You Can’t Hack Your Way Out of Debt

0:00Brought to you by the EveryDollar app. Start budgeting for free today. Normalist broke and common sense is weird. So we're here to help you transform your life from the Ramsey Network in the Fairwinds Credit Union Studio. This is the Ramsey Show. Virtual Cruise Ramsey Personality. Number one best selling author and my daughter is my co-host today. Open phones at AAA 825-5225. Robert is in Philadelphia. Hey Robert, how are you? Hey, come on in Dave. What's up? So I'm calling to get a little advice and your opinion on a financial, I would categorize as a disaster that I'm going through currently.

1:01Okay. So I am 34 years old and I am married to my wife. We got married back in 2018 and it kind of goes back to the relationship with her family. So I met her, my in-laws, her parents back in 2010. They lived a very lavish lifestyle. And again, I was never passed judgment but I was like, well, my father and mom does very well for themselves. He was in the real estate business and had what I would say a large portfolio of commercial real estate. Fast forward to two years ago, I discovered that my father-in-law back in 2015 or 2016 basically got himself in a giant mess with the IRS. He owes currently several hundred thousand dollars in taxes.

2:06And what he did was he put my wife, his daughter and her two sisters basically transferred all of the assets into their name. And my wife, she did sign documents. It wasn't that her signature was forged or anything. But she kind of prantedly just said, hey, it's my father. He asked me to sign some documents. So he was all floating assets into his kid's name to keep the IRS from taking the assets fraudulently? Yeah. Okay. This is fraud. Okay. So basically... How old was your wife at the time? She was, so this was 2021, so she was probably... No, no, no, no. You said 16 and 15 is what had happened. Okay. So that's when she signed the documents after you were married? Yeah.

3:06Oh. So, and I'll get to what I've discussed with attorneys, but when fast forward to the forward, he had taken out a $10 million loan out under these girls' names, which they personally guaranteed. And the buildings that were in the LLC that he started, they have been taken. They are up for share of sale. Now I have talked multiple attorneys. We filed tax-decebrate. Our house is in my name. I am financially and I know we're married, but I'm financially fine. I have a lot of investments. I have a lot of retirement savings. I do have another piece of real estate that is all in my name, only no mortgage.

4:11And multiple attorneys have told me, you have nothing to be worried about. We feel that your wife should just file chapter seven. And I guess this isn't more so a financial question, even though it is, but I kind of just wanted your input. Like, how do I navigate this? I have this, I mean, me and my wife were okay. So here's the thing. Because she felt deceived by her father, basically. Yeah, absolutely. She went in naively and just signed whatever he'd to sign. Yeah, right, right. Yeah. And she is arrogant enough. He thought this was all going to work out. He probably did not set out to harm his children, but he's just an idiot. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Now, gosh. Okay. So the properties have all been foreclosed on. There's $10 million in loans. And properties have not yet sold after foreclosure, correct?

5:13Correct. Okay. All right. So the way the process will go down is, is the properties will be sold. You have any idea what this portfolio of properties might be worth. Approximately $7 million. Okay. All right. So let's pretend that they brought that and then that would leave $3 million unpaid. Correct. Okay. And I'm guessing that the other siblings don't have any money and are chapter seven bankruptcy as well. That is correct. Okay. All right. And so let's just switch shoes a minute and put on the bankers shoes. Okay. If I'm the banker sitting there, once I get into this, I can tell what happened. Okay. That the dad is a shister and he dumped his kids on the railroad track and here comes the train. Okay. If I'm the banker, I'm looking at that. And I know that that actually happened. But do you care?

6:13And I don't care if your wife had $3 million, I might not care, but your wife has nothing. And so I probably 98% chance if I'm the banker, I'm looking at this, I'm going, whatever I'm going to get out of this deal, I'm going to get out of these properties because these three kids are all filing BK. Okay. And what that means is, if that guy really believes that or that guy, or the banker, then you might for X number of dollars buy out her position, release her. Okay. And so what I would do is this, I would wait right now. Let's let the whole thing go down and don't bother. I wouldn't file filing today as premature. They may never come after her just because they know she's not a rich target. And if they did, you might all from something absurd, $20,000 and they might go away.

7:15Just something symbolic, you know, that's all it is because if they don't take that $20,000, they're going to get zero because your wife has no assets, all the assets are in your name, you're protected. Does she have any assets in her name? No, the bankruptcy attorney we sat down asked for assets and liability and my wife is worth $29,000. Okay, there it is. I'll end up. Yeah. Okay. And Philadelphia, I don't know what, I'm Pennsylvania, I don't know what your personal exemption is but she probably gets to keep most of that, if not all of that in the personal exemptions and the bankruptcy. So I, I, I'm not going to wait 10 years for this to unfold. But right now I'm not going to let it, how pissed off I am about this and the emotions of this caused me to act prematurely. I'm just going to let it roll out, let the properties be sold. When they call, go, hey guys, we got this short conversation. We've already teed up the bankruptcy attorney.

8:17This kid's got nothing, she got screwed over about her dad and you're getting nothing or I'll give you 20 grand a keeper from having a file bankruptcy. Which one you wanted to? Man, I want to know what the dad's saying right now. Tough. Woof, so sorry Robert, that's, that's, that's Thanksgiving's going to be weird. If there is a Thanksgiving. I'm nothing to be thankful for. Wow. If you're shopping online and these days, everybody does, data brokers are out there right now buying and selling your personal information. Your phone number, your home address, your email, without your knowledge or consent. And that puts you at risk for spam calls, scam texts and fraud.

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10:22to get out of debt and into wealth. And the fastest way to do all of this is using every dollar. It's more than a budging app. It's the whole ramsy plan built right in. You track your progress. You get personalized ramsy baby steps recommendations as you go. It's a good thing for your situation as you go and it'll help you free up more money and work the plan faster. It's like having one of us walking with you every day showing you the next ride step. Start every dollar for free by downloading it in the App Store or Google Play. Rachel, that ad copy reminds me. I was doing an interview with a major international network this morning and the guy said, do you think that some of your listeners think you're mean? And I said, absolutely. Oh, you had to read the comments and you know that. And he goes, um, you can be grumpy sometimes. And, well, that's different than me. But yeah, but I said, well, he said, well, why would people keep listening and keep calling you if they think you're mean?

11:23And I said, well, to start with, there are shows that are much meaner than we are, much more over the top. And they basically use their callers to create drama. Sure. And they get great ratings. So those kinds of that process works, which is not our process, our process is to help people. And it's telling you the truth. He said, well, when I listen to your show, I feel like I've got to do list of things that aren't done. And I don't get any credit for the things that are done. And I said, yeah. I mean, when I go home, Sharon Ramsey's got one of those. I got to do list of things to do. And I don't get any credit for the ones that are already done. Celebrate our listeners more. Yeah, that's what it is. But you know, he was like, you know, we, we are taking you from where you are to where you want to go. Yeah. And we love you. And we're going to tell you the truth to get you from where you are to where you want to go. Just like this every dollar ad just said, right? Yes. 100%. But also, we want to. Where you've been is just part of the story.

12:24Yes. But if you've completed baby step one, incredible you guys. If you've done. I don't get that. Yeah. We tell people often way to go. I know. Great job. And time to go on to the next thing. Yeah. There's always a next step. Yeah. Yeah. Where it feels like it's like a never ending process is what you finish the laundry and they'll be another. I got a, I got a key. Yes. Tomorrow. I'm sorry. Welcome to grown up like. Yeah. Jonathan is with us. Jonathan is in Sarasota, Florida. Hi, Jonathan. How are you? Doing okay, Dave. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? So my question is, should I use my gambling winnings to help pay off my house or do I let it ride? Because I'm doing pretty well with it. You're about to get grumpy Dave. Are you? Are you? Are you? Are you? I want to hear John. Hold on. I want to hear. What is this? What? What did you gamble? What do you have?

13:25Give us. I'm just curious. I have to go to the details now that's going to change my answer. I am a long time listener and I'm being a little bit silly here. Oh, good. I hope so. Good. I feel better already about you. I do want to hear the numbers. My, my crypto and my single stocks. I call that my beer and gambling money. That's your game. I know that's. Yeah. I don't, beer, I don't gamble. You are a long time listener. I know I like it. Okay. I know how much beer and gambling money do you have, Jonathan? Yeah. So about, about 25 K built from essentially paintings. I think I am overfunded in my emergency fund or maybe so my question is, do I convert this crypto and single stocks to my emergency fund and then essentially drain the 100K that I have in my high yield savings? because I owe 100K on my house.

14:26Would that leave you with no emergency fund? No, it would leave me with about 25K from the crypto-on-single stock, if I got a rid of them. Oh, I see. Okay. So that would mean, okay. Well, if your house was paid off, would you borrow on it to put money in your high yield savings and into crypto? Of course, yeah, of course not. Same thing, isn't it? Right. Yeah, if I pay the house off, we could live on about 2K a month. So I think the 25K would be sufficient. Yeah. Did you agree with that? Did you get my analysis there? Did you understand what I was saying? That's why I laughed instead of, of course not. So yeah. 1 million percent. Yeah, yeah. So here's, here's. You kind of already knew I was going to say that because you're listening. So there's a couple of what I think are big asterisk here. One is bigger than the other. One is, I mean, a 1970s home for my countertops

15:32and 70s things everywhere. They're cosmetic, so I can deal with it. However, the other wrinkle in this, and this is why I'm hesitant to pay the house off, is we have some upcoming medical stuff that we know is 95% chance it's going to happen. My wife, unfortunately, without getting too personal, has a disease that requires surgery every one to three years we've been together for 20 years. So we've been through 10 of them together. And then you have health insurance. We do have health insurance. So yeah, out of pocket. You're out of pocket for the surgery's going to be how much does the insurance is going to cover most of it? So that's the tough part. We've gone through local doctors before and let's just say last time the surgery did not go well.

16:35And there's a specialty center that's kind of far from us that does not take insurance, but they are, that we've done our research. They're the best of the best. It's where she should be. And how much is that? They're charging us 1,200 bucks to have a conversation. So I don't yet know because there's a lot of it's a half a million dollars. That's a great question. You have not had any conversations till you give me a price range. No paid conversations. Fair enough. So I pay the $200 bucks and the, and let's call the procedure $20,000 and you want to do it outside of insurance because of quality issues. Okay, that's fine. What do you, what's your household income? Just just over 200.

