took, I used forty thousand to pay off all my debt. That was the first thing I did. I paid off all my debt and wonderful. Good for you. Um, so, and then I had, um, of course I took twenty thousand for my kids and I put a $10,000 into, um, diversified

portfolios, um, with a stockbroker, uh, and, and, and then tie to trust to it. So that that's their inheritance when if something were happening to me and my wife, uh, specifically because I have a three-year-old son who's special needs. Do you have life insurance? So I wanted to make sure that he was taking care of- Hey Jason, Jason, Jason. Yes. Do you have life insurance?

I do. How much? I have life insurance on myself, my wife, and both my kids. Okay. Why do you need life insurance on your kids? Just in case. I mean, something happens to them. I mean, it's never a bad idea that my mother had life insurance on me because both of my brothers passed away, one when he was six and one when he was 25. And it hit my family hard financially, so my mother took life insurance out on me in case something were to happen to me, that way the fuel could be paid for. You've had a lot hit you in your lifetime, a lot of trauma. I'm the last of my family, so my father, my mother, my mother died October 1st, and that's how I got my inheritance. I'm sorry, brother.

But here's the deal, you've been making a lot of decisions out of fear. I can tell there's a lot of anxiousness about, but what if it's not enough and what I need to take care of? And I want you to just breathe. Exhale, homie. Slow down. You're gonna be okay. You are so far beyond what most people couldn't even spell the word trust.

And you've got it set up for your kids already. So let me just give you some facts to slow it and let you breathe when it comes to the economy. Under President Trump's last presidency, the stock market was up 53%. Three and a half years into his presidency, it was up 53%. Under Joe Biden's presidency,

three and a half years in, it was up 50%. So basic math says over seven year period, the stock market went up 103%. It doubled. Correct? Mm-hmm, right. And I'm not a guru, I don't have a crystal ball. My guess is we're gonna see the same thing happen

over the next seven years. We're gonna see about 100% return. And I think it's gonna go half. I think it's gonna be worse than that. And you know what, what's fun about this is- You still win. It doesn't matter. Like me sitting here trying to predict it, George-

We don't time the market. And that's what you're trying to do right now is go, well, I wanna wait till the right time. I wanna wait for a crash to invest this. I wouldn't wait. I would invest now. And what you'll see is over time, the sooner you invest,

the more money you're gonna have later. The more time compound growth has to work its magic. And so I would, I don't know what headline you're looking at or what stock you're looking at, but I'm looking at the S&P 500, the largest 500 companies that largely represent the overall US economy. And that's, when you invest in a mutual fund,

that's largely what you're investing in as well, the top companies. Can I give you some, a different perspective, Jason? Well, I mean what I was worried about was it rather than putting it in the stock market should I go into CDs that are a little bit more secure but with less interest? If you want to lose money, sure yeah you'll lose money against inflation. Let me let me can I throw something else at you Jason something totally

different? Mm-hmm. You got a hundred thousand dollars and you paid forty grand of your debt off which left you with sixty. You took twenty thousand dollars and created a trust for your kids, especially a special needs trust for your three-year-old, right? Mm-hmm. So that leaves you with forty grand. Do you and your wife have a house? Our house was a gift from my father-in-law. It's paid off. Okay, so you have a paid off home. Yes. You have an emergency fund. Is this, you have

an emergency fund where you are now your own bank? No, I don't. No, I am. We only make about $37,000 a year because I'm a stay-at-home dad. I'm a caregiver for my son. Well, listen to me. So, I don't really work. You now have $40,000. I want you to put it'm a stay-at-home dad. I'm a caregiver for my son. Well, listen to me So I don't really work you now have $40,000 I want you to put it in a high-yield savings account and now you have six months if anything ever happens, you've got six months of of taxes bills Groceries in an account that you never have to borrow money again And I want you to look at what you're actually solving for.

What you're trying to solve for is you're trying to look at a crystal ball and see what's going to happen in 35 years because you're still in the backdraft of the pain of losing your mom, of losing your brothers, losing your dad. The one thing you have never had in your home is peace. And instead of trying to solve for the next calamity coming, which by the way, they're gonna keep coming, that's just life and it sucks, it is. I want you to solve for peace

so that when those things come, you don't have a care in the world, you can just focus on being sad, on grieving. Because right now you are in a financial position that very, very few Americans are in. And that is, you don't owe anybody anything. You have a paid-for house. You now have six to eight months

of cash in the bank that's just yours. Period. Nobody can take your house away. Nobody can take food off your table. You see what kind of position you're in? Right. That is peace homie. I would solve for peace. And your main breadwinner in your house makes 37,000 bucks. That's not gonna be enough money over the long term. You're all gonna have to figure that out. But right now, y'all are safe. Okay? You get what I'm getting at?

Yeah. I would not invest any of this extra money. That's just me. That's my concern. The main breadweather isn't making enough. And I run my own small business selling stuff at farmers markets to try to make extra money. But in three and a half years,

I only make about $10,000 a year. Okay, so let's quit that job. Absolutely, just dumping it into, re into the company. I don't even pay myself. Yeah, so it's been a hobby and we're going to stop that now. You're tired. I can hear it on you. You're exhausted.

You're playing whack-a-mole with the next anxious thing that pops up. Let's just stop. Let's just put the stop putting quarters in the machine. Quit playing. Does that sound, if you hear my voice, does that sound good? Well, yeah, I mean, I'm just, I'm, I'm, it's, it's, it's, I do a lot. I know. I mean, I haven't, be honest with you, I haven't grieved for my mother because I have too much to do. I have too much to do. I know, but here's the thing. Your body's grieving whether you stop and do it or not. I have too much to do. I know, but here's the thing,

your body's grieving whether you stop and do it or not. So, I never stop, I never stop, man. I'm going nonstop. That's what I know. And what to do. And as my friend, Ian Simpkins says, if busyness is your drug, rest will feel like stress. And right now you're medicating with Whac-A-Mole.

