Are You Investing in Tomorrow or Robbing It?

23:48So in this case, what he has to do is this is him working harder than he's ever worked before to make a personal connection with people so they know the story. And he's got to own it, by the way. Like, he's got to own it. There is no spin because people react like Dave reacted. I was feeling the same thing. I don't want to hear some hard-to-prove story. I want somebody to go, here's what happened. Here's what I learned. And, you know, you eat the humble pie right in front of people. But what they really need is they need somebody they can rely on to get the truck from point A to point B. so this is where he's making every connection that he's ever had uh he is working it it's not just applying online he is actually sitting down with people because i'm telling you if i were to draw a circle around your house 30 minutes each way just total circumference i'm telling you there are people who need somebody like your husband that they can depend on to get trucked from point a to point b but he's got to find it it's like a scavenger hunt on steroids talking to real people That's how you get out of this.

24:54Now, tell us what he was making and tell us what he's making with these three jobs. So he was making$27 an hour with a lot of overtime. And that would come to, I'm guessing, anywhere between$5 ,000 to$5 ,500 a month, sometimes less. and with these three jobs he's working one job at a remodeling for$15 an hour and another job for hauling for Amish family for hauling produce and that pays about$7 a pallet which in a week he can get about$500 from that and then for his other job he works temporarily until wintertime comes for a person who does CDL hauling for a, like, large equipment, and that pays$25 an hour.

25:52And he only gets those jobs maybe a few hours a day. Okay, so it's only been a couple weeks, so he's making, what, roughly half of what he was making before? Yeah. Okay, right.

26:04Dave Ramsey:So that's not wise. There's two answers to the question. One is do all the stuff Ken's talking about and go get the new job, okay? And that means hanging out at a truck stop and walking up to guys at the truck stop and going, hey, you know anybody's hiring? I got a CDL. I'm looking for work. Yeah. And then you go, hey, George, you don't have to tell them you met George 10 minutes ago. George told me you were hiring over here. Okay. Henry told me you were hiring over here. Okay. And you go knock on the door and you go get the job. That's what Ken's talking about. The second part is your original question is you have to prioritize your budget.

26:38Dave Ramsey:and we take care of necessities. When we were in the seventh grade, they used to teach a class called civics, and they would teach you what are necessities, food, shelter, clothing, transportation, and utilities. So we have to put food on the table first, and that's not going out to eat. You don't need to see the inside of a restaurant unless you're working there. You're broke, okay? So we're buying groceries. That's it. That's all, food. And you're cooking from scratch. It's healthier, and it's cheaper, okay? Clothing. You're probably okay. You probably got enough clothes in the closet. The kids probably got enough clothes in the closet to make it a few months.

27:12Dave Ramsey:You're probably okay. And if somebody's got their toe sticking out of one of the shoes, buy some shoes. But really, most people are okay on clothes. Most people have way okay on clothes, okay? The third thing is you pay the rent or the house payment. So food and house payment. Minor purchases of clothing. Gasoline in the car and car payment if there's a car payment. You got enough coming in to do that. Right. And then some of the other stuff is probably not going to get done right now. But you eat, you have a place to live, you keep the lights and water on, keep your utilities going, and you keep gas in the car, and he starts looking for a better position.

27:52Dave Ramsey:But I would not let the words come out of my mouth again. I would not speak this lie over your life that no one's hiring CDL drivers in your area who have been fired for a non-driving violation. That is not a true statement, and you should never say that again. You should say, we haven't found the person yet who is hiring a CDL driver who has been fired for gossip. But they are around here somewhere. We just haven't found them yet. And that is a true statement. And it's hard to find them. That's a true statement. I'm okay with that. And we're out here scratching and clawing. That's a true statement.

28:31Dave Ramsey:And he's not lazy. He went and got three jobs. Way to go, dude. Yeah. What a good guy. Okay. And, um, but I would never say in the interview ever again, cultural differences and he worked hard and they didn't. So they hated him and fired him that I would not say stuff like that. That doesn't, that's not very appealing to a potential employer. Say, listen, I was accused of gossip. I may have said something I shouldn't have said. I don't know. It's not who I am. I'm a hardworking guy. let's go let's go drive some truck and i would just leave it at that man that's right just own it a little bit and move on but i wouldn't try to throw it back on them that they cultural different yeah then they're trying to figure out well what cultural differences have you got with me you know like hard work i mean what's your cultural difference you're trying to figure out off going i worked for or worked with a couple buttholes and i was a bigger butthole apparently people buy that that's true okay i've been in that situation right that could be true they can resonate and go, all right, you let it get to you.