17:36Okay. When will the surgery happen? Not take home that. Yeah. That's okay. That's gross. I got one. When, when will the surgery take place? Rachel said. It's not scheduled yet because the initial consult is this week assuming within the next six months. Let's say, okay. Here's, here's what I would do. I would, because your house is not paid off and because having cash in the season is probably going to be really a priority for you guys. Because of the health stuff, I would get out of crypto single stock. I would, I would condense down. I would have my high yield savings. Anything over, and you'll know after the consult, kind of the range of what this is going to cost you guys. But let's say it's, let's say it's 70,000. I don't know. You know what I mean? I may just take a beat and get through the health stuff. I mean, John, that's, I mean, to me, that's, I would want all of that taken care of and have that peace knowing like, hey, we have the money to make the moves

18:37we need to make with our health. And to me, like that, that's priceless. I agree. But with the caveat that once all of this is settled up and if she doesn't need the surgery for another three years after this one, we're paying the house off. And then, yeah, and then we're going to save again. So when this, when it comes back up in three years, we're good. Like the cushion for me is knowing health wise, we're fine. And but we still have a target date. We're still not going to take our eye off the ball because we want to, we're going to stay motivated knowing what we're going to do after this. But that's what I would do. Completely agree. So recap. Cash out the crypto and the stock today. Put it in your high yield savings. Go do the consult. Set aside the emergency front plus the budget for the surgery, throw the rest of it at the mortgage. And by Christmas, the surgery is in your rearview mirror and you know how much you got left to throw at the mortgage even more. And you can do this very, very quickly. Both things will occur. The emotions of the surgery and taking care of your wife

19:37are raising this up and making it like it's a blocker to this. It's really not. It's just a step. It's just one more step in the process, as all, from the math part. Hey, guys, it's Rachel Cruz. If you're working the baby steps, every major expense deserves a second look. And healthcare is one of the biggest expenses in most family's budgets. And that is why I recommend that you check out Christian healthcare ministries. CHM isn't insurance. It's a health cost sharing ministry. That means members help pay one another's medical bills. And they've been serving Christians since 1981. CHM programs start at just $115 a month.

20:38And here's why that matters. If you are paying more than you need to for healthcare, that money could be going toward paying off debt, building your emergency fund, or reaching your next financial goal. And your monthly cost isn't based on your medical history or where you live. Y'all, a lot of families find CHM gives them more room in the budget. That's why so many members say they're better with CHM. And right now, new members can receive a 50% credit towards their first month of membership. Go to CHministries.org slash budget and use promo code Ramsey. That's CHministries.org slash budget and promo code Ramsey. Ramsey. Show a question of the day is brought to you by Y. Revi.

21:40If your private student loan payments are out of control, you may feel like you're out of options. That's why Revi was built for borrowers in different situations and difficult situations. And it helps to explore refinancing options to fit your budget. Visit Yrevi.com slash Ramsey might not be in all states. Today's question comes from Paul and London. Hope you're doing better than you deserve. I'm a long time list center from across the pond. I'm on baby step two and have $25,000 in card debt at a 7.5% interest rate. Now that my credit cards are paid off, I have the option to withdraw cash from the LMAT 0% for 18 months with a 3.5% cash fee. Would you recommend doing this to save on the interest? If I'm confident I can pay it off within the time frame. Now he's not talking about using the credit card that to pay off the car. He's just talking about using cash from the credit card with 0% interest. Right? Yeah, so zero versus 7.5 on 25,000.

22:42Yes, but to pay off the car with it. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, no, Paul, the reason you're in debt and the reason and how you're going to get out, it's you. It's not moving from debt to debt, still continuing to kind of play the game even at 0% interest. The math isn't the issue at this point. In 25,000, I mean, hopefully you can pay that off to be on what you're making in 12 months, right? 2,000 bucks a month and that gets you out of debt. And the 7.5% interest rate at that point really really doesn't matter. So less than, I mean, it's a, you know, it's about it's about 300 bucks. Yeah, you might save 1,000, 1300, yeah, maybe maybe 1500, something like that. Because you're not going to have the 25,000 borrowed for an entire year. You'll have about 10,000 borrowed average over the course of the 12 months if you're paying it off in 12 months. You said you can do it for 18 if you want to, but I didn't think you were going to do that. Let's call it a year. So the discussion is, do I save a thousand dollars by doing this hack and borrowing money on my credit card?

23:47And I'm with Rachel, no, you don't. Because you don't have a $1,000 problem. You have a 25,000 dollar problem. And you don't solve a $25,000 problem with $1,000. So the thing is you feel like when you do this, that you did something and the Bible says out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. In other words, what's really inside, you end up saying it without meaning to, and you'll say something like, I paid off my car. No, you didn't. You moved your car dead onto credit cards. You did not pay it off, but you'll say that. Yeah. And you didn't. And it feels like it in a sense because you're not making that. That'll slow you down. That'll slow you down. So you need to just be pissed off at $25,000 worth and how fast can I knock that out? It's called $2,100 a month for 12 months and you are done, my friend. And that's what we're aiming at here. So let's just do that. And it's gonna cost you $1,000 more than your idea,

24:50but you can't hack your way out of debt. You pay your way out of debt. Yep. And that's the same. I mean, people, we see this all the time with either debt consolidation companies, people taking out, he locks to pay this. I mean, just the moving the debt around. Makes you feel like you did something. That's right. That's right. So that goes for all those options. And so the painful answer is, you just pay it off with money you earn and the debt goes away. And by the way, it's only a bit surely. Copy stupid credit cards today. Don't keep them around. And it gets all this stuff out of your head then. They're no longer an option. We don't have credit cards in our house. That's the what you need to share. And he said now that my credit cards are paid off, meaning at some point, you would have credit card debt. And now we're going to get rid of them. By the way, the way you got credit card debt was you believe the lie that you could go use it as zero percent interest for 90 days. And pay it off. Yeah. And then you didn't or 30 days. And then you didn't. And so let's just stay away from these snakes.

25:52They bite. They're real snakes. They have venom and stuff. All right, Mark's in West Virginia. Hey, Mark, what's up? Well, everything's going good. Just made a lot of bad choices. You look alike. Oh, God, just like that. He does a radio show now. Yeah. Well, I had emailed you and I had no clue that I would get a call. I just figured I'd get an email. So I got a question maybe too late. I'm almost 64 years old. I have zero retirement. And I'm looking at Social Security in a few years. That'll be about $1500 a month. What do you make? What's your income? With my income and my wife's without, before taxes, what you need? Yeah. About 54,000. Okay. All right. You're both working 40 hours. No, she's, she's on Social Security.

26:54She don't work. And I'm a pastor. And I'm, I reckon it'll be a considered by vocational. I still come to work on my machinist, but trade. But I've been pastoring 41 years. So I've never had to, I've never had a retirement. Everywhere I work, there was never no retirement offered. So I've just lived from hand to mouth. Actually. Yeah, you have. Okay. So, and do you have debt? That's my question. You have debt? So, yeah, I have a hundred and 18,000 left on my mortgage because I had to refinance. Because of medical issues, I didn't have to insurance it to time. So I was on a way I could pay that debt, was to refinance and just have it in a different place. Well, I, my magic wand is low on batteries. And so I don't, I don't have, I don't have an easy way to fix this.

27:55The only way I know how to fix it is that you guys have to do things you've never done before in your life. And that's work. A lot more than you've been working, not that you're not a hard worker, you are a hard worker. But I want you to take all the overtime. I want her to get a job. I want everybody working. And let's just stack as much cash as we can stack because we need some money. Now, well, she's basically not able. I'm working best, can still pastor, but I've had a stroke and come of heart attacks and I got cancer. So it's a, it limits me and what I can do. That's fair. You know what I mean? So I am, I'm already getting about 30 hours out of the day. Yeah, I bet you are. Yeah. And, and, and, and pushing to do that with all the stuff you've faced, I'm sorry. But I do not, I do not know how to fix your situation except add money to the equation. And is there anything available?

28:56I mean, I know it's too late. I understand too late for anything major, but is there anything I can out there? I've never entered my mind about investing until here just recently, but I've done some checking, of course. Is there anything I can do that would that makes money? Is there a money for the money thing that I've talked to me and that's worked on these 401Ks and they're all the time pushing money here and there and watching. Well, if you put some money into a good mutual fund, it will grow. And that's what I would suggest. And you can learn about that by getting one of our smart investor pros on the line. I just go to ramsysolutions.com and click on smart investor pro and they've got the heart of a teacher and they'll, they'll talk to you and tell you how to do it. But you're the only way this machine spits out money is you have to put money into it. And so you're going to be living on less than you make, which means you're going to cut

29:58expenses further than you've ever cut them. And anything you could, you or she can do to get any income coming in to throw into this machine. It's called a mutual fund. And you're Roth IRA and let's just see how much we can get in there because I mean, if you start putting 500 bucks a month away, that's a lot, but that's going to be a whole lot more than you got today. Yeah. And this is not going to end the way all $1,500 a month is not going to work. No, because they're probably living off around four. It's probably what they're bringing home after taxes and everything. And so I'm just wondering mark where you guys can look at that and say, hey, what if we radically, yeah, put 800 away, even for a short term, you know, that's $10,000 a year. Emergency fund though, even just starting out, right? And so small steps, I think for you guys, Mark is going to feel like a lot, a little bit more money coming in than what you're used to tightening up the budget and putting some away in savings. And then yes, eventually, and investing would be a great spot.

31:02But it's going to, it's going to be a lot considering everything that you guys have going on. Hey guys, George Campbell here. There are a lot of things you probably shouldn't ignore. Your check engine light that weird smell in your fridge, the smoke detector that's been beeping for six days and maybe most importantly, your phone bill, the things we ignore have a funny way of costing us the most. And your phone carrier is counting on you, ignoring that over price bill month after month so they can keep charging you more and more. But that's not the case with boost mobile. You don't need to keep overpaying when you can pay just $25 a month for boost mobile's unlimited plan. And the best part is you can bring your phone, keep your number and pay just $25 a month. Forever, that price will not go up. It is inflation proof. There's no contracts. There's no hidden fees. There's no catch. And since most smartphones have an e-sim these days, you can switch from the comfort of

32:05your home just like I did. So it's okay to notice when you're paying more than you should, but you shouldn't keep doing that. Stop overpaying for your phone service. Go to boostmobile.com slash ramsy and make the switch today. That's boostmobile.com slash ramsy. $25 forever requires customers to remain active on boost mobile unlimited plan. Thank you for joining us America. We're glad you're here. Sheridan is in Winston's Salem, North Carolina. Sheridan, how are you? Hey, David Rachel. Thank you so much for taking your call. I'm doing well. How are you guys doing? Better than I deserve. How can I help? Hey, I was just wondering, should I be saving up for a new family vehicle while I still have my house mortgage? Yeah, you can upgrade a vehicle.