You're medicating with busy, stop. Tonight, it's the weekend, I want you to, you're about to come up on Thanksgiving for the first time without your mom. I want you to write mom a letter tonight. I want you to tell your mom how much you miss her. And I want you to tell your mom in that letter what kind of dad you're going to be. What kind of provider you're going to be and how you're going to give peace to her grandkids that she'll never get to meet. Okay? You're burning your hole through your home right now with your anxiousness.

I want you to relax. You're safe right now. You got a paid for house. You got 40 grand in the bank. You have a small account set up for your kid's future, man. You got life grand in the bank. You have a small account set up for your kids future, man. You got life insurance on everybody. You're so far ahead of the game, my man. Now you got to turn and sit and just exhale in the sadness.

And that's part of the part of the deal. We got to make Jason well again. And then this whole thing will take care of itself. And then we got to deal with the money. We'll have to deal with, you know, how are we going to like we don't make enough money to eat and what job am I gonna do? Am I gonna go back to school? We can figure all that out.

But right now we're gonna exhale, we're safe. We're gonna grieve mom. And then when the new year rolls around, we're gonna figure out what comes next for our family. Thanks for the call, brother. We'll be right back. Hey guys, I've never done this before, but I'm partnering with a nutrition company, Field of Greens.

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According to their research, only 3.2 of Americans have a million dollars or for retirement. According to the research, only 3.2 of Americans have a million dollars or more in their taxed advantage accounts, like a 401k and IRAs. 58% of Americans have less than $10,000 saved in their retirement accounts. Dude, that's dark stuff. I had no idea it was that bad. 60%. Six out of ten Americans basically could do a month and a half in a retirement home. That's it. As a listener of the Ramsey Show, are you staying on track with the Baby Steps to reach

your financial goals? Here's the deal. Take a quick quiz to check your progress and receive a personalized plan just for you. Simply head to the show notes, click on the link titled Are You On Track With The Baby Steps and complete the free quiz. If you are one of the six out of a 10 Americans that have less than 10 grand,

there is a light for you, but you gotta get on it, right? You have to, you gotta begin to act differently. George, that would freak me out. That would scare me to death. Yeah, and people think it's a life sentence. They think their DNA inherently has this in them, where they go, well, I'm just gonna, I'm a broke person, John.

You can change. You can just snap your fingers and go, I don't wanna live like this. I wanna change my family tree. I don't have to retire broke. And so this quiz will help you start to take the next step, figure out where you're really at. And if you just look at, man, basic demographic data,

this same six out of 10 who have less than 10,000, I'll go as high as 70%, 80% that are fragile. It's about the same stat that are living paycheck to paycheck. But also everybody knows that they're ringing the bell saying, hey, your social security is gonna be less than, like we're not solvent here in the next 10, 15, 20 years. By 2034, they're gonna reduce the benefit by 27%.

So there is a- It already wasn't that high. It's a slow car crash coming. You gotta be your own financial plan. Act today, act today, act today. Check out the show notes. Are you on track with the baby steps? Complete the free quiz. Stare down this anxious moment in your life and begin to do

something different. Let's go out to Stamford, Connecticut and talk to James. What is up James? Everything above the nose. John and George, how's this day finding you? Excellent. The same. What's up? Excellent. I need some advice. We're going to try it a little bit carefully because I am trying my best to thread the needle with my mother-in-law. She keeps giving financial and career advice to my family, specifically my wife, that do not work for our family situation and really do not work in 2024. So James, you do not have a problem with

your mother-in-law. She has your proxy war. You have a problem with your wife. I would think that you are probably correct. I am worried that my wife is going to listen to her mother. My mother-in-law was able to raise four children in the Midwest through the 80s and 90s without working. She, I don't believe has ever worked a 40 hour a week job in her life. She, a couple of days, you know, helping out at this nursery school,

a couple of days here. So what do you disagree on with your mother-in-law? What does she want your wife to do? Stay at home? Well, yes, basically all of the advice that she's giving involves things around, we have two children under six, and it's comments along the lines of, you know, when both the kids are out of daycare, my wife works as a daycare teacher as well, when the kids are out of daycare, you can leave that job and just teach

music lessons. I make 60 an hour teaching music lessons and that's great, but that doesn't make up for the income that we need in order to live where we do. Okay, here's the thing James, who... I have the greatest mother-in-law who's ever lived. She's amazing. And I expect my mother-in-law who's ever lived. She's amazing. And I expect my mother-in-law to give the advice that she sees fit for how she wants the world to work. I acknowledge that too. But when it comes to the life that me and my wife have to build for ourselves, she doesn't get a vote. And so your mother-in-law can say whatever she wants. Good for her. That's awesome. It's amazing. She's not the problem here.

The problem here is, is you and your wife are not on the same page. And so it doesn't do, it doesn't matter what your mother-in-law's saying. It matters that you look at your wife and your wife says, hey, I want to stay home. And you say, we can't afford to do that. Or we can, but here's what it's going to cost gonna cost you have to sell the car we can't live in this

particular house or in this particular neighborhood yeah and at this point we're having to have this conversation about every six to nine months or so and I've tried showing my wife the math and that it does not so James I'm hearing your wife wants to stay home if she could have it her way she would stay home is that true? I think that she gets the impression that she is working to pay for daycare and nothing else. And that once the children are out of daycare, that that need might disappear.

And then she wants to stay home? I think so. I think part of it may be a byproduct to that's the home environment that she was raised in. So she has seen it work, but that I don't think is realistic or sustainable. I want you to reverse engineer y'all's dream that you decide together.

And that might mean, okay, here's the math of it. We can't do this right now, here's why. But if she says, hey, my dream is really, I wanna stay home and you wanna support that dream, then you go, let's do the budget. What's it gonna take? Okay, I need to do this many more music lessons. We need to do this.