29:31Dave Ramsey:Yeah, we had a little contest and I lost.

29:37Dave Ramsey:That's a real thing, okay? I can buy that as a potential employer. But the great news is CDL is in great demand. The great news is that you don't have a driving violation that caused this. It's not in great demand. Very hard to get a job if you tore something up or hurt somebody. Very hard. By the way, heavy equipment, a lot of times CDL people can get those jobs because, again, they've done through so much qualifying. So I'd be looking, driving around everywhere where you see this stuff. You'd be surprised. When you're delivering some of that heavy equipment, ask if they need somebody to drive it.

30:13Dave Ramsey:That's right. Yeah.

30:52Dave, we got a lot of calls on this show where life happens. One day someone's healthy, they're working, providing for their family,

30:58Dave Ramsey:and then a curveball hits. You know, we hear it all the time. A car accident, a cancer diagnosis, a heart attack, and suddenly everything changes. Yeah, and that's why you've always said that having term life insurance from Xander is essential because it protects your family if the worst happens. Yeah, that's right. You need 10 to 12 times your income in coverage. No gimmicks, no whole life junk, just straightforward term life protection. But there's another piece that people often overlook, and that's long-term disability insurance. Yeah, it's important to understand the difference between them.

31:33Life insurance steps in when you die. Disability insurance steps in while you're alive but can't work. So it replaces a large part of your income so the bills still get paid while you get back on your feet.

31:45Dave Ramsey:Now, if your employer gives you free disability insurance, great, take it. If it's discounted there at a better price, take it. But if not, Xander can help you find the right plan. whether you're single or married it's not optional if you're going to be out of work for a while then you need to make sure the money's still showing up and that's why zander is our go-to they make it super simple to get the right coverage at the best price no pressure no upselling i've trusted jeff zander and zander insurance for over 25 years and so has my family so don't wait it's fast it's easy and it could make all the difference go to zander.com or call 800-356-4282 Protect yourself, protect your income, protect your family.

32:41Dave Ramsey:The all-new EveryDollar is coming. It's more than just a budgeting app now. It's a financial game changer. We're releasing a ton of advanced features to help you make the progress with your money that you dreamed up. If you've never tried, or even if you have tried EveryDollar, you definitely want to try it. This is a pretty powerful thing we're doing here. Yeah, like the most important thing we've ever done other than launch the thing. People are finding thousands of dollars of margin in just 15 minutes. Watch the premiere of the all-new EveryDollar September 25th to see real success stories and how you can be next.

33:21Dave Ramsey:Turn on your YouTube notifications to get notified when the premiere drops, and you'll be able to see what's happening with this. It's pretty stinking incredible. Do not miss this. John's in Raleigh. Hi, John. How are you? I had a tail of me wagging, Dave. How are you? That'd be great. Better than I deserve. What's up? So we are facing a question on what to do with our home. So for background, we bought this house in May of 2024. And at the time, our take home was about$10 ,000 a month. And our monthly payment was between 25 % and 30%, as y 'all would suggest. Some things have changed in our life since then.

34:00Primarily, we have a new baby, so she's four months old. And my wife has gone to part-time instead of full-time. So our take-home pay has gone from the$10 ,000 down to about$7 ,000. This makes our monthly payment be around 40 % of our take-home. And we've also had a few other new circumstances, such as our neighbors have completely gone off the rails, it seems. and we're really considering moving both to lower our monthly payment as well as to maybe get into a slightly better situation. We have identified three options that we would like to do. So the first being to stay where we are and refinance when rates drop and try and just lower that monthly payment, maybe even recasting our mortgage because we have a fairly significant amount of cash liquid right now that we could put a significant down payment on there to lower the monthly payment or to move to a smaller situation where we'll have around that 25%.

35:08Dave Ramsey:Okay, you make seven. How long before you make ten? Probably in the next four to five years, three to four maybe. Okay. What did your wife do for a living? So she is in data analysis. She works for an agrochemical company, and so she does that from home, which has been very convenient with the baby. Okay. But she's gone to part-time hours? She has, and she's expressed that she would like to just be full-time, stay-at-home mom because it's just been wonderful having the baby and something we really enjoy. And if we can make that work financially, that would be nice. How much cash do you have? About$150 ,000 liquid.