33:06What's the current one that you have? Well, I have three vehicles. Actually, I have a pickup and I have a little bit of car that I drive to work and I've also got my wife's maldo that we drive for good. And we're going to upgrade that. And I want to upgrade the maldo. Yeah. Yeah. How much would it go for? It doesn't have to be right now. It's probably worth about $4,500. I would say. Okay. How much do you guys make a year? Take home after taxes around $100. Okay. You're fine. Yeah. What we teach Sheridan is the first three baby steps, $1,000 saved and paying off all your debt except your house and then having an emergency fund you do with intensity and you don't do anything during those. You don't go on vacation, you don't buy anything. You got all that in your rear view mirror. And when you moved the baby steps, $4,500 and $6,000, then you move from intensity to intentional

34:09and intentional includes. Yeah. Well, I have a buddy that thinks I'm stupid for saving up for a vehicle. Why, I still on my house loan. And I was like, well, I'm going to call you guys and see. I have about 15,000 in a high yield savings and I've got another almost 6,000 in other savings account. Is that your emergency fund? I don't have any other. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So, yep, I would leave that alone. And then if you want to, yeah, save a couple of thousand and upgrade to a $10,000 car. Well, I have, you know, I have some in my account already. I have about 10,000 in my vehicle fund now. Oh, that's in addition to the 15,000. In addition to, yeah. Go buy a car. Go get a car. Go buy a car. Pay cash. Well, I've got, yeah, pay cash. Absolutely. Well, you got a good friend who's like, semi great about saying you should pay for a car. Usually most friends are the opposite of that. And you can get you a car payment. That's what most people say.

35:10I know. Yeah. This guy's got, you can't ever buy a car again till you get your money. No, that's not what we teach here. And we teach when you get to this stage, baby steps four, five and six, that you can do some things like upgrade the car, go on vacation, go out to eat again. And any extra money you get beyond your, that stuff and the 15,000, 15% going into retirement goes on your mortgage. And that's baby steps four, five and six run simultaneously. So you're doing it right. You're doing it perfect. West is in Atlanta. High west. How are you? Hey, how you doing? Better than I deserve. What's up? So about two years ago, I was able to leave my company that I worked for and start running my own business. Cool. I've got a long landscape business. I've got big enough where I can do it myself. Cool. I've got about 10 employees and finally got mad about the debt and started paying it off. I paid off about $80,000 in the last last year. Good for you. That's great. So the big question I have is I'd like to always plan an event.

36:12I've got a 401K account that I had with the previous company. I've got about $80,000 in there. So my question is should this kind of been like that six. But I want to start outing. Now that I started getting it, they paid off. I want to start adding money to it. Should I leave it? Where it's at or should I move over to like an IRA or some other account to that would be better off for me? Yeah, roll it over to a traditional IRA. So you can get with the Smart Vista Pro and do that if you need to. You can go to RamseySolutions.com and check one of them out in your area. But yeah, you never want to leave an account with an old employer. So go ahead and just roll it over. And then yeah, I mean, you're to the point with after paying off the debt to start investing. Yeah, you're not actually going to add to that account. That's a specific one. But you can sit down with the Smart Vista Pro and set up your retirement planning through your new company or just direct as an individual, which everyone you decide to do.

37:14And but you are Rachel's right. You always roll it over and we always tell you to spread your mutual funds across four types when you do the roll over growth, growth and income, aggressive growth and international all with good long track records, very calm, very, very sedate, kind of boring. But then you've got control of it. You're not sitting back with some HR firm or some HR department and you hadn't looked at it in five years. You don't want to do that. You want to get it with a Smart Vista. But as an employer with ten employees, I mean, he can set up a simple. He can set up a simple or a set up. Probably a simple would be better, a simple IRA, which is a very expensive for our inexpensive 401k for a small time employer. The only has almost no administrative fees to run it. A big time 401k when you got a bunch of team members is expensive to run from the employer's perspective. But this is very inexpensive. It's called a simple IRA. So ask them about that for your new account and roll over the old 401k just into, as Rachel

38:16said, a traditional IRA. Lindsay's in Boise, Idaho. Hi, Lindsay. How are you? Hello. I'm good. Thank you for taking my call. Sure. What's up? I found myself in a pretty precarious situation this last year with some significant home of chairs and medical bills that have piled up. Unfortunately, my husband and I are separated. So maintaining two households. Found out yesterday the well has failed in the home that I'm living in and requires a new well to be drilled. So I'm looking at approximately a $23,000 yet coming onto me. And I am just wondering if a few of the best options are we through a well's in Tennessee and nobody ever said $23,000. Serious. That's nuts. The last one I drilled was $3,500.

39:21Okay. And it was like a year and a half ago. I got a quote from a second company just brief information over the phone and he had said $16,000. Now, it's $23,000. It also includes the $4,000 repair that they attempted yesterday that did not happen. But that was not. What's the repair of them? No, no. So our aquifer has filled the stand. So they tried to flush it out and it was unsuccessful. And so they charged us $4,000 for that. Well, I'll be honest. I've never drilled a well in Idaho. So I don't know what I'm talking about. I've only done it in Tennessee. But that just sounds way out of whack. I'm going to keep learning about this. What's the, you own the house. I take it. Yes. No city water available. No, not available.

40:23So I guess we were looking at more likely for all of the components. 18 or 19,000. That 23 includes the $4,000 where they attempted to repair yesterday. Yeah, the repair that was attempted. How much do you make, Lindsay? I'm currently unemployed, but working on employment. My husband does make $250,000. And why does he not have 23,000 put into his house? Oh, he is working with me on it. He is. Yeah. Why doesn't he write a check and pay for it? Because there's no cash available for that right now. Well, it's $250,000 coming in. So where's it going? Between two households and four children. No, that's not still $23,000 left over. No. What for a monthly? Like, when I call that month.

41:24His monthly income is $20,000 a month. Oh, no, no, no. I'm sorry. That's pre-tax. I know. I know. I know. But his monthly income is actually $24,000 a month, pre-tax. And so, and he has absolutely no money saved. So, after the emergency found that we put towards the home repair last year. OK. So you're telling me your husband makes $250,000 a year, you don't have a dime. But I repeat that, I can't. I said, you're telling me your husband makes $250,000 a year, and he doesn't have a dime. And you're separated and you're unemployed. There's a lot going on here, kiddo. I'm digging a, I'm digging this further since we're digging a wall. I'm going to get multiple quotes. I'm going to get multiple quotes, and I'm going to lean in with him a little bit more and go, you're the only one with an income and your four kids need water.

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43:29That's Shopify.com slash Ramsey. Welcome back to the Ramsey show in the Farrow Winds Credit Union studio. I'm Dave Ramsey, Rachel Cruz, Ramsey personality. My daughter is my co-host today. Brad is with us in Seattle. Hi, Brad, how are you? Hey, Dave, thanks for taking my call. Sure. What's up? So I have a pretty unique situation that I haven't been able to get great advice on. Over the last year, I've been in a really unique situation where my wife and I have been busing our butts. We've been working five jobs and I'll have about a million dollars in income just for this year. That includes revenue from a for-profit flower farm agricultural business. My problem is that I hate giving the government my money. The question is, I've met with about 8501 C3 lawyers and they're telling you that I can

44:32start a non-for-profit that I kind of do on the side anyway. I just use for-profit revenue. I can use my to bring value to you. You can use what? Say again. The lawyers are saying that I can start a non-for-profit and use my donor-advised funds that I will contribute this year to bring value in some way shape reform to my community and self-dealing is a concern. So I want to make sure that I'm approaching this decision from a position of integrity. And I thought I'd ask you advice. So the non-profit, okay, so you put money in a donor-advised fund and you add it to your 501 C3, which by the way, you could just put it in the 501 C3. You don't have to go through donor-advised. If you did that, the only way that works is the 501 C3 money is gone. Whatever you put in there has to be used for that charity, that purpose. What is the purpose? What are you doing? So we have a flower farm and it's a for-profit business.

45:37We have basically an agro-tourism business, but we've already been volunteering in the local community teaching kids how to do what we do. I'm just using my time and our revenue to do that. Teaching kids to do what you do. You cannot pay yourself out of your own non-profit to teach kids to do what you do. That will not pass on audit. Yeah, I will put in an independent board of directors. Doesn't matter. And don't do that anyway, I wouldn't. Okay. I have a family foundation and me and Sharon are the board of directors, no. But everything we give to is independent from us. We're not buying financial peace university and giving the kids to somebody and giving us, giving ourselves the money out of that. We don't do that. That's not an integrity problem. That won't pass the tax law. So all that's my question. Let me challenge you by flowers with your 501 C3 to give to the poor from yourself, you're

46:41going to get hammered in an audit. So the challenge is that's what lawyers are telling me that I can do. There's a use case where I can have my for profit by a tractor and I can have my non-for-profit lease the use of the tractor if it is at fair market value. You're going to get hammered in an audit. I don't care. I don't care what your lawyers are saying. The IRS audits me like it's a hobby. Okay. Like they have their own office here. They're here all the time and our family foundation is included. We had another non-profit at one point that we shut down just because of this exact crap because it became it does not do what you want it to do. You're trying to, you've made money for the first time in your life. You've become successful and you've figured out that in America that people want you to be successful until you are and then that you are evil and you must be punished and taxed into oblivion because socialism is good and all that bull crap. You're discovering that you're being punished for winning and you're trying to keep from

47:45giving the government all your stupid money and I don't blame you. I get mad every April. But I don't blame you on that. I'm also not going to do something that invites the IRS to do an anal exam on me every April either. They do. They come around here and live with us and it's just they're horrible. They're horrible. You don't want to do anything. You can't hide the pee from yourself by doing all this shell game stuff. You can't move the shell game around. You can't move the pee round enough to do it. It doesn't work. So don't try to hide. Don't lease the tractor back from yourself. Just go make money and give some money away and give it to a nonprofit that is independent from you. Yes. What do you think about Daffs, the donor advice funds for? I don't don't don't advise funds. It's an inexpensive way to not our foundation has a lot more expenses to run it than it does to run a donor advice fund. Don't advise fun.