We need to cut our lifestyle by this to get in a financial place in order to do this. So I think she's the wow, you're the how, and you're going, well, we have no way to actually accomplish this. But then there's also the part of, you don't want this to happen right now. So this is really, like John said, this is between you and your wife. She wants to stay home, you don't want this to happen right now. So this is really, like John said,

this is between you and your wife. She wants to stay home, you don't want her to stay home. Take the mother-in-law out of it. Yeah, you keep crafting all these stories and imaginations like, well, it's probably because of this and maybe it's, it doesn't matter. Just forget all the story parts. Just sit down and look at the woman

that you've made humans with. Look at the woman that you said, I do, till death do us part. Like, what kind of life do we wanna have? What do we want this house to feel like when we get home every day? How much are you making a year, James? Just you? Just myself, about 60,000. And are you doing music lessons full time?

No mother-in-law does music lessons. My wife, no. She's a music teacher by trade. Okay. What are you doing full time? I am a program director for a medium sized nonprofit. Okay. Okay. So I think we also need to go, okay, if this is in the future, my wife's staying home, we're gonna be a one income family.

What changes do I need to make? What education do I need to get? What career moves do I need to make in order to sustain a good life for my family? And that's the part that I think scares you, is this involves you having to change too. Or at least it involves y'all having to have a truthful conversation about, hey, what do I want? What do I really want?

I really wanna work at this job. I love my nonprofit work. And I know I make half of what I could make in the for-profit world, but I feel valued and loved here. And then your wife looks across the table and says, I really want to stay at home with our kids. I see what happens in daycares. I want to be with our kids. Okay, now we have a desires challenge. Both of us are being honest, both of us on the table. Now we're just going to look at them at math does not care about what

we want. Math is just math. So let's look at the math problem we have here. And maybe it's for three years, I'm gonna stay at this nonprofit, but I'm gonna work an extra job so that you can stay home because I know that's important to you. And maybe it's, you know what, for three years, I'm gonna keep working at daycare because at least I get to see the kids half the day.

And we're not netting a lot of new income, but this mission that you're called to at this nonprofit is really important. But now you all are actually talking substantively. You're being honest with one another and you're putting your hearts and minds and souls on the table like you promised each other you would at your wedding. And your mother-in-law doesn't get a vote. But right now when your wife says, well, my mom says that I, that's her knowing if I,

she just tells you what she wants, you're going to blow by her with a spreadsheet. And when your wife says something and you go, well, it's just your mother-in-law speaking, that's you not being able to say, I really love my work. It means something to me. Do you get what I'm saying? Let's just take mother-in-law out of the equation. Let's just talk directly with your wife. Is that possible? Yeah, yeah. Most of the time you sound like a um actually you sound a lot like me brother. You sound like a spreadsheet guy. You can pull up a spreadsheet and you can make the math work or you can be real honest about it not working. I want you to sit down with your wife and talk about emotions and feelings which is maybe a scary thing. Here's how I feel about this.

Here's what I want. I feel like your mother-in-law has a seat at our table, at dinner table. I feel like your mom has a seat in our bedroom. I don't want her in here anymore. I want it to be us. What world do we want to create? Thank you so much for the call, my brother. This is The Ramsey Show.

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We help people do work they love and we help people with their relationships and mental and emotional health. I'm John Delaney joined by George Camel. We are taking your calls live at triple eight, eight to five, five, two to five. Let's go out to British Columbia, Canada and talk to Alison. Hey, Alison, what's up? Hi, I have a quick question for you guys. And it might not be a short answer, but, um, let it rip. It never is right. So my husband and I have about $3.2 million worth

of debt total. And most of that is in our business, but some of that is personal. And I'm just wondering, is it better to focus on paying personal debts before your business debts? I have a friend named Denny, and he can help you change your identity. I think he should hook you all up.

Alison, Alison, here's, I'm like, am I the first one to tell you this? That's all personal debt. You guys sign the dotted line. There's no like magic businessman who gets to take the brunt of this. Yeah, that's fair. What's this debt? What's the business? So it's a medical practice that my husband and I own. Okay, are y'all physicians? He is, I am more of an office manager. So how are y'all working through it? Are y'all making enough to pay your bills? Are y'all working to pay this thing off? How's the business working?

Like we got it 100% fully financed from the banks. So we do have a big loan from them, but we are able to make our payments every month, which is great What's the debt service on that? I'm just wondering What's the number for debt on that? No, what's your payment every month on 3.2 million? What are you paying to lenders every month total? Hmm. I think it's around 30 K And what is the what is the practice bringing in between you two and profit? And what is the practice bringing in between you two and profit?

So our profit at the end, we only owned for about two to three years, but the profit every year that we've gotten is about 250 to 300, and that's after all the bills, all the loans, staff costs, everything is all paid. So you guys are essentially, your gross income as a household is 250, 300.

Yeah. But then we have to make all the debt payments. But that's your take home? Well, that's not what we take home in our personal account. We pay ourselves as contractors, and so we only pay ourselves about 12 grand a month. Okay. That's my-

Let me keep you represented. Are you saying your profits are after making this $30,000 monthly payment? Yes. Okay. Okay. So how many debts are there total if you split everything out? So for our business, the reason I split it up is because they're in separate accounts

and they're also taxed differently, but yes, it is all kind of one number. But for the business, it has $2.6 million worth of debt. And then the rest of our debt is all personal. Okay. So what is the other $600? So for the personal stuff, so my husband, because he's a physician, he graduated probably five, six years ago from school.