35:59Dave Ramsey:What do you owe on the house? $360 ,000. Where'd you get the$150 ,000? So a little bit. We were in very frugal over the course of our life. Why didn't you put it down on the house in the first place? I think we were a little scared. We were very conservative. And now you figured out what to be scared of is the payment, not the cash. Yes. Yes, absolutely. What's your interest rate? 7.375, which is not great. Yeah, you can get a 5.7 now. Yeah. That's a point and a half shift. Yeah, I'd refinance it and put the 150 on it and just stay there, unless the neighbors are so crazy that you have to move.

36:49Dave Ramsey:Maybe hold a little cash back to build a fence. I don't know. True. True, yeah. I mean, it's been multiple arrests. Large evergreen trees. I don't know. Yes. They grow fast. I mean, is there any safety issues for you? Do you fear for your family's safety because of all this nonsense? There have been times. I mean, explosions that have shaken our house. and are they running a crack house over there yes for real yes yeah for real what price is your house it was 500 000 and it was not an issue when we bought it it's well now i'm not speaking for dave this is not an official show response my response is if i knew that what you're telling me i'd be out i'm not going to keep my family there it takes one crazy night the whole thing could explode yeah for real there's a there's a little bit of a uh change there's a new owner somebody bought it but they're allowing the guy that continued to live there to continue as a living estate well then it's still a problem on the on the uh precipice of death but yes so he's on the precipice of death and he's running a crack house what is this breaking bad it's it could be a half hour show right here yeah i'm just i'm hearing this this is amazing well if you think your family he's in danger it's a no-brainer mic drop you're i'm out of there okay if you think you're you can outlive the guy and outlast him and survive and uh he's either going to blow himself up or die or whatever's happening to him good lord um and you want to stay there and then recast the mortgage but i wouldn't recast the mortgage and then move two months later yeah that's throwing good money after bad if you recast the mortgage you're staying and can we recast the mortgage and get the lower interest rate?

38:39No, you just have to refinance. It's not a recash.

38:41Dave Ramsey:You'll refinance. You'll reset the mortgage. You refinance it on a new 15-year, start again with 150 more down, and then suddenly you can afford the payment. Yeah, for sure. That's if you want to stay there. If you don't want to stay there, that's okay. And yeah, there's nothing wrong with either option. Moving down, she does not like the house enough to be willing to work a few hours a day to keep it. she doesn't like it that much yeah i forgot to ask how she feel about this the nuts next door i i'm telling you right now stacy would have already made that decision for me you'd be done well yeah it's just why play with fire if it's as bad as he says and i believe him i i i just don't get it why you would leave your family there yeah i i if you think you're in danger you're out of there that instant i mean i don't know how it sounds very bizarre yeah yeah But if you're in danger, you should leave.

39:37Dave Ramsey:No question. All other parts of the conversation aside, very simple. If you're in danger. And crack houses do explode. The whole thing can blow up. I mean, it's very explosive. Yeah. If I have a wife at home with a newborn baby and that kind of stuff is going on, you just never know when it spills over beyond their yard. If I have any hope that the guy is going to be gone in a short period of time, that's different. But short being a month or two, I can deal with it for a month or two. But if I think he's going to deal with this for three years, no, I'm out of there. Yeah. I agree. I agree with you.

40:11Dave Ramsey:I'm not arguing with that. Very interesting. Wow. I mean, what I would put up with. Things I didn't have on my bingo card this morning. There's that rule. What I would put up with is very different than what Stacey would put up with. And that's the issue. Happy wife, happy life. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Safe wife, happy life. There's that one too. I'm afraid my wife would shoot back. No, here's what Sharon would do. Sharon would walk over there and knock on the door and have a word with the young man. And not in a mean, because she's not a mean person. She's a straight shooter, but she's not mean. But I see her just kind of wagging her finger.