48:45But for individual, the big thing you game with the donor advice fund is you don't have to obey the calendar. Okay. Yeah. I can dump in half a million dollars in December and spend the next three years giving it away. But I get to write off in December. Yep. Yep. It has to go to a nonprofit on the other side. Yeah. Yeah. Who are maybe on baby steps four, five, six, maybe seven that are building wealth. Don't our vice funds great. It's great. Yeah. The last level of sophistication and expense is a family foundation, which we did about 10, 12 years ago now. Yeah. Because I know people, but don't our vice funds are great though that yes, that there's ways that you can do it in a little bit more of a sophisticated manner. Brad, I think your lawyers are living in the land of theory. And in theory, in theory, there probably is a test case that survived and went all the way to the Supreme Court. But I'm talking about in practical fact, when you start trying to move the tractor around and lease the tractor back from yourself from the nonprofit and buy the gasoline for the

49:49diesel for the tractor and then you can't figure out whether the guy picking the flowers with who he worked for that day. And when you get down into all of this, you're going to wish you just paid taxes. And by the time they come in there and you have to try to explain it to somebody who's not that smart because they work for the IRS. So that's a pre-qualifier. And so you have to sit down with them and try to explain how this works. And oh, there's a test case and lawyers and they go, I don't even know what you mean. And all I know is as you can't do this. And this is what you're dealing with, man. And so the practicality of what you're suggesting doesn't work. That's what I'm saying. And. And the hassle you'll probably have to deal with. It's going to be a pain in the body. Because there was a non-pro. I forgot about that here. Right. That we gave. We had a nonprofit that we gave people donated to it and we gave financial patient diversity away from their donations. Yes. To homeless shelter. Right? They came in and audited and they said, you have to have a board of directors.

50:50And I'm like, oh, you don't. The law says you don't. Well, you have to. And I'm like, okay, just shut it down. Well, I can't really tell you you have to. And I'm like, well, you just did. And you're wrong. I know. But we think you should. And I don't care what you think. Get out of my office. I mean, this is the kind of conversations we've actually had with these human beings. And so I know what embarrasses you, but it's the truth. No, it's embarrassing. It's probably why they always aren't you. Yeah, well, cause I think they're idiots. But yeah, that'll do it. I think they're and they represent an idiot government. So there we go. Just keeps on going from there. Anyway, don't. I wouldn't do it, Brad. I think you might survive the theoretical thing, but you might spend more in legal fees and in CPAs fighting your audit and tax lawyers fighting your audit. Then you ever saved in taxes all with good intent. So I'm sorry. The bad news is when you make money, you get to pay a lot of taxes. The rich don't pay any taxes said no one who's ever been rich.

51:52Rich pay more taxes and all the people that said that put together. It's just bull. One of the biggest mistakes Homebuyers make is talking to a realtor and shopping for houses before understanding their real budget. And that's how you end up falling in love with a house you can't afford and trapping yourself in a bigger payment than you can handle. That's why you should talk to Churchill Mortgage first. Churchill shows you what you can actually afford, not just what a bank will approve.

52:56And with their certified home buyer program, your financing is completely secured before you shop. So you won't miss out on your dream home while you're waiting for pre-approval. I've recommended Churchill for 30 years because they help you buy a home the Ramsey way. So here's your plan. Contact Churchill. Know your numbers. And then when you find the perfect house, you're ready. Go to Churchill Mortgage.com slash Ramsey offer for a special offer only for Ramsey fans. That's Churchill Mortgage.com slash Ramsey offer or click the link in the description. David is with us in Chicago. Hi, David. How are you? Good. How are you, sir? I really appreciate you taking my phone call. My pleasure. What's up?

53:56To keep this as brief as possible, although there are a lot of moving parts. My wife went to the call and she her father took out and she has two other siblings and her older sister, younger brother. Her father took out a parent plus loan for all three of them. And after everything happened with COVID and stuff and they reinstituted loan payments, the father had it set up where these payments were auto-debuted from his account. And then he expected his three children to individually somehow there's a system with points to figure out the amount. And then he sold him the other sell app that payment to replenish his bank account. My wife and I were complying to that and doing that because there's Christians. We want to do the right thing. But then there was an incident on Mother's Day over a year and a half ago where there

54:56was a disagreement. They do not like that my wife converted to Christianity and was baptized. And they also do not like me. I'm a disabled police officer and they do not support my career what I'm doing. And because of some mishaps which have been apologized, multiple attempts of forgiveness. The father and mother and sister and brother have completely disowned me and my wife. There has been zero communication to us for over that entire year and a half. And with that said, the father is still wants the money. I am conflated with morality on what there is no written agreement. There was no contract where I'm fixed in come and we simply want to understand you don't want a relationship with your daughter but you want her money. And with that said, does that know if I understand legally the parent plus loan is in his name

55:57and it's auto-debuted from his account. It's also collective with the three students. It's not separate or individualized. Like my friend for example can log in on his own and pay from his own account even though it was under his mother's name. It's not set up like that. It's all collective. And so I'm generally asking should we continue to sell him this payment? So before your wife went to DePaul, he said I'm going to take out a parent plus loan and your wife looked at him and said I will pay that. Or she went to DePaul and then he said, oh by the way, you owe a bunch of money. It was there really was no concrete conversation. My wife and I discussed this. It was more just it was assumed it would be paid by the kids. They did mention verbally who assumed it to the kid assumet? The father. No, but I mean, did your wife promise him that she would repay for her college at the

56:58point before the loans were taken out? I believe there was a verbal agreement there possibly but with that said, he's completely disowned. I understand that part. I'm asking about her promise. I'm not asking about his behavior. Yeah. I do not have, according to my wife, there was a very brief conversation when he said basically something. Does she have any idea how much he owes? How much is owed to David on her part? I believe it's upwards of $75,000. We've attempted to ask even to lower the loan payment and he refuses to even sit down with accountability. Martin or somebody in a public area to even discuss lowering the loan payment and anything like that. I believe the loan payment was attempted to be lowered with him and my wife once, at which time the sister flipped out and made phone calls to have it readjusted so she could pay off her sooner because it's all combined at which point now none of them are talking to us and refuse to even talk to us about this payment.

58:01How much is the payment a month? It's $516 and about $35.00 roughly. How much do you guys make here? I'm a disabled police officer in a fixed income of about $80,000 a year and my wife makes roughly about $72,000 to $78,000 a year also. We live paycheck to paycheck right now and we're expected to return to save. Other than it's unbelievably sad and ridiculous that he's disowned as daughter and still wants money, the issue if I'm in your shoes and that's what you're asking is, you know, this is this a moral obligation that your wife made. Regardless of the behavior of her father, you can't control his behavior, you can only control your behavior. And if she on a handshake said, I'm going to Nepal dad borrow the money and I will pay you back. If that is the deal, that is the deal.

59:05And if it's not the deal, it's not the deal. I can't tell from our conversation because it's still wishy-washy if that's the deal. You said it was kind of implied, parent thought it and maybe there was a conversation with a 17 year old but she has no very clear memory of it. I mean, if I sat and looked her in the eyes, I don't think based on what you've said, she's going to slap her hand on the table and say, absolutely, I promised him I would pay it. I don't think she believes that. She was under the impression at the time of the loan that the loan was taken out separately in her name and it was not combined where she's paid. That doesn't matter. That's not the issue. That's not the issue as well. The issue is did she promise him she would pay his loan that he went and borrowed. That's the only thing that's bothering me. If you get one side of the other or that, it's your answer. And so I wish that you would tell me that she didn't make that promise and the old man just told everybody that that's the way it is because I'm in charge and you're going to pay this back in which case I'm telling him to stick it.

1:00:07That's actually, no, that's what happened. He said they asked if they could, they said where they wanted to go to school and he replied and he said, okay, I'm going to take out these loans for you guys with a favor and then they said, okay, and he goes, you're going to have to pay this stuff back. That was his demand. And I think at the time, this happened several years ago. She agreed to that demand before she went to school and took his money. Then she promised to repay it. As uncomfortable and ridiculous as this is, she made a promise to pay him. And she shouldn't have to. It's wrong. I wish she hadn't. I don't want her to. I don't like this guy. Your call made me not like him. And got a lot of suspicions about all the stuff going on. It's really nasty, but yeah. So you know, you could do this. You could say, all right, when you give us a full accounting of exactly what my share is

1:01:08and a payment schedule that shows us when that is going to be paid off, we will resume payments until you do, you'll get nothing. I mean, I would do that with a bank. Yes. Well, and because there's a weirdness, if you're two years in and you guys are throwing you're like, I think we've hit the side of the bank. I don't know. We don't know. And for the sister, he said the sister got mad because she wanted to pay her off sooner, which I get because the interest is accruing. And if he makes them spread out, she's going to know more, but we don't know how I know this. I'm saying your sister, the sister shouldn't have a say in your part, not in her, but not in their part. She probably says on my part, I don't, I don't want that payment schedule. I want to pay more so I can get it paid off because I don't want to pay the interest on it for long. But he's lumped it all into one and you can't tell. So, which is the problem. So here's the deal. When you give me an exact amount and an interest rate and I will pay on that schedule, we'll resume payments until you do. We're not going to pay anymore. He has nothing in writing. Because I need to see something. Yes. He has nothing in writing. There is nothing he can do.

1:02:09He's going to have to just sit on that egg until it hatches. And so I would, I would stop all of this craziness. This guy's a power player and he throws himself around all the time and the way to handle that is just very calmly. Just say, you know, we've talked about it and we're not going to be sending you anymore payments until we have an actual accounting of what is owed that is her part only. And, and, you know, and then we will pay payments on her part only. That's, and that's like not a crazy request. No, that's if a bank, if a bank was jerking me around, I'd want to account more to it to it before I gave him any more money. I just put them on the sidelines. I do the exact same thing. And I have. I'm sorry. I'm sure he feels in the middle of it too. It's horrible. Well, and it's just horrible. And word of warning to the 30 million of you listening, that's what a parent plus loan is. Can you say sucks? Don't do student loans. Really don't do parent plus loans.

1:03:10And really don't obligate your 17 year old for $70,000 to go to DePaul to get a degree that makes $70,000. Bad parent. Bad parent. Bad parent. If you're behind on your bills, doing more of the same isn't going to fix it. You need a different plan. And that's why I tell people about guardian litigation group. If you've missed payments, if collectors are calling nonstop, or if you're getting letters about legal action, that's your signal. And it's where a lot of people wait too long because the longer you wait, the fewer options you usually have. And once it turns into a lawsuit, things can get more expensive and more complicated fast. Guardian litigation is a law firm, not a call center. From day one, you are assigned an attorney who represents you.