He has $ 300K worth of student loans that he has to pay back still. Okay. And then we have 20K for our car, 215 for our house that we still owe. And then I have 4K from my schooling as well. Okay. So your question is what's the best way to tackle all of this? Yeah, like where do I start? Is it more important to focus on

paying personal stuff off or business stuff? I know it's best to kind of tackle everything at once if you can, but- Well, I mean, just based on the sheer numbers, if you just do the debt snowball, that would be your student loan first, then the car loan, then his student loans, then the business debt,

and then the mortgage would come later. Okay, so mortgages always last then? The mortgage is a baby step six item. So you can consider this kind of a consumer debt. I mean, 2.6 million, that's trumping all these other debts. It's gonna take a while to pay this off. Yeah. So my guess is you probably have the mortgage knocked out

by the time the business debt is knocked out. I'm hoping you guys continue to make more, take home more, and use more to tackle the debt. Because right now- Well, that's my question though. You're bringing home 150 grand a year. Are you paying each other 12, each of you 12 grand a month,

or just as a family you're taking home 12 grand a month? As a family. So we do split income. Okay. Just because I manage the medical practice and he physically works in the practice. Okay. So we just pay ourselves six grand each. Okay. Gosh man, he's the most... So is his reimbursement capped in Canada? I'm not really sure. That's a good question though. Because we can claim capital gains but that only comes like if good question though. I know that we can claim capital gains,

but that only comes like if we ever sell. Yeah, that's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about like because of the medical system y'all have in Canada, is there a cap on what he can charge per procedure or which procedures he can do or how many patients he can have? Can he work on Sundays? I've heard there's a cap for physicians that after you make a certain amount of money, physicians just take the next four months off because they can't make any more money. I'm not really sure how that all works. I'll have to ask my husband. Okay, if y'all were in the United States, you had a medical practice, I would tell you there's what y'all need to earn more money. Yeah. Because paying off 2.6 million dollars for $200,000, that's gonna take you forever.

Yeah. Right? What's that? Is that 13 years? Like y'all gonna have to make more money. And all your nurses are gonna want raises. Like everything's gonna go up, right? And so, like that's expensive. I just don't know if y'all can do that in Canada. Well, we just hope that interest rates go down and so we pay less interest on our loans. Oh sister, you have an adjustable rate loan on this thing? Yeah, we do. In Canada, is it every five years they adjust the rate? I think it's every five years. Yeah. That's not on mortgages. That's on all loans? Not on all of them. That's only with the business one,

which is the 2.6 million. Which is the giant one. This new segment is brought to you by Dr. Butler's hemorrhoid spray, because I now have hemorrhoids. Here's some basic math for you on the business loan. You pay 260 grand a year, it would still take 10 years. And that's 260 grand of extra money, beyond all of your bills

that you can throw at the business debt. So that's why we're saying we need to drastically get our income up. I'm guessing there's no way to get out of this. Like, I mean, even if you sold the practice, you're gonna lose the tune of a million bucks, I'm guessing.

Yeah. Yeah. There's only one way out then, and that's to increase income and decrease expenses, both in the business and in your personal life. Okay. Which means vacations are off the table. We're not getting any more car loans.

You may want to sell the car and downgrade. Truthfully, it's such a small percentage of this debt. I would just pay it off and keep the car. He's working Saturdays and probably being the only doctor's office open Sundays for half day on Sunday. Like, like there's just not a way. You'll just dug yourself a humongous hole. And so you have to just get it,

find a way to get a big shovel. Yeah. Yeah, we'd have to try to find another doctor to hire and work with us part-time or something like that. Potentially, but you've got to make sure that works because that doctor's going to come in. They need a hefty salary. Coming in to salary, right.

So he's going to have to, or she's going to have to earn beyond their weight, right? They need to bring in 600 grand a year to get paid 300 grand a year, right? and it may be that y'all do with one less nurse and You and or your husband has to pick up some administrative duties that most fancy physicians just just pawn off on their nurses, but Here's what I would do in order. Number one, as George said,

I would split off the personal stuff. What's our take home? We're making 140 grand a year. We're gonna pay off our consumer debt and we're gonna hammer this student loan. When it comes to the business, man, I'd find out what is your cap in the medical system that you guys find yourself in Canada.

And then I'd figure out ways to increase drastically the income of this practice Whoo, I couldn't sleep with that much debt John. I'm so sorry Allison. I hope you guys get out of this unscathed This is the Ramsey Show This show is sponsored by BetterHelp This month is all about gratitude and most of us have people in our lives who are grateful for One of those people for me is the great Jean Noel Thompson Every month is all about gratitude, and most of us have people in our lives who we're grateful for. One of those people for me is the great Jean Noel Thompson. He taught me how to be a dad, a husband, a professional, and how to balance caring for

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Welcome back to The Ramsey Show. I'm John Delaney. Let's go out to, oh, I'm joined by George Campbell. Thanks, John. I'm here too. Happy to help. I felt you kick me under the desk. Blessed to be a blessing.

I don't even know what that means. Let's go out to Cincinnati, Ohio and talk to Eric. What's up, Eric? Good afternoon. I hope everyone is doing well. We are running a scam here called a podcast, YouTube show, man. We're doing great. How about you? Couldn't be better. Thank you so much. That's awesome. What's up, brother?

So fun. So fun fact. I've heard about you guys back in like senior year of 2012, heard all about the baby steps and from years from years on, I've been on and off on and off and I hate to say it. I haven't been really committed to the whole thing. It wasn't until this year when I almost got evicted that I evicted from my apartment that I decided yeah, I need to change. I need to be dedicated. I need to be devoted. So I am for real this time going through the seven baby steps as we speak. Oh man, drinking the Kool-Aid finally. So, uh, I've art, I've been completed baby step one.

I have a thousand dollars currently saved up. Uh, as of last week I've paid off the only debt ever had which is my medical bill and I'm currently Ready to start baby step three and this is where my question comes into play So I did my own little research about where to put that thousand dollars I have and two things keeps popping up one is Money market account and the other is a high yield savings account. Good research. So my question is, which of the two overall

would be the better choice for me, as well as what situation would one be better than the other? I'll tell you what I do, and most folks out there following the Ramsey Plan, they're remarkably similar. The money market versus the high yield savings. The money market may have an extra benefit like you can write checks out of it,

it might come with a debit card, but outside of that, they're a savings account. And so I have a high yield savings account and you're gonna get some still really decent interest rates, talking over 4% with some of the good ones out there, and that'll help your emergency fund stay liquid, grow at the pace of inflation,

and it's there to protect you. It is insurance, it's not an investment. So we're not trying to make money off of this thing, but we also wanna keep it somewhere safe that's FDIC insured, doesn't have any minimum balance and monthly fees and all of that. So those are the boxes you wanna check when it comes to a good high-yield savings.