40:54Dave Ramsey:Young man, you're not making good life choices. steel magnolia here wheezy is knocking on your door next door right yeah yeah and he probably listened to her yeah he's probably scared to death if he knows what's good for him that's right a little little east tennessee fable she tells a story you know about the time the guy died doing this you know it's like yeah we used to have a neighbor did stuff like this and nobody knows where he is now now he goes by one leg larry you know now you know why can't find the boy we don't know what happened to him it's the strangest thing people have a way of dealing with those things in the holler breaking bad is next door the guy is dying he sells the house he's got a life estate and he's doing making crack next door breaking bad i didn't see that one today i didn't see that one i was not on my bingo card this morning i thought he was joking until he wasn't no he wasn't joking no he said neighbors off the rails but we didn't know which rails yeah right wow bless your heart man coming to Netflix the more we laugh about this the more it's not funny I'd move I would just move yikes yeah I'd move and just accomplish several birds with one stone yeah yeah

42:31For way too long, I struggled with sleep and woke up groggy after tossing and turning all night. But now, I look forward to bedtime and I wake up bright-eyed and bushy-tailed thanks to Casper, a company that's been perfecting better sleep for over a decade using durable, high-quality materials that actually last. My whole family now sleeps on Casper mattresses. Yes, even the dogs have their own Casper dog bed, to no one's surprise. And it's not just one man's opinion. Casper customers keep their mattresses for years, and four out of five customers recommend them to friends. And with free delivery and 100-night trial, Casper is no gimmicks.

43:06A mattress you can trust, backed by quality that lasts. So go to casper.com slash Ramsey and use promo code Ramsey to receive 25 % off all mattresses and 10 % off everything else with code Ramsey. That's casper.com slash Ramsey. Exclusions apply.

43:33Dave Ramsey:welcome back to the ramsey show in the fair winds credit union studio ken coleman ramsey personality number one best-selling author is my co-host today shay is in idaho hi shay how are you hi there i'm glad to be speaking with you dave and ken i'm very grateful for your ministry Well, thank you. How can we help? Yeah, my question is around the enjoyment side of money. My husband and I both struggle with that and specifically around planning and booking vacations. When that time comes around, I just start to feel so much like anxiety and like shame about spending so much money on something. it's just hard for us and so I was wondering if you had any tips.

44:23Dave Ramsey:Well, number one, you have to practice because you've not developed that muscle. Your frugal muscle is overdeveloped and that's how you got here. Thank goodness. But you've not flexed your enjoyment muscle very much while you were flexing your frugal muscle, agreed? Probably, yeah. So the more you do it, the better you get at it. I speak from experience. I mean, I had a hard time buying a decent car, you know, and now I don't have any trouble at all. That has been our struggle as well. Yeah, the second thing is I look at ratios, and the ratios are what percentage of our world are we actually spending, and how does it compare to our generosity?

45:17Dave Ramsey:so we look over here and we say our generosity equals x and this dinky butt little trip we're doing is a small small small percentage of what we make and what we give okay and so my heavenly father who's crazy about me says if we being evil know how to give our children good things, how much more so our Father in heaven wants us to have good things, in other words. And so, you know, God's not mad if I enjoy some of the blessings that he gave me. While I'm being generous and while the amount of money feels like a lot because it's compared weirdly emotionally to the old days, but as a percentage of my world today, it's a very small amount and that that's you know the ratio thing the generosity thing and uh the acknowledgement so another example that is okay around ramsey we have 1100 team members we're in 650 000 square feet we spend more we furnish coffee we have coffee these grinding coffee machines on every floor right they make fresh brewed ground coffee for everybody right and they don't pay for it's free to all the team members we spend more on coffee than i made in a year most of my life that still freaks me out you know it's still a problem but it's just a matter of scale and ratio and but it's a very small percentage of what ramsey the organization has coming in and revenues So obviously we're not being irresponsible.

47:04Dave Ramsey:We're not going to have to shut down because of our coffee. It's not even close. And that's the case, I'm guessing. And what's your all's net worth, Shay? Over a million. And what is your household income? My husband makes$120 ,000, and I make around$50 ,000. So$170 ,000 with a million. And what are you talking about spending on a trip? they just get more expensive every year what are you talking about spending on a trip uh like 12 to 15 yeah well it's absurdly small percentage of your world is that you hubs the kids while we were talking about this the million dollars made you 12 oh that's true who's going on the trip all six of us right how old are the kids oh sorry there's six eight ten and eleven okay as a guy who has one in college and another one graduating high school, I'm going to give you two words that I think you need to process the next time you start feeling this shame about spending money, because you've already proven to be frugal.

48:11So here's what I want you to think of. Return versus regret. What's the return on that investment of the$12 ,000 to$15 ,000 with those six kids 10 years, 20 years, 30 years from now? What's the return on those memories and all of the things, all right? Mine still talk about it. Versus the regret if you don't take those kinds of trips with those six and then they get out. And I think return versus regret. You've already proven you're frugal. So Dave and I aren't here worried about you overspending, but you've got to play those words out. What's the return on this trip? And then what would the regret be if we didn't do things like this and had all this money, but very few memories and experiences?