1:04:13So if a creditor moves forward, you're not caught off guard and you're not hit with surprise legal fees. Guardian litigation only gets paid when the debt isn't negotiated and the client accepts the settlement offer. This is about stepping in early while you still have leverage. Don't ignore the problem. Take control of it. Go to guardianlit.com slash ramsy right now. That's guardianlit.com slash ramsy. Attorney advertising results may vary and no specific outcomes guaranteed. We teach you to live like no one else. Sacrifice hustle grind sell stuff to get out of debt so that later you can live and give like no one else set yourself free. Get rid of the debt.

1:05:13Get your emergency fund done. That's baby steps one through three baby step four and beyond you move from intense to intentional. And that's where you get the second half of that live like no one else. So that later you can live and give like no one else. So you need to live again, once you've gotten to baby step four, we want you to live again with the live like no one else. Cruise. Go with us on a cruise, baby. That's it. That was my best, that was my best home right there. That was pretty lame. All right. That's pretty good. That's pretty. Hey, the live like no one else cruise. The second time we've done it is this coming March and March will be here in 20 minutes show. It's right here. Let's go. Let's go baby March 14 through 21 seven nights. Holland America nice ship. This is not Walmart on the season. This is the good stuff. And this is incredible. We had an absolute blast. This time we're going to Jamaica, the Grand Cayman, Grand Cayman, Cosmell, even the Bahamas. We're going to all this stuff.

1:06:15And we're going to come the whole ship is people that have gotten to baby step four and beyond and are sell up braiding. The fact that they got out of debt and they're winning with money and they're living like no one else. I'll be on there with my wife Sharon Rachel, John Deloney, George Campbell, Jade Washout, Natalie Grant is coming as our musical guest. She's incredible. And many others. There's going to be a whole thing. We're going to pop up Q and A's. We're going to do events. George and I decided this week we're probably going to do some of that investing essential stuff. Where we go into the wealth planning, the state planning stuff, the nerdy stuff because it was real popular. We think some of y'all might want to have that on the cruise. Anyway, we're all. And then you can have a cocktail with George and I for Smart Money Happy Hour Live. You know, oh my gosh. There's there it is. There's the picture. When y'all live in those corners. We record a Smart Money Happy Hour Live event there. We're going to do it. We have fun. We have a blast. The people had a blast. Everyone on the ship was positive. Let me tell you how you know it's cool. The staff on the ship, all the workers on the ship said, we have never had a ship full

1:07:19of people that were this kind and this generous to us and easy to work with. That's who comes on the ship. They said they're the nicest people. Like I know. You can license people and they were dreading having a regular people on the following week. Oh no. Yeah. It's so great. It is so fun. You guys. So maybe step forward beyond go to Ramsey Solutions dot com slash events or click the link in the show notes. Get your cabin. You can reserve it for $600. There's a few left. We would love to have you come with us. It's going to be 2000 people just like you and people celebrate. But yeah, people that had just gotten married. We have people that have been married 50 years. But it's live like no one else crews. March. Get your world's largest debt free screen. There it is right there. Man, it's going to be a blast. You don't want to miss this. We actually enjoyed it. I kind of was worried about if I got trapped on a ship with 2000 of you people. But it actually, I actually had a great time. It was a lot of fun.

1:08:19I had took a lot of pictures with the friend, new friends and we did a lot of fun stuff and we really, really enjoyed it. Cindy is in Reno, Nevada. Hi, Cindy. Welcome to the Ramsey show. Hey, thanks so much for taking my call. I'm excited to talk to you. You too. What's up? Thanks. So I'm calling about my brother. This is kind of a moral financial situation. But over a year ago, he was making $100,000. He lost that job and couldn't make one single rent payment after losing the job. So I paid his rent and our parents supported him during the first year of unemployment. I should say he's 63 years old and he has now at the point where he is unable to afford housing. So how do you help someone who has been so irresponsible financially their entire life? I would say he has a shopping addiction. Do I get involved? I'd like to sit him down and talk baby steps with him. But is that my business to do that? And is it too late to turn things around when you're in your 60s?

1:09:23It's never too late. People change all the time. And sometimes they have the best chapter of their life, late in life because they finally wake up. So we can certainly be prayerful for him and think good things for him. I have a, when I first started making a tiny bit of money and I saw someone in need in a situation like that, I would just give him money. A guy told me one time he said, you're lazy Dave. You didn't care enough about them to really help them. So you threw money at them for your conscience and you walked away. That's exactly what our parents have done for years. That kind of convicted me that just throwing money at something might even be harmful. That's what I think. Rather than helpful. And so I don't want to be an enabler. I want to be a helper. And so that would require me, where I in your situation to sit down with him and say, look,

1:10:28we've allocated some of our money to try to help you make the turn. But with that money comes requirements of your behavior. No behavior change, no money. And it's not because we're punishing anyone or controlling anyone. It's because we love you and the behaviors that you're using are hurting you and we want to see you not be hurt. If he had like a drug problem or a gambling problem, I feel like they're avenues that I would be aware of to go for help. But what do you do when someone just shops? This is a guy who has no money, but he has had an apartment. He doesn't anymore full of stuff plus three. Where is he living? Full of stuff. Right now he's in a warehouse that a brother of our of our of our zones. It's in a poor part of town, the roof leaks, but it does have a little kitchen and a bathroom. One. And he's living there free of charge. He's truly hit by it. It's not. It's not it's not zoned residential.

1:11:30So I'm assuming that that could be like a county code file. Oh, I'm sure it is. But that's okay. I'm going to worry about that. But the point is he's made it to a point of his own. I'm 63 years old and I live in a warehouse that my brother owns. That's the bottom. It's that. But then it's also the sad realization though of and I don't want to speak this over him, Sydney, but there are just some people and they just don't. They just they they are fine with where they are. That even the bottom doesn't like I want the bottom to change. Right. For your sake, you want them to hit some level of reality. And I pray he does. And then you also have to come to grips with there is a possible fact that he may never right. And so what do you do? I'm not giving him anything. Yeah. Because I'm not going to participate when you give someone money that is engaged in misbehavior, you're financing the behavior that's bringing harm to them. You are harming them. Well, and I feel like that's exactly what our parents are. Yeah, that's what you've done too.

1:12:3190s. So what you've done too. And he always it's always the big joke that he's going to end up retired and living with me because I'm a big Ramsey fan. Let me help you. It's not a big joke. It's not happening. So it's not funny. It's not funny at all. So what I would do in this situation, you ask for kind of I'm going to create a structure of some kind that has some accountability to behaviors that get him out up and out of this mess. So thing one is you get no money except I'm going to match what you make at your new job and you need a job. And I don't care if it's cleaning dishes. I don't care what it is. You need a job. And the more money you make, the more I'll match for a certain period of time. And then you're going to be on a written budget and you and I are going to go over the budget and you're going to stick to the budget or you don't get money. This is also part of your job because I'm not going to give you money for your shopping addiction. I'm not going to give you money for your alcohol problem. I'm not going to give you money for your cocaine problem and I'm not going to give you

1:13:33money for your problem, whatever it is fill in the blank. So we're going to be on a budget. We're going to stick to the budget. And we're going to work. And we're going to go to counseling. And he needs to go to counseling. I mean, there's obviously, yeah, there's I mean, there's it's real bad. I mean, there's something in him that's very, very, very broken and then deny it. Whatever it is. And he never really, I pay for that. Yeah. And he never says that he has collected. I don't even think it has very much worth, but he is so, so, so attached to it. I don't know if I can get almost like a horse. It's almost like a hoarder type. Yeah. Again, whatever the behavior you want to change, tie it to the money supply. No behavior change, no money supply. Yeah. And he, again, he also needs to work on who he is because if it's a symptom, all of this is a symptom of something going on in him and until he gets that anchor fix, all of this is just going to continue to spend and spend an orbit. Gotta get upstream. She's right. Let me tell you what I get asked all the time.

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1:15:51It's zander.com. If you enjoy this show, we could use some help. If you'll click the like button, subscribe, the share button where you share the episode, you tell somebody where you're listening on talk radio, spread the word digitally and in person, let people know we're here. You're the best marketing we have. You might be the only marketing we have. So check it out. We'd love to hear from you and we'd love for you to tell people we're here. Thank you very much. Charles is with us in Chicago. Hey, Charles, what's up? Hi, Dave and Rachel. Before I asked my question, I just wanted to thank you for helping completely change my life. I've been listening to the show for a few years.

1:16:53When I finished medical training 24 months ago, my wife and I had about $535,000 in combined with that. Oh my gosh. And about $50,000 in auto loans as well. And over the past 24 months, I paid off every single dollar of all of this. And I've also built up about $300,000 in investible assets. That's crazy. That's amazing. You are making some serious money. Way to go, Charles. What are your doctors? What are you doing? Yeah, and what do you do? I'm 32 years old. I'm an anesthesiologist. I'm earning about 680,000 a year. My wife is an occupational therapist. She makes 100,000 a year. We have no student loans, no car debt, no consumer debt of any kind. My only debt is 240,000 remaining on my mortgage for my house at 3.2%.

1:17:55That's amazing. We'll done, Charles. Yeah, I just love living like a resident for the you have, man. You don't. You throw it at the debt. You avoided Doc Eidish, man. I'm proud of you. That's amazing. Well done. Very well done. Now I'm going to do something that just doesn't feel comfortable because I've been listening to the show and delaying gratification. But in the spring and March, I want to buy a new car. I want to buy a Corvette. And I want to pay for it and cash. But it's about $105,000. I already have about 50,000 earmarked for this on top of a $40,000 emergency fund as well. And my only thing every month is 1,600 mortgage. I plan to pay that off sooner. What's your home worth? My home is worth about $470,000.

1:18:56I was paying a little extra on it. I bought it in 2020 right when I started training. And I've been paying a little extra towards it as well. But now I'm at a point where I'm starting to feel more secure, more confident. And I do want to reward myself. I think I could do it without derailing my long-term plans. But I'm having a hard time with the opportunity cost of what if I put that $105,000 in the market? What if I put that in a mutual fund? You'll do that the rest of your life. You got plenty of time. You're okay. You can do both. Every time we buy anything that we enjoy, it has an opportunity cost to it. Right. When Sharon and I go on a trip, that's two weeks long, and we stay at really nice places and spend too much money, there's an opportunity cost on that. I could have given that to a charity. I could have invested it. But you also need to live it. And you have done a wonderful job. You're killing it. Your income is ridiculously wonderful. It's otherworldly.