Okay. But also, it's a thousand bucks, man, so you can drop it in a local credit union. Don't step over dollars to pick up nickels, as my friend Layne Norton says. Don't go chasing the nickels. Well, it's 0.1% more if I move it here, so I would just choose one and stick with it. Overcomplication is going to be your enemy at this point. Let's keep things simple, man. Right.

So, which comes to another thing, is there any place that I could look at to see which would be the most beneficial place to put the $1,000? Because the Bank of Korea, if I work with USAA, been in there for over years or since I joined the military, and they do this thing where it's like a.01% so if I leave it there, I'm only getting a penny a month. No, yeah, that's terrible.

You can do better. So there's a balance here. And so we've got a great partner called FairWinds. If you go to fairwinds.org slash Ramsey, they've got a bundle just for our Ramsey listeners. I've got a partner on my YouTube channel called Laurel Road. You can sign up at laurelroad.com slash George. That's the one that I'm using.

John and Jade and Rachel, they're probably all using different ones, but the key here is you want it to be FDIC insured with minimum to no fees, and you can get that money easily. And probably a good answer, a good question you might ask is yes, George and I both put our emergency funds

into online high yield savings accounts. I'm pretty old school. I like to go to my local bank, I still like a brick and mortar like bank from my house stuff, but I do have my emergency fund in a high yield savings account. And the reason they're simple, they have less overhead because they're online, they don't have all the brick and mortars, they don't have to cover as many bills and hire as many people so they can pass on their savings to have all the brick and mortars. They don't have to cover as many bills and hire as many people. So they can pass on their savings to you

in the form of a higher interest rate. But me, as my wife says, being born in the wrong century, I still like to shake the hands of my banker. I wanna see their face. So, that's just me. So I have both. I wanna bank with a local bank for my checking account and for my high yield savings,

I'm fine putting that online knowing that I'll touch it, you know, once or twice a year. Okay, it's interesting that you say that because I do have two banks. I have one bank for general purpose, my second bank where, again, that's where my $1,000 is at. And I was always thinking of looking for a third one to take my $1,000 and let that...

No, dude. You don't need to overcomplicate. You're gonna get too complicated. Too many, yeah, you're gonna be triple stamp and a double stamp. Minimalist. No, dude. You don't need to overcomplicate. You're gonna get too complicated. Too many, yeah, you're gonna be like triple stamp and a double stamp. Minimalist. Just, yes. A checking account with a good local bank,

a credit union's a great option, and then for your emergency fund or short-term savings, we'll call it one to three or four years, a high-yield savings account with a great online institution is great. I mean, credit unions can sometimes have great rates too. They're amazing, yeah. Hey, can you do me a favor Eric yes sir this is kind of

impromptu in front of I don't know several million people you cool yeah that's fine well you do like an impromptu debt-free scream we count it down okay you just you paid off all your debts right that's correct how much debt was it and how long did it take? It was around 500 bucks. It was a medical bill. You owed 500 bucks? So long as there's an emergency situation.

No, that's the smallest debt I've ever heard paid off. That's amazing. This could be a world record, smallest debt-free scream ever. How long did you have the debt for? Oh my goodness, um, I've had this since I want to say December if not January Wow Donski. All right, so Eric making a hundred million dollars paid off his debt of five hundred bucks.

And it will take you one month. It did. Excellent. Count it down, dude. Let's hear your debt free scream, Eric. All right. I'm debt free. That's right. We got the music and everything. Even got it. There we go. Hey man, we celebrate the big ones and we will celebrate the $500 debt-free screams. Because here's the deal, freedom is freedom is freedom, right? And it comes with a promise, you've got to promise not to go into consumer debt ever again.

Promise, promise, promise, promise. Because you're following this Ramsey plan now after ignoring it for 12 years. And it's about to change your life, man. I want to set you up for freedom. We're gonna hook you up with my book, Breaking Free from Broke, as well as a year of every dollar premium so you can budget your way to that emergency fund

and investing and everything beyond. George, how many people do you see get to the stage and begin to try to over-sophisticate things? The amount of complication we try to do because it seems too simple. We're like, no, it's gotta be more complicated to be smart and efficient and great. And I'm going, no, if you look at Dave Ramsey, who has more, he has enough wealth to feed my family for 17,000 generations.

He owns mutual funds in real estate. He doesn't have a crypto wallet. He doesn't have 17 offshore accounts. He doesn't make it overcomplicated. And that's what I found. It's the people that don't have wealth crypto wallet, he doesn't have 17 offshore accounts, he doesn't make it over complicated. And that's what I found. It's the people that don't have wealth that want to over complicate it. The ones that do have this dirty little secret where they go, yeah, I just, I have a savings

account. I have money in the bank. I invest in the stock market. I own paid for real estate. And it's always amazing to me that when you get around those people, they have a different energy about them. You're expecting more. You're like, no, but wait, there's a secret. No, but it's this. It's that when you get around those people, they have a different energy about them. You're expecting more. You're like, no, but wait, there's a secret.

No, but it's this. It's just like my give a crap. I took it apart and I eBayed all the parts. Like I like if you're around Dave, just like when we go hang out, right? We go to his barn or we are out traveling. There's just an air of like, yeah, I don't care. And it's because I've just in a complicated life, right? I'm gonna I'm gonna do the things I got to do to make things as simple as possible

And you and I both have been hit up by the by the Instagram finance bros Oh, yeah, you pay off your 3.2 percent mortgage and you can get 4.8 percent It's like bro, I'll use the word arbitrage and then a puppy stops wagging its tail exactly. Oh, it's exhausting It's like yeah Get the whole life policy and then you puppy stops wagging its tail. Exactly. Oh, it's exhausting. It's like, yeah. Get the whole life policy and then you can borrow against it and then you need 16 credit cards to maximize the rewards and I'm going, dude, listen to yourself talk.