48:56Dave Ramsey:The return versus the regret does not work if you're borrowing the money to do it, boys and girls out there in Radioland. Good point. So this lady is a millionaire making$170 ,000, and she's going to write a check for this. That's right. Don't use the same argument. I put$12 ,000 on my credit card because Kid Coman said I would regret it if I didn't go on this vacation. No, you'd be regretting being stupid if you did that. Thank you for clarifying that. Okay. That is within the context of you have cash. Yeah, you have the money. It's a small percentage of your world. And I suspect your generosity is larger than your trip.

49:29Dave Ramsey:I suspect most people who get where you are, their generosity is there. So, hey, you're doing a good job. Enjoy the ride. Yeah. So, folks, this is where this falls under the reason I have to stop and clarify that is live like no one else. So that. That's correct. And she's at the so that. Later, you can live and give like no one else. But the truth is what I spend or what someone who has accumulated some wealth is a small percentage of our wealth is spent on consumption. Most of it is spent on generosity and reinvestment. The vast majority of the money that I touch and that God has blessed me to manage for him is either reinvested for future generations or it is invested in other ways called generosity.

50:23Dave Ramsey:back into the community, in some community somewhere, and some dollar amount. And those are the two things that make up the vast majority, the highest percentage by far of our income or of our net worth is invested in those two things. Our consumption, though, is still ridiculously larger than it was when we were not making any money and didn't have any money so it still is emotional it still feels weird and you know sometimes even friends or dysfunctional family will say stupid things like you're so lucky well that's a dumb butt thing to say luck had nothing to do with it yeah don't say that around dave luck had luck comes in dressed with calluses and overalls getting ready to do some work that's where luck comes in.

51:18Dave Ramsey:I know where luck comes from. It's a sweat. That's where luck comes from. I got your luck. Luck's when you win the raffle. Yeah. Luck's when you were smoking crack in the parking lot and bought a lottery ticket and hit it. That's luck. Oh, there we go. Okay. But that's luck. But this is not luck. This is work and God's blessings. God just deciding in his infinite grace that he was going to touch us with the tip of his finger and bless the things that we were working on and protect us and allow us to be sitting here. So, but don't call it luck. It's insulting to God and it's insulting to my calluses.

52:22Dave Ramsey:If you've listened to me for more than five minutes, you know that being normal with your money is not a good thing because normal is broke. And I want you to be weird. That's why I love what we're doing with Fairwinds Credit Union. Our friends at Fairwinds just launched a brand new Ramsey debit card, And it says, debt is normal, be weird. Right on the front. I love that. Because every time you swipe it, you're choosing to live differently with no credit card payments and no debt. You see, Fairwinds has been helping people like you ditch debt faster and build wealth for years. They're not trying to shove credit cards or auto loans in your face like the big banks do.

53:08Dave Ramsey:And they've worked with us to create the smart bundle for Ramsey fans. It includes a no-fee checking account, a high-yield savings account to supercharge your emergency fund, and now the Ramsey debit card to help you stay focused on the baby steps. We're excited for you to try it. So check them out today at fairwinds.org slash Ramsey. That's fairwinds.org slash Ramsey, insured by the NCUA.

53:54Dave Ramsey:Alan is in New York. Hi, Alan. How are you? Very good. And yourself? Better than I deserve. What's up? Well, my wife and I, we're both semi-retired. I retired a while, eight years ago, and then I worked part-time for the company I retired from as a consultant, and my wife works a couple days a week. We are getting ready to sell our house. It's too big for us, downsize, that type of thing. We have a place in Florida that we're going to go to. But in the meantime, our children are grown, and they're all over the world. And we have one in Colorado who a while back they asked us, you know, hey, it would be great if you guys would come out here and stay with us for a while and do things and blah, blah, blah.

54:48And we said, sure, that'd be great. And they didn't have a house, so they were looking for one. We entered into an agreement that we would give them money for a down payment. Some. They had half. We had some. and the agreement kind of fell apart here. Now there's some animosity, a little bit, and they want to pay us back. We sent the money, which was$117 ,000 as a gift. We did the gifting paperwork. They bought their house, and now they want out, and they said they want to pay us back, And I'm just concerned about, oh, one thing is taxes, and we haven't kind of really gotten into the meat of it yet.