1:20:00So everything is in place. You're obviously going to have the other $50,000 to pay cash by spring, right? I'll have that in like two months. Yeah, I'm still going to wait till spring. Do you have investments of any kind at this stage? Yeah, I have about $290,000 worth of investments, mostly Roth. And I max out my, my Roth 401. I max out my mega backdoor Roth IRA. I max out two separate Roth IRAs. And then my wife puts 20,000 a year into a 403D. It sounds like your net worth is bumping up around a million dollars with a house equity on that, isn't it? It's about 600. Yeah. And by spring, it'll probably be close to a million. Probably within a year, I've injected based on my, so one of our rules of thumb, and we just made it up, by the way, is don't buy a new car. They don't go down in value until you have a net worth of at least a million dollars.

1:21:03That usually doesn't come up when someone is making 800,000 though. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, so you're in a different situation here. And you're going to be very, very close to the million. So if I were you, I would buy that car in the spring for cash. All right. We're talking about a 27 Corvette, right? Mm-hmm. Oh, yeah. It's a new engine they came out with. 535 horsepower. Yeah. It's pretty awesome. I know. There's one on my garage. I just got delivery on it the other day. Both okay. The 27. Hey, let Charles have his moment. That's okay. We're having our moment together. We both love this car. Oh, yeah. This is, I really want you to have this car. It's a great car. And yeah, it's a perfect car. It's very neat. Yeah, I want you to get it. And you've done everything right. You've done everything right. Me and my minivan will just wave at us. You're in your battery car.

1:22:05Yeah, you're just wave at us from your battery car. But we'll have a real engine. Charles, that's awesome though. Well done. Have fun. Yeah, enjoy it. Enjoy it. It's a great vehicle. And even if it wasn't, even if it was $100,000 Tesla, the day phase, regardless. Yeah, that's right. I'll still tell you to do it. You'd still tell them to do it. You get more joy in telling you to do this one. But yeah, but it's still a great, you know, it's still you are the math and the process of where you are is freaking incredible. You guys just did a, I mean, you went all in and did it, man. And just couldn't do it. It's such a magnified, because the numbers are so big of the death though, but it just shows your intense for two years, regardless of it's 500,000 or 50,000, right? Of death. You pay it off and then your man. Your life is open to you. And your income's there, right? And again, not me, you know, it could be 80,000 versus 800,000, but the numbers are magnified in this specific situation, but it goes to show, regardless of the numbers, it's still the same thing, like sacrifice for two years

1:23:06of your life. And then all of a sudden, it's like, okay, pay off 500,000 dollars of student loans in two years. And there is a, it's kind of like we're talking about the cruise earlier. It's a, it's an emotional thing to, I think, it's harder psychologically and emotionally to turn off the hustling grind and turn on the enjoy. Then it is to actually do the hustle and grind. It's weird. I mean, because deep, we all, when we're in a different kind of way. Yeah, it's a, it all takes work. It all takes work to enjoy. Well, it all takes work, yeah, because when you're, because those of you in the grind are feeling it and you're exhausted, you're ready, you're ready for a break. But then it's weird. It's like grass is always greener. And then when you get to the break, it's like, okay, now I'm almost fearful to spend it because I don't want to go back to. Well, no, it's just your, your, your body and your system is running at one speed on one thing and you're taking a hard right turn. And it's just, it's like, it's crazy.

1:24:08And to, to be able to look at that car and go, is that okay? Now, you're talking, is it okay for a guy that's making the household income is $800,000 to buy a $100,000 car? Yes. Let's pretend you made $80,000 in about a $10,000 car, exact same ratio. But most people just can't relate to an $800,000 income. Yeah, I mean, really, wow. And so, but an $80,000, a couple of making $80,000 grand by a $10,000 car for cash. In the exact same situation, we told them to do it. Yep, absolutely. For sure. For the ratios still work and you still get to flip the switch from intensity to intentional, from live like no one else to so that, so that, so that I can live and put a 27 Corvette in your garage, Charles. Way to go, man. Yeah.

1:25:08And that's permission for all of you because there's a lot of new listeners and some of you are building your baby step one, your $1,000. Some of you are in the hustle and the grind of getting out of debt. But once you get that emergency funded and then beyond, that, that is where you actually get to make choices with your money because you have margin again. And if you're investing still and being intentional with some of it, there is the freedom to be able to say yes. We're going to, we're going to make some decisions and to spend and that's okay. That permission to spend is okay. Here's something that keeps a lot of parents up at night. Kids are growing up with more access to information than ever before in history. But most of the content is calculated to keep them distracted, make them mad, and keep

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1:27:11Welcome back to the ramsy show in the fair winds credit union studio. I'm Dave Ramsey. Steven is in Columbus, Ohio. Hi, Steven. How are you? Hey, thanks for taking my call. Appreciate it. Sure. What's up? Well, uh, me and my wife were, uh, we just turned 20 or 47 this year and just now started to retire and my job offered a 401k, a Roth 401k. So I enrolled in it and they're taking 940 out of my check. I'm going to max it out every year. And then I got an account set up with fidelity. Roth IRA there. So we'll max it out. But everything I've been seeing is saying I'm just too late and I don't know if I should just put it in the bank and. I'm sorry. I'm late to old. Is that what the tone you, Steven? Yeah, to. Yeah. Who told you you're too old? Well, I think I see on the internet and looking up that it won't accumulate in time.

1:28:18Everything on the internet is true. Abraham Lincoln said that. You're right about that. That's just, you know, anytime you got that, that's just hogwash man. So. Okay. So you're 47. Let's just play with it a second and you said you're putting in 900 at where a thousand dollars a month or work, right? No, no, no, I get paid by weekly. Oh, okay. I put in a $2,000 a month. Yes. I'm maxing out. Okay. Are they matching? Are they matching also? They don't do a match. You do it. If they do a property year, they'll throw some in. Okay. But right now we're a 2000 dollars a month and then you're putting how much in your Roth IRA individually. I'm maxing out. 7,500 a year. Yes. Okay. Yes. Each though your spouse has one to 14. That's an extra thousand bucks. Yeah. 12,000, 1200. Okay. So that's going to be $3,200, right?

1:29:18Yeah. 30. Goodness gracious. You're doing well, man. That's awesome. And so let's see. At 67, you'd have 2.7 million. Yeah, I think you're too late. I don't think you're going to make it. Oh. I don't think I will be now. Okay. So you can go to ramsysolutions.com and use our investment calculator. That's what I just used. I've got it on my little phone thing here. And it came up $2.7 million. Okay. So if I'm half wrong, you're still okay. Right? That's right. You mean my wife struggled for so long. I just don't want to continue. I just got a great promotion in my job. And that's what it is. The thing I want you to learn to do is just to calculate these things out for yourself and let the math tell you what the facts are, not the internet. That's right.

1:30:19You're right. Now, let's make sure that you're invested in good growth stock mutual funds. You're not in bonds. You're not in money markets. You're not in cash. You're in good growth stock mutual funds. And the four types we talk about look for them in your 401k and talk to your smart investor pro or whoever's helping you with your Roth IRAs. Make sure that they're in that. They're not just in the bank. But don't let the hope stealers that are out there. There's people that they're full time job is to steal people's hope. And they run out these bogus theories of things the way things are going to be and you don't do this, you don't do that. You're not going to have enough with after a flation adjusted and all that. The bottom line is dude, you're going to be a multi-millionaire. If you'd never get a raise in 20 years and just only keep putting in this amount. And dude, if you don't get a raise for 20 years, you're a loser. Really? You're going to get raises.

1:31:20So this is going to be even more than that. I'm going to say you're going to have about four million dollars if you stay with this and you stay in good growth stock mutual funds. And you just, yeah. It's the consistency, Steven. Now, if you're 27, obviously would that be better mathematically? Sure. Yes. Absolutely. But no, but it's never, never too late. Never let someone tell you that it's too late and make you cause you to do nothing. Because if you do nothing, you're guaranteeing it's too late. That's the irony of that stupid advice that's out there. Well, it's just too late. So are you going to put it in the bank? I'm just going to eat dog food. I mean, what in the world? Robin Eudel. Serious, you know? So, yeah. And just make sure you're in good growth stock mutual funds as you go along. That's the trick. Dan is with us in Raleigh, North Carolina. Hi, Dan. How are you? I'm very well. Thank you, Dan.

1:32:20Thanks for having me on your crawl. I had a question. So my wife and I are working this together. I just retired this year. It turns 70 as well. My question is we have 1.5 between the two. There was 1.5 million in our IRA and we pull in 12,000 a month after taxes in our retirement. The question I have is should I start pulling out from my IRA rolling into our Roth? IRA, the tax free one and keep those distributions. So I say in the 22% bracket, or should I month up to the 24% bracket and pull out a little over 200,000 each year? Okay. Yeah. You're going to run into RMDs. You know that. Required minimum distributions of 73. Whatever's remaining at 73 in that traditional, you're going to have to begin drawing down on it even though you don't need to because you have enough monthly income to live on, right? Yes, sir. Is that why you're wanting to roll it over to the Roth, man, Lee, Dan?

1:33:24Yeah. I want to pull it out and put it into the Roth. You know, I don't know if it's wiser to pull it out up front earlier and start making more money on the tax free side or just leave it in the IRA and just roll it and start pulling out the middle one. Well, the thing is the tax bracket thing becomes tricky and you actually can sit down with somebody and try to map it out. But I would get it done sooner rather than later because the problem is that 1.5 continues to grow. In other words, while you pull out 200, it probably grew another 200. Great. And we've balanced it between the four categories that you're talking about. Yeah, but I mean, if it's growing at 12% or so, it's going to grow another 200 pretty quick here. So you're never going to get ahead of it in licks of 200. You're going to have to do more than that and that is going to push you up a bracket.

1:34:24So the thing is this, if you just kind of do some math this way, it helps me remember how to do it. It'll double if it's at 10% growth rate, it'll double about every seven years. And so 1.5 in seven years is going to be three and seven more years is going to be six. And every one of those dollars you haven't moved to Roth are going to be taxable. So now you got $6 million worth of taxes because you're trying to avoid bracket creep. Six taxes on $6 million because you're trying to avoid bracket creep instead of taxes on 1.5. So I'm going to move the bulk of it. I'm going to move it pretty quickly. I'm tempted to do it all at once. I'm not sure that the math works on that just sitting here doing it in my head, but I'm probably going to do it in no longer than three years. I'm going to do a half million. Get the taxes on that. You're going to pay the taxes, but you're going to pay taxes on $6 million if you don't. No, you're not. Yeah. Someday you're going to pay the taxes and you're going to pay taxes on more and more and more every year that you don't move it. That's the downside.