Exactly. You sound like a crazy person trying to maximize your freaking rewards to get an extra 1% arbitrage to pay for that first class flight so you can take a picture of it and post it to your Instagram. It's exhausting. Yeah, you know what I have? I have a an Olympic wrestling mat in my living room that I just wrestle with my daughter. I'd rather spend my energy doing that. That's a flex right there. Or like,

hey, wife, let's go for like a two-hour walk tonight and leave the kids rather feral. Let's just go spend time together. What a thought. What if you could build a life that didn't exhaust you? Yeah, that you were excited to wake up and be a part of. Keep it simple. Yeah, it's all for peace, people. We'll be right back. Hey guys, George Camel here for Delete Me.

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at ramsysolutions.com slash giveaway. It's that easy. Plus our 50 days of Christmas deals is on right now. Get up to 30% off bestsellers and life changing gifts that won't break the holiday budget. ramsysolutions.com slash store. Welcome back to the Ramsey Show. I'm John Delaney joined by George Campbell, 888255225. The Ramsey Show question of the day. This is a spicy one. Brought to you by Why ReFi. Why ReFi refinances defaulted private student loans which are different than federal student loans. Why ReFi refinances your defaulted private student loans and builds a custom loan based on your ability to pay.

Kick your private student loan debt out of your life forever by going to yreify.com slash Ramsey. That's the letter Y, R-E-F-Y dot com slash Ramsey. And this may not be available in all states. Today's question comes from Meg in Maine. I've been an avid follower for 20 years and I'm debt free. However, I'm facing a bit of a challenge and would love to get your advice. I travel quite a bit now that I'm semi-retired,

and I've been considering getting a travel points credit card. My plan is to charge my travel expenses and large purchases, then pay them off immediately. I feel disciplined enough to handle this without carrying any debt, plus the idea of earning points and not carrying so much cash is appealing. But here's the kicker, despite having a credit score of 833, I've been turned down for several credit cards since I haven't used one in many years. Do you have any suggestions on how to approach the situation or any alternatives I should consider?

I think you should get a credit card for points if you hate widows, orphans, and those who are struggling to pay their bills. Whoa, John, shots fired. Hot take. What's going on here? So I remember, it's not for Ramsey, I was moving across, I was moving, I was taking a long move, and the business I was moving would not for Ramsey. I was moving across I was moving I was taking a long move and the plate the business I was moving was would pay

Reimbursed my move as a whole family one of the big old monster trucks But I had to front it and so I thought oh man I'm gonna open up a credit card and with points on it and I'll make just free points because I'm just gonna turn around and this new company that I'm working for is gonna reimburse reimburse me for the move. So I did that. And I remember getting a whole bunch of free points for opening the card. And then I got a whole bunch more points for this massive amount of money I spent right out of the gate to move my whole family. And then I was literally driving on the road and I remember thinking, wait a minute, the credit card company is not my friend and the airline company is not my friend. Like they're not hooking me up like bro you spent money with us we're gonna hook you

up. Somebody's paying for this flight and somebody's paying for these hotel stays and when I dug into it that's when to my horror I realized oh it's not the companies it's not the credit card company I realized, oh, it's not the companies, it's not the credit card companies, not the airlines, not the hotels that are paying for these rooms. It's the single mom with three kids who just left an abusive relationship,

who is struggling to feed her kids, who puts this credit card in, and then her boss cuts her hours, and she gets a $50 late fee or a $39 late fee or her APR goes from 13 to 29% in one month. She's paying for my flight or the single dad whose wife just passed away and like they're scrambling and scrambling. He opens up a credit card at a desperation and then he misses a payment and it balloons

on that guy's paying for my flights and it all of a sudden got very gross for me. Like I don't wanna be a part of this system. I travel, you and I travel a lot. I travel all the time, all the time. I'd rather pay for my own flights or work out a business arrangement with a company that's paying me to come speak for them than ever think I have some single mom who can't put food on her table, pay my bills. And it just got gross for me

real fast. You did some research on this, right? There's a moral argument to be made. Yeah, my book, Breaking Free from Broke, here's the quote from the book. A 2023 study by the Federal Reserve. They set out to determine who pays for these credit card awards, and the results, though expected, are alarming. In the report, the Fed said, we estimate an aggregate annual redistribution of $15 billion from less to more educated, from the poorer to richer, and from high to low minority areas, widening existing disparities. Simple.

And here's what gets worse, John, as I dug into it. Families with household incomes below 40 grand are less likely to even qualify for These rewards, but they're more likely to pay late fees and additional interest the family's making a hundred grand or more Obviously more likely to have access to these reward cards and less likely to pay late fees and interest So it's not saying you're a bad person if you use the Rewards, this is not a moral argument to say John is a better person than you. I mean, but John John sleeps better at night because of it. Yeah.

And can you play the game? Sure, is it worth the 2%? Let's say you spend 25 grand. I mean, is it really worth that amount to you? Well, they put in a huge font cash back, right? Cash back. Well, and they go, well, it's points now, John. It's not cash.

Oh, it's points. What's 100,000 points? I don't know, it's like Chuck E. Cheese. You spent $100 at Chuck E. Cheese to get a thing that's actually worth $7. Right. So you get like a cool monogrammed Bluetooth speaker. Like, because I got 100,000 points for it. It's a no-name brand. Yeah, it's awesome. You get some, you know, one of those sticky hands, and a pack of gum.

Yeah. And you're like, I spent 20 bucks for this. Refurbished like New Balances, right? So can it be done? Can you be super disciplined and beat the cyst? Sure, I don't think it's worth the brain calories and the energy and the money spent to try to do it personally. And if you, I mean, geez, I don't want to make it a moral issue, but I want to call

these programs to task. If you like the idea of somebody's, of wealth being redistributed from the least of these in our communities to pay for your flights and hotels, knock your lights out. For me, George, it just got gross. And again, we can line up the things that I need to work on. I'm not a better person than anybody, but in this one particular thing, this is just a hot button issue with me. The banks aren't your friends. The credit card companies aren't your friends. The airline companies are not your friends. They're running businesses. They would not be giving you these flights if it was, if they weren't making that money up somewhere else, right? There's an

old saying in the internet world, if you get online and you log in and you have to put your email address in for free and you get a product for free, you're the product, right? They want you, right? So it's similarly asking that next layer question, who's paying for these flights actually? Who's paying for the advantage I just think I got? Because they're not hooking you up like your friend or your neighbor. Well, when you think about this, let's say you do spend 25,000 a year on travel.