55:36I'm concerned about where they're going to get the money from, and I think they'd take it out of their retirement accounts, which I don't want them to do. And I'm just looking for some advice, what your thoughts are.

55:50Dave Ramsey:So you're partners in the house? It was not a gift. No, no. We're not partners in the house. What's the agreement you're referring to? Well, they bought a house with a finished basement with, you know, two bedrooms, bathroom down there, family room, different things, you know, and space for us where we could come for two, three months out of the year. Oh, so the agreement was you could live in the basement three months a year? Yeah. And now they don't want you to because they're mad. What did they get mad about? No, what happened was we told them right up front, we said, listen, we need our own space.

56:32There'll be times when we'll get on each other's nerves. We know we don't need to be together 24-7. We'd like a place to cook some meals so we don't have to all eat together all the time. And we agreed to that. Then they bought a place and they said, well, it's not as big as we'd hoped, So we're going to have to, you know, share that space and that's not going to work. And some of them, they, it just fell apart. And so now they're. What's the animosity? The animosity is, well, it's really just that we said, well, no, the agreement was this. And they said, well, no, we, we told you that changed.

57:16And we said, no, you didn't. And so it grew from there. And they said, well, we don't want this over our head. So what is your net worth? Well, we have no debt.

57:28Dave Ramsey:What's your net worth? I would say almost$3 million. We have absolutely no debt. We have IRAs. I have an IRA with 1.5, another one with 400. I'll tell you what I would do. I'll tell you what I would do. I would call them up and say, I'm really sorry. I entered into a really stupid idea. The whole thing we started doing was a bad idea because it really was a bad idea. Your agreement was really a bad idea. And I would just tell them that it was a bad idea. And you know what? We're just going to forgive the debt and you don't have to let us stay there. We won't ever stay there. We'll stay in a hotel when we come visit or we'll get a condo when we come visit.

58:11Dave Ramsey:We've got plenty of money. The money doesn't matter. We don't need a place to stay. You don't need to live in somebody's basement when you have$3 million. Yeah. Bad idea. Yeah, we know now. So just let them off the hook, dude. That was a screwed up mess. Yeah, it sounds to me like they're paying you back out of spite because of the way that everything went down. They didn't like you that you argued with them about where the kitchen was. I think you've got to be the parents here. Right. And I know your feelings are hurt, and I'm not – this is not about Dave and I taking a position. No, hold on.

58:44Dave Ramsey:But you've got to hear this. I am taking a position. Well, I'm seeing a who's right and who's wrong in their argument. Oh, you are? Yeah. This is a dumb idea. This is a dumb idea. I never mind. I was going to add something. It's out of$3 million,$117 ,000, forget it. Just walk away. It was a dumb idea. Be the parent is what I'm getting at here. And just take the high road and let them off the hook and solve this thing. You know what? I'm sorry. I didn't think about how screwed up this was going to be. It's only$100 ,000. Screw it. You can have it. I'll just get an apartment. I'll get a condo. when I come to Colorado or I won't.

59:17Dave Ramsey:Don't worry about it. It's okay. Forget it. I shouldn't have – because you should not have asked for this to be the deal. Yeah. It's a bad idea. Did I mention that? You did, clearly. I thought you covered it from every angle. What is it you were going to add before I so rudely interrupted you? I did. That he needs to take the high road here. Okay. And my point was saying who did what and all that is irrelevant. You, as the parents, realize you did a dumb thing and put them in a tough position because when they change your mind, you got your feelings hurt. I think you got to go, you know what? Let's just let this thing go away and be the bigger person here so that Christmas and Thanksgiving isn't awkward.

59:59My gosh. I just think I'm looking at how, and I'll brag on my in-laws for a second. They have, for years and years and years, Stacy and I have been married 27 years, they have always taken a position where they never, ever wanted us to feel pressure about anything. And I just really admire that. And I didn't plan to say that, but I'm telling you as an experience, that's how we want to be.

1:00:21Dave Ramsey:You mean you're going to their house for Christmas? You mean you're going to their house for Thanksgiving? That didn't come up, huh? Okay. That's good. No, because they've always said you guys do what is best for your family. That's right. Yeah, and they didn't keep score either. I'm telling you, it's a thing. It is. Yeah, Sharon and I, we made a decision early on. When in doubt, go over there. Right. Yeah. Go to the other one. When in doubt, it's okay. It's okay. We're going to see you. Yeah, that's exactly right. It's going to work out. Yeah. But this is only$100 ,000, Alan. And really, you guys, you cheaped out when you thought you were getting a place to stay for three months a year for$100 ,000.