1:35:24You can't get ahead of this creeping it. And so you've got to chunk it to get there. And if you've got the money to pay the taxes somewhere, then I'm going to do it. Save Ramsey here. Every day on this show we help people work through real money problems and figure out what to do next. Now you can get that same kind of help anytime with Ask Ramsey. Ask your money question and get answers built on Ramsey principles we use on the show. Whether you're making a decision or just want something explained, Ask Ramsey is here to help.

1:36:25It's fast, simple and free to use. Go to RamseySolutions.com and try Ask Ramsey today. That's RamseySolutions.com. Everyone needs insurance. You need defense and offense. It can be hard trying to find pros or just looking to make a buck and agents who really know their stuff. Ramsey trusted insurance pros are vetted by us and coached by us to make sure they're market experts and make sure they have the heart of a teacher and your best interested heart. Go to RamseySolutions.com slash coverage to find the type of insurance you're looking for and connect with a Ramsey trusted agent. Tucker is in Breckenridge. Hi, Tucker, how are you?

1:37:25Hi, Dave and Rachel. Hey, I'll do it straight to my question. As I said, I live near Breckenridge, Colorado where housing prices are very high. Local governments have created workforce housing programs for people. Absolutely. Most of the ski resource staff, yeah. Yeah. So you must live and work locally. You cannot own any other real estate and appreciation is capped at 2 to 3% per year. We currently on a market rate, two better and condo worth about 750,000. We could move laterally or even down in value into to say a four better and workforce home. What's your opinion? But would not do that. No. No. The reason for owning real estate is the appreciation. The purpose of the workforce housing is to try to keep workforce that can work the ski resort and you can afford to live there because we're dealing with 10 million dollar houses everywhere, right?

1:38:26And condos that are 3 million dollars and everything else. 750. It's hard to be a bartender and live there unless you have workforce housing. And so most of the ski resorts have done that, but that doesn't mean that you purchasing something that's appreciation capped is good for you. It's just a way to get people to work the mountain. That's the reason they're doing it. And so I don't know. You're past that. You are now a condo owner that's going up in value. And so my guess is your family is growing and the two better and condos getting tight. Yeah. Golden retriever would like a yard. That's the family growing. Okay. Well, the golden's a great dog. You're on with your brother as well. Yeah. I would like for the golden to have a dog too, but I don't want to lose 700 grand for that. And that's what you're going to increase in value. So how long have you owned the condo?

1:39:27Three years on this one. Okay. On this one. You lived in the area though for a while. Yeah. This is the second property I've owned. Okay. All right. Are you there full times at your primary residence? Correct. Yeah. My reason for my question is still, it's easy for you to answer. Think about all those years ago when you bought the first one versus what prices are now. And that's why I'm telling you not to do an appreciation cap work force housing you. Yeah. Understood. I'm a real estate agent up here. So that has always been my inclination is that you know kind of kind of project housing. But um. But it's it is and it isn't. But it's a government subsidized thing to create a labor supply that is needed. And that's not invalid because it's. But it's not where I'd put my primary residence. But I don't want to.

1:40:28I don't want to bet my future on that. Yeah. You know, if you're a bartender and you're single and you need to instead of driving in from Denver every day, which is impossible, you know, then that that's that's why they did this is so to cover that and not for you. So no, I would never take. I would never step out of the free market that is working into a subsidized market that is capped. That's bottom line. And it's just an expensive place as you know Tucker to live. So that's it's beautiful too. Absolutely gorgeous. All right. Jason's in Pensacola. Hi Jason. How are you? Hi guys. How you doing better than we deserve? What's up? So my fiance and I are trying to work through a base step to and we've got about $60,000 in personal loans and credit card debt.

1:41:28And we got 90,000 still left on the mortgage. Net take home pay is about 130 grand a year. And we were really committed to getting rid of this debt. But we really want to get married about this time next year. So I was wondering if you had any general advice advice about how to save for the wedding and also and pay off as much as we can. Yeah, well first Jason, I would keep the debt and the income separate. So I'm just curious. The 60,000 is it pretty much 30, 30 or what makes up the 60,000? The majority of it is mine about 5,000 is hers. Okay. And then how much is she making a year? She is, she's netting well, her growth pay is about 50,000 a year without overtime. Okay. And yours is 80. That's correct.

1:42:30Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So I mean, first and foremost, Jason, I really would. I would not be paying on hers. I wouldn't have her paying on yours. I think you guys functioning still as two single people during the debt pay off process. You can both sign on this house. No, no, no, no, no. I mean, who whose name is it under? It's under my name. Actually, I actually purchased the home before we met. Okay. Okay. So yeah, so I would just I would see every now and then. She makes 50 grand has no debt and you're deeply in debt. Excuse me. Yes. Right. Yeah. You're just going to see. Well, there is a small caveat to the debt. 30,000 of that debt is currently being paid off by student loan payments for the national card. Okay. When will that be completed? That'll be completed in about four years. Okay. While you're you're in the national guard, so it'll take the four years of service.

1:43:31Yes, man. They make a they make one lump some payment at the one anniversary day every year. My list. Okay. Um, hmm. I'd probably still make it a goal. Just I mean, I don't know. I think I'd want to be done with it so that you have the ability to make decisions if something changes in your life. So the question you asked though was how do we save for a wedding while on baby step two? So I would figure out, okay, what is probably because I mean, you know, you guys have debt. All of this other stuff is happening. So I would say, what's the least wedding we can have that we would be okay with? Right. Look out to say we're probably not going to go and have a $50,000 wedding, right? So what what does the feel look like? Do we want venue church? Like I would really look and kind of map out here would be my reasonable quote unquote dream wedding. And this is me if I'm if I'm her. And then we back out the pricing and say, okay, here's probably what this is going to

1:44:33cost. And you're going to see the price and probably be like, okay, it's probably not what we can afford because that means we're going to have to save X amount every single month. Until the wedding, but we still have other goals. We're still wanting to put some towards the debt. And so I would start to really paint this picture of what do we want this wedding to look like. And then once you have that realistic number of what you're shooting for to say, okay, then how much do we have to put aside each month to save for that wedding in junction with though having, you know, a goal to get this debt paid off, right? To be putting money towards the debt. So it's kind of like a two for one, but it's going to be a check of expectations on what type of wedding you all will have. And at the rate at which you can save. Does that make sense? Yes, it does. I appreciate that. So Jason, the way the language you used tells me that you've combined everything you're living together, everything but a marriage. Yes. Jason, it's how you get married this weekend.

1:45:34Yep. I mean, we get married this weekend and then live your life for a year and have a celebration in a year because you're fooling no one, not even yourselves. No one's fooled. You know, I mean, what is the deal here? You're already acting like it. So just be it. Now, I would get a pastor and get married this weekend if I were you. And then I would have a celebration a year from now and pay off as much debt as I can while budgeting for the celebration that looks a lot like a wedding. You work your butt off for your money, but your money's never going to return the favor

1:46:43if all you do is hope for the best. If you're ready to learn how to make your money work for you, check out the Smart Vester program. Smart Vester can help you find advisors who specialize in retirement planning, charitable giving, advanced investing strategies and more. Whatever your goals, your pro will take the time to explain your options so you never have to invest in anything you don't understand. Head to ramsysolutions.com slash smart vester, the Get Connected. Ramsey Solutions is a paid non-client promoter of participating pros. Learn more at ramseysolutions.com slash smart vester. Amy is in Austin, Texas.

1:47:46Hi, Amy. How are you? I'm doing well. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? Hey there. I am calling to see what I need to disclose to my boyfriend. We've been together a little over a year. We have very different backgrounds and situations when it comes to employment, income, savings, all the things. And we're looking and discussing emerging homes, getting married, things of that nature. Just trying to figure out what to disclose and when without giving all my cards away, too early in the game, if you will, and just kind of where to go from here. So are you more successful financially than him? Yes. Yes. Yes. By how much do you think? Substantial. I, to put it out there, I, a recent divorce, made over, you know, walked away with over a million dollars cash and home paid for car paid for, he's working two jobs, has two small kids,

1:48:47early any savings. The house is fully paid for in cash by me with my name on it fully. Just trying to figure out. That she lives in the boyfriend? No, not yet. But we're, we're getting there. Oh, but the house you're currently living in is what you're saying. Correct. Yeah. Yeah. How, how, when, when did you get divorced? About over a year ago now. Over a year. How long have you guys been dating? I have, it's funny you ask. Probably just shy of a year. Um, so in general, the rule would be, a relationship rule would be if you're going to share your life with someone before you agreed to do that, they should know who you are. Okay. 100%. And if you're uncomfortable them knowing who you are, you're not ready to spend your life with them. That's fair. I think I'm just more hesitant how to do this in a smart way.

1:49:53I guess I don't want to overwhelm them. I am. I will tell you a very privileged situation where I'm a single mom, two kids. I'm not working. I have an income, a very substantial income as a equalization payment for divorce. Mm hmm. And what's the, how much do you get coming in? I get 10,000 a month. How much do you think he is coming in? Probably 4,000 with two jobs. Okay. Yes. Okay. I don't think that's that far out of a culture, but what's out of culture is is that you haven't, you got two things going to number one, you're a human and you got your heart trampled on and it ended a year ago. And so to jump back into the trust game is hard when you're wounded. And that would be normal, right? I mean, you should be a little bit standoffish. Yes. But it's slow. But it's all that. But the divorce it's as fresh, right? That would be normal. You'd be weird if you're like, oh, yeah, it's all okay now.

1:50:53I mean, that's a, that's a denial, right? So, I mean, your heart has had some healing to do. The scars of the process you all went through there has some healing to do to be able to fully engage and trust someone else. And so some good pre-marriage counseling is in order for sure. And I personally think it would be a huge mistake to live with someone. Especially in this situation before you're married, because it involves your paid for house and your income that's three to two and a half times of his and you don't, you don't work. Right. And so I think that's going to get weird fast as a shacked up boyfriend thing. So I would just stand off and say, we're going to continue our life separate until we are actually married and we're going to enter disclosing this through a married pre-marriage counseling process gradually and gently. And then a pre-nup is in order in this situation. Okay. Because it's substantially, we don't recommend pre-nups most of the time, but where there's

1:51:57a substantial difference between the two. And with kids involved second marriages. I mean, it's just, yeah. Yeah. And your, your, your alimony or support payments are not based on you not remarrying, right? Correct. It's more of an equalization payment as he wanted the investment accounts and he owed me cash. Ah, okay. So it's to equal that out more or less. I did. It is significant amount in savings, cash up front from selling homes and whatnot. Yeah. So I do have a large savings of the side, but how old are your children? Mine are elementary and middle school. So we're looking at him in 13. They're younger, five and three. Okay. So you've, you've got up from today forward, the day you're married forward, be treating these children equally too. Correct. Because otherwise you're going to have the Cinderella syndrome going on. And we don't want that. Yeah. I think it would be worth the time and the money, Amy, to do, which I think you will. You sound intelligent, smart.