I think we'd all agree that's a lot. Someone's traveling a lot with 25 grand a year. And 2%, it's 500 bucks. You could put 40 bucks in a savings account every month and give yourself the rewards. Yeah, absolutely. And so you're never gonna convince me because of humans being emotional creatures,

that psychologically you're not going to spend $500 more on that card over the course of a year because you're going, well, I'll get some points. Might as well get the nicer flight. Well, and if you fly Southwest or America, you fly these companies all the time, you get flight points for participating. I'm okay with that, right? Because they're marking up your ticket and they're going to give you a piece. That's fine. If I fly 25 times of Southwest, I'll get a free flight. Not gonna lie, that's fantastic. That's

awesome. It's that next level of, hey my gasoline, my Snickers bar, my whatever, your haircuts, which is a, I mean, that's a lot of money. I'd get some serious cash back, but instead here's what I do with my haircuts, John. I pay cash and I get a discount. I do, because we use the same barber. He gives a cash discount. Exactly, so I'm like, well, I'm making more by paying cash than by swiping my card, which by the way, hurts the small business owner,

because they've got to now pay the 3% fee or pass it on to you all to get my 2% cash back. So either way, you are not the one winning. It's the card processing companies, it's Visa, it's MasterCard, it's AMX, it's Discover, it's Southwest, it's Delta, and these are not evil companies. This is just how they do business,

and you need to understand how they're marketing to you. There's a reason they're always offering you, hey, John, you're so wonderful, here's more line of credit. We're gonna give you an extra $5,000 in credit that you can spend. You're telling me psychologically I don't get the dopamine hit that tells me I am winning.

The banks love me. Yeah, they love you. So I don't know. As for me and my house, we solve for peace. And if I can opt out of a system, I like that. I like that. I like to think through that. This is truly how we love.

People think, well, they just have to say that on air. Dave secretly, no, you can check his wallet. You can check any of our wallets. There is not a single credit card to be found. And it's not because we're scared of Dave finding out, it's because we truly have no need for them. Just opt out of the system. Once we started following the Ramsey plan, we're like, oh, we can just use our own money and have freedom and control over our life? Great. Sign me up. Screw the rewards.

It's just, again, let's go back to simplicity. Where's that George Campbell t-shirt? Screw your rewards. I like the one that says, go fund yourself. That one I'm still trying to get as part of Ramsey merch. That's fantastic. Yeah, I don't know that Dave's gonna go for it yet. He could. I like that though.

He's not here a lot on the show. Just imagine if America said, go fund yourself. Go fund your own retirement. Go fund your own credit card rewards, and America would be a better place instead of making banks and lenders richer if you made a shirt that said go fund yourself And I made one that said that gives me hemorrhoids you and I would both would be billionaires America would buy those t-shirts. This is the Ramsey show. We'll be right back Well, it's decision time again every year during open enrollment

You have the chance to check in on your insurance and make sure it's right for you and your family. Whether you have health coverage through your job, a private company, or a government program like Medicare, you don't have to figure this out alone. We have reliable folks we trust to help you get the right coverage for whatever stage you're in. Go to ramsysolutions.com slash health dash coverage. Welcome back to the Ramsey show. Triple eight, eight to five, five, two, two, five.

I'm John Delaney joined by George camel. This is the raddest thing I think I got going on in my life right now. Me and Dave Ramsey launching a brand new tour this spring called the Money and Relationships Tour. It's gonna be gonzo. Oh, that is rad, yeah. Wheels off. So this is a very different event than we've ever done

because there's no talks, there's no scripts. You guys are gonna riff based on what the audience wants to hear, is that right? It will not be, yeah, it won't be like two one hour lectures. It will be chaos, it'll be a blast. It will, yeah, the audience gets to vote on what we talk about and Dave and I will have spent the last six months like researching

and digging into these topics and then we'll spread them out and say, all right, y'all pick from this menu. What do you wanna talk about? Wow, I think Dave's accidentally starting an improv troupe. I never thought this day would come. This is amazing. This is as close as we're gonna see to Dave doing improv. So you guys are heading out to six cities.

Six cities. So Louisville in April 21, Durham in April 23rd, Atlanta, April 25th, Phoenix, May 5th, Fort Worth, Fort Worth, Texas, Texas, y'all gotta show up for me. May 7th in the Kansas City, May 9th. We're gonna be there live. We're gonna be talking about and we talk about relationship dynamics your marriage your kids budgeting financial goals, whatever you got You your voice will drive the night get your tickets at relate Ramsey solutions comm slash tour by the way great Christmas gifts Ramsey solutions comm slash

Tour yeah, I I was telling somebody on the audience, just a little bit, I don't get nervous just being on stage with Dave for two and a half hours and letting it rip. I'll probably be a little puckered up. Yeah I might show up to like the Atlanta one just to see what what the heck happens there. You can bomb with some questions from the audience. That'd be real fun actually. I'll put on a fake mustache. That would be hilarious. But then we'd all find out that well actually you have a pretty nice beard from the audience. That'd be amazing. That'd be real fun actually. I'll put on a fake mustache. That would be hilarious. That'd be amazing. But then we'd all find out that,

well actually you have a pretty nice beard going. Thank you. That looks good. I haven't shaved in seven months, this is all I got. It's barely a five, it's like a four o'clock shadow. Couldn't even make it to five. No, it's a noon shadow. My face just gave up.

Let's go out to, let's go down the street to Nashville and talk to Michael. What's up, Michael? I'm on a whole lot of guys, a bunch of stuff. We're just running the scam out here. What's up man, how can I help? Alrighty, so got a question. So me and my wife have finally got to the point to where we paid off all of our debts and we've saved up a pretty good amount of money and we we saved up a pretty good amount of money and we actually came into a pretty good amount of money as well on top of that.

We ended up putting a big down payment on a house. Now unfortunately, I didn't want to be in a scenario where it took both of our income to pay the mortgage and I'm a big farm guy. I had to have land. So we ended up with $300,000 in debt now on a home for 30 years. And that I did pay my rates down to 5% and like I said, I paid off everything. I have $10,000 into a emergency fund. I have 6,,000 into a emergency fund. I have six months of payments ready

for any time. And right now it's currently only taking like $3,000 of our money to pay all of our bills. And we grow anywhere between $8,500 to $9,000 a month. So my question is, yes, I know I went with a 30 year note. Would it be better just to pay double payments or literally take everything I got and just keep dropping it in there until I get paid off? So you said your bills are how much per month? Total expenses? About three to $3,500.

$3,500, okay. So you've got plenty of margin to the tune of, you know, five grand a month you could just chunk at the mortgage. And then you have how much, you said you came into some money. How much is sitting there outside of your emergency fund that you could use? Outside of my emergency fund?

Well, I put everything in the three categories. I got $10,000 in emergency fund I have well I put everything in the three categories I got ten thousand in emergency fund and I have just over 22 Just for six months of everything So let's get your emergency fund Well, I reason I say I got ten thousand000 for your like, you know, vehicle stuff like that, they tore up. With that being said, so yeah, we have $32,000 and I also have just like vacation money that we put in that we have close to five grand right now. Just that way we don't spend anything extra. So we're not going to touch the emergency fund. We're not going to touch the vacation money. Keep

your sinking funds happening as they should. But all of your future income, that five grand a month, I would be throwing at the mortgage, my friend. How quickly do you think you could pay that off? I would go crunch the numbers in a mortgage payoff calculator at ramsaysolutions.com and see for yourself how quickly you can pay off 300 grand, making an extra $5,000 payment every month. It'll blow your mind.

You'll be done in probably, my guess, I mean, that's- Four years. 60 grand a year on top of your normal mortgage payment, probably four years instead of 30. Yeah, I've already done that. We looked into that. I just didn't know if it would be smarter

to put half of that money towards mortgage and then invest half the other money into something else. Well, you should be investing already. Are you investing 15% of your income? No, we had not. Like I said, we were... So when I got my wife, she had $100,000 in debt, and it was all school debt. She's a school teacher. And I was big about getting that done, getting that out of our hair. And we spent the last three years just hammering it all over big bills. How much do you make a year? What's your household income?

What's your household income? Well before this year it was 120. Now it's 96 because I went from OTR to local. Okay, here's how I hear you asking this question. You're in the studio and you're standing with me and George and you just have your head hanging in shame. Do me a huge favor, man. Like George and I, would we sign off on a 30 year mortgage? No, I'd do a 15.

That's what we recommend. You paid off all your debts. You didn't go crazy, you bought a $300,000 house. George and I both live in Nashville. We both recently bought places. I don't know where you found a $300,000 house, but God bless you and your family and your grandkids. That's amazing.

You got yourself some land. You've paid off all of your debts, including the 100 grand that your wife can make. Hear me say this, dude. Y'all are crushing it. You're doing great. And how old are you two? How old are you two?

I am 34. She's 36. Oh my goodness. This is amazing. So can I do some fun math for you, Michael? Yes, sir. Okay. So let's say you start investing now and you do 15% of your income.

That's about 1200 bucks every month going into retirement accounts. I assume you have one through your employer? I do. Good. So we'll shovel away 1200 bucks into these tax advantage retirement accounts. In 23 years, that puts you at 57, correct? You're gonna have probably $1.4 million in that one account.

And by the way, 23 years from now, you're gonna have probably $1.4 million in that one account. And by the way, 23 years from now, your mortgage payment has been gone for like 20 years, which means you probably increased your investing and you've had freedom for the last two decades of your life. And so- You bought your neighbor's property and the property next to that one, the property. Do you see how it changes your options?

You're a great man. And so you've set yourself up for that kind of future because of the hustle and grind you just spent the last few years doing. So I know you're tired, you're worn out, you're like, what do I do now? We got the money. You think you did something wrong.

Should I do 17 things at once? Just follow these steps, man. 15% of your income to retirement, anything beyond that, throw it the mortgage and let's be done with it. Set a goal for let's say five years. And if you're like me, and I have like a kind of an obscene allergy to owing somebody something. I just, I hate people telling me what to do and I hate owing somebody. Hate it, hate it, hate it.

It's like an itch you just can't scratch. Yeah, so sit down with your wife and say, okay, it's going to cost us three years of some B-A-N-A-N some BANAS living, but let's just do this and get this thing over with. All right. 38 years old. That's fine. But you have to work weekends, Saturdays, whatever. And we're going to keep, we're just going to gnaw on this thing and gnaw on this thing until it's gone. If it goes beyond three years and y'all can't figure out a way to do that, just exhale and just say, okay, when I'm 40, I'm going to have a paid off house and make peace with yourself and go hunting tomorrow morning when the season opens like you know I'm saying

like you have done such a good job man you should be proud of yourself yeah I am and that's a week so my wife she's she has this mindset like me I'm a big avid hunter and every time I see something for hunting I don't I don't splurge on anything I mean you, you sound just like John. I have the money to buy anything I want, but like I'm the type of guy that I'll go take my boots before I have to go find one. Well, don't do that. Enjoy your life and have a good time and also get this house paid off. For all of you listening to the show on YouTube or podcasts, it's about to end. Head over to the Ramsey network app and the party will continue. Go to the show notes and you can watch the rest of the show

on the app for free. We'll see you soon. 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 gotta 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.

Badda bing, badda boom. Alright, I'm getting out of here. Enjoy, we'll see you on the app.