1:52:57I think you would. Thank you. But just sit down with, you know, in attorney and, and, and map this out really cleanly and well. And again, it's nothing against him. No, no, no, no. No, no, no. Yeah. I mean, I think he's great. I don't hear anything negative about him. But the, the, and you're very wise, Rachel's point to realize these differences mean something. And then you're also very wise to say what we said out loud is that this stuff's off still fresh. And to work through the emotions of all of that trust stuff and not hold him accountable for things he didn't do that the X did. And that's a process. That's a top of mind thing you have to do intentionally. Because your human nature is your body ceases up every time he makes some comment that sounds like the X. And your body just freaks out. Yeah, there's been a lot of therapy on my part and it was emotionally abusive relationship that I, you know, I had to be that role model for my kiddos.

1:53:58Wow. So we got out of there and I came out very, I kind of joke like, thanks for the money in the trauma. It is, it's been a lot of hard work and this man I'm with is very patient and he's, he's like, you know, we're doing well, that that graphs exactly into what we're suggesting. Well, and and it's going to be a beautiful thing. I mean, yeah, it if or when I'm going to say when you guys get married, I mean, that's what's it's sounding like eventually that probably will happen because you're talking about living together. And and there's a, there's a beautiful future for you guys when you say, yeah, you keep it separate, which makes it so clean, no weird entangled emotions of who owes what I wouldn't. I would and because of them, I mean, genuinely keep, keep everything separate. You guys get married, come back from the honeymoon. It's the Brady Bunch situation. And at that point, he's going to know everything and and what a beautiful life you guys get to start to build together. Do you know what he mean? Like it, you can see this money as as a gift and a tool and having him on board as well.

1:54:59And there's no level of him feeling demasculated or you know, emasculated or anything demasculated. I mean, either one does the same thing. I know, do you know what I'm saying? But like you guys, through an engagement process, really work and build this new units of when it's going to happen, right? But I think it really is important to keep the steps in order. Yeah. If that makes sense because, yeah, I think that's exactly right. So I'm excited because you've processed this so well to this point, all the stuff you've been through. And this is just the next step. And I predict that your radar is really good. And if he is, there's three possibilities. He's healthy enough that he can graft right into this and that's our positive possibility. The negative possibilities are this causes him to not feel a need to produce in which case he's opting out of your relationship or he's like freaked out in some other way.

1:56:04And that's another reason that he, you know, he doesn't make the cut. And so he gets to choose how he's going to react to this and how he's going to graft into this by meeting with a good counselor along the way. And you guys talking through, but when he has full knowledge of everything, his behavior is going to tell you whether he's a keeper at that point. Yeah. Okay. If he's not, then that's just God's signal for you to not do this. Well, that it was, you know, that he couldn't handle it because this all comes with the package called Amy. And she's, and she's worth it. And she's worth it. You know, so he wants to, he gets the two kids and he gets the package. This is it. A former trauma, the healing. He gets all of it. And it's wonderful. It's beautiful. I hope it's a great second chapter for you, Amy. Amen.

1:57:24I'm not every excuse for why folks think they can't get ahead with money. So let's go ahead and settle this right now. You get the final say on what happens with your money. That's why you have to start telling your money where to go so you can stop wondering where it went. So if you're going to start winning with money, you have to get on a budget and the easiest way to get started and stick to it is with the every dollar budget app. It'll help you make a plan for every single dollar coming in and every single dollar going out every single month. And guess what? It's free. So no excuses. Download every dollar in the app store or Google Play today. Our scripture of the day, first Timothy, one five, the goal of our instruction is love

1:58:27from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith. Louisiana Senator John Kennedy said, always follow your heart, but take your brain with you. He's got some great one liners. He really does. Karen is in Orlando. Hi, Karen. How are you? Hi. Good. Thank you. What's up? My house has a leaky roof. And I did take financial piece, but I wound up in debt again. I just spent too much and made some bad decisions. I did wind up getting solar and getting a new roof with solar is almost twice as hard because they charge quite a bit just to take the panels off and put them back on. So the roofing job is quite more than a regular roofing job. And then I'm thinking there could be water damage. So I'm just trying to think, would it be better off to sell my house?

1:59:28Because I don't have my kids are grown and out of the house and just get an apartment or something. Or would it be better to keep the house and try to fix it and maybe turn my debt to that Trinity management or something like that. What your turn your debt to what? You've never heard of them. They said you recommended them. That Trinity management. No, that would be people that lie. Oh, dear. Okay. Dave recommended them. Is like a debt consultant, like a debt consolidation company? Yeah. And they are our Christian. No, they're not. They're liars. Oh, they're liars. They're liars. Well, some Christians lie. Oh, no. Jesus may love them. I don't. Yeah. No, this is not true here at all. Oh, my gosh. You're sure that that isn't like I'm positive. Some I have never endorsed Trinity anything. Okay.

2:00:28The yeah. Okay. Anyways, so here how much I'm assuming you have no money? No savings. That was one skill I didn't acquire because I always got my bills paid and I was usually out of debt and then I kind of took some wrong turns. But the savings part I didn't know. And you have debt? Yes. How much? 30,000. And what? Credit card debt. Just credit card debt. You pay cash for the solar? No. I'm still paying on that too. Why should you own the solar? I 40. It was 60, but I've got it down to 40 at that 4% interest. So I didn't think it was about a deal. You really did flunk financial peace university. Okay. I'm the wow. All right, Ms. Karen.

2:01:31Wow. So if you sell the house, what do you owe on the house? You owe 30? I don't know anything on the house. Oh, just to sell you. Okay. That's good. What's the house worth? I haven't officially got it a praise, but I've looked at similar homes. There are 300 to 400. And but it does have it need a new roof. So I don't know how anybody can get insurance. No, I mean, that's going to be a part of it. But the, so if you make a year, about 48. Okay. What do you do for a living? I work at it a assistant living. Okay. Okay. So you, you have the 30,000 in solar. What was the other debt? One more credit card. Credit card. 30,000 in the credit card. Okay. So if you sold the house, you were be free of the solar mess, which apparently was a mistake since you don't have the money to, you know, they might have paid for it.

2:02:32And the credit cards could be paid off and you'd be debt free and you could buy a 200, $200,000 property that more suited your needs. More condo-esque, probably not a single family. Yeah. What would you enjoy? What would you, if you could pick anything in the world that was for you today? Because the house sounds like it was purchased for a different phase of your life a few years ago. Yeah. Yeah. I had two children and the house is a four bedroom house. I don't need something quite that big, but it seems like even the smaller homes are still pretty pricey nowadays. Yeah. Everything is, but so yours. If they're pricey, yours is pricey. Okay. You know, yours isn't like all of a sudden on the, on the wood, on the rubbish pile and then there's is gleaming castles. That's not the way it works. Right. Okay. So yeah, I think, I think what a flower in your shoes, I would want to gather some information and it would maybe lead me to the wisdom. If I know all the info, usually I make better decisions.

2:03:33So let's get two, two beds on the roof, actual beds. Let's call a smart vester, or a Ramsey trusted, I'm sorry, Ramsey trusted real estate agent, have them come out and do a comparative market analysis and tell you what they would list your home for and show you why. And then also take the get with that person and go look at some of the smaller, shinier, lower, slightly lower priced, where you could be 100% debt free when you sell this. And 100% debt free when you buy the next one. Okay. And let's go, go look at what you could actually live in and go, okay, I really like that. And I really like this number that the person's giving me on selling my house and I don't have to fix the roof and I can sell it as is and I can be out of debt and I'm going to cut up my credit cards and I'm going to live on a budget and we're going to put you back through financial peace as our guest. Oh, yeah. Absolutely. Or you may find that you can patch the roof for. Yeah. You know, half of what was quoted to you, right, just in one little area, I don't know,

2:04:36but that just gives you options, Karen. Yeah. And but at the end of the day, I probably would downsize because of the not even just from the financial perspective, part of that is motivating me for you, but also your season of life and where you are. You're like, oh, yeah, you said it twice. I don't need this. I don't need it. So it could be a great move for you in this next part of your life. And don't finance solar and cut up the credit cards, Karen. If you if you do this move, the scary thing is when whether it's, you know, a massive, you know, payment people get from equity from a home that had sells or an inheritance or a lawsuit, right? And you get paid out like whatever it is. And when you go and clear that debt, you've not really changed Karen. You've just made some decisions that have helped you financially, but you have to promise yourself that you're going to change your behavior in that process. Yes. Never go back here again. Because if you go and get a $200,000 house and you're debt free and everything and you'll rack up credit card, you're going to be right back where you started. So you've got you have to stay, stay the course.

2:05:38Logan's in Minneapolis. Hey, Logan, what's up? Hey, folks, thanks for taking the call. Sure. How can we help? So my wife and I are debt free. We've got our emergency fund and we've got our down payment saved. We're currently paying pretty well under market rent. And I was wondering if it ever makes sense to wait another year, save more in rent for longer before jumping into a home at the end of our lease. Yeah, it can be. How far under market are you? We're paying about $1,300 for a place that should be probably be sent around $22 to $2,500 if we are renting to an almost equivalent. Okay. And so we're talking about $12,000 a year. Okay. And what price range home would you be buying? We're shooting for mid to $200 to $300. How fast does that go up $12,000? One year. Not sure there. One year.

2:06:40So what you're saving and rent, the house you're getting ready to buy is probably going to go up about the same amount. Sure. You see what I did? I do. So it's okay and it might be less because it's on the area and so forth. The appreciation rates might not be 6%. I think it's like 3%. And so it might not be quite that much. But the point is it's not really saving. Yeah, you're not really saving all of it because while you're saving rent, the other thing is going to close to the same amount. And so you know, I don't have to play catch up. Yeah, I have a big down payment and all that. Yeah. It's okay to do that if you want to do it. And I'm all for taking your time. Rent as patients. So get something for the patients. You know, I want to get a great buy on the other end to offset this. I want to bargain somewhere. Take that extra time and find something great to get a deal. Yeah, get a deal, man. That puts us out of the Rams.

2:07:40He's showing the books. We'll be back with you before you know it. In the meantime, remember, there's ultimately only one way to financial peace and that's to walk daily with the Prince of Peace. Rise Jesus.