1:00:59Dave Ramsey:And you shouldn't have done that. It was a bad idea. Yeah. And you put pressure on something that shouldn't have been there. And good news is you've got plenty of net worth. If it was a big percentage of your world, we might have to discuss how they can pay you back. But I would not allow them to pay you back. Like rent a house down the street and then you've got your own place. Which is even better. You leave the grandkids with them screaming and crying. You go back to your little peaceful place. I think this one's broken. I'm going to hand it back to you. This one's crying. I don't think this one's working right now.

1:01:31Dave Ramsey:I think I'll let you handle it. Can you imagine David sharing in Rachel's basement and you're cooking away down there? You decide it's whatever night and it's stinking the whole basement up. I mean, the whole idea just is crazy of living in your kid's basement for three months. Well, it would be different if you were broke. Right. Yeah. No, this was like a vacation. I know. An empty nester. Hey, we'll come spend three months with you. I'm going to come hang out just because I want to. That's great. Oh, my goodness. Yeah. Boundaries. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, and so the other thing is words matter.

1:02:13Dave Ramsey:Yeah. Okay. A gift is not a gift if it has conditions. Yeah. It is a purchase of ownership in the basement. It's not a gift. A gift has no strings attached. so um but yeah that that's the thing so yeah alan i would just please let just let it go i just let it go just just play frozen on the radio and let it go you know just like just over and over so true that's the answer to so many relationship ills isn't it yeah just let it go

1:03:07guitar solo

1:03:28Thank you.

1:03:44You've worked hard to control your money. You've been budgeting with intention, building a plan, and creating a secure future for your family. But there's one area most people forget to protect, their online data. So I use DeleteMe. Because y 'all, data brokers collect and post personal information like your home address, phone number, and even your kids' school's info. They do it without your permission. And once it's out there, it can be used by scammers, AI spam tools, and other people that you would never want to have access to your life. So think about it. You wouldn't hand that info to a stranger at the grocery store.

1:04:21So why let it sit there online for anyone to find it? Well, Delete Me helps you take control back. Their team of real, live privacy experts finds your exposed info, removes it from sketchy websites, and makes sure that it stays gone. Then they send you a report so that you know exactly what they've taken care of. So protect your peace and the life that you're working so hard to build. Right now, Ramsey listeners get 20 % off at joindeliteme.com slash Ramsey with code Ramsey at checkout. Do it today. That's joindeliteme.com slash Ramsey and code Ramsey.

1:05:25Dave Ramsey:Bethany is in Mississippi. Hi, Bethany. How are you? Hi. Thank you for taking my call. Sure. What's up? My husband inherited an annuity approximately 20 years ago, and it is currently worth about$233 ,000. He is 72. We keep rolling it over into different products because we just can't quite come to grips with taking some of the money out of it and getting a huge tax, you know, implications from it. So I didn't know if there were any ways potentially that we could, if we ever need the money, which currently we don't, we are completely debt-free, and it's a fixed index annuity. And is there ever any way to get the money out of there without being hit on taxes so much?

1:06:21Dave Ramsey:Before you said that, did you say it's a fixed annuity? It is. Oh, gross. I know, but when you inherit it, what are you going to do? Well, you can roll it to a variable annuity without any tax implications. And a variable annuity is a mutual fund inside of an annuity that will give you over double the return you're getting now. Okay. So, yeah, you need to talk to one of our SmartVestor pros and get some help rolling it to a variable annuity. Variable annuity simply is a series of mutual funds that you can select inside of an annuity. And in your situation, that's going to be a far superior product.

1:06:57Dave Ramsey:um the no there's not any way to take no but to answer your other part of your question there's no way i know of to take the money out without paying taxes on it right and so it's a taxable yeah you've not paid taxes on the gains yet and the downs the real negative thing is is you're going to pay ordinary income not capital gains so it's much like um a traditional ira traditional 401k when you get ready to take the money out you pay taxes on it at your income tax rate not at uh not at uh other things so um if you don't need it uh i probably would simply move it to a variable and because i'm like you i don't want to pay those taxes right we just leave it set then kind of forget it yeah set it and forget it and and um uh the problem is when the next generation inherits that it's also going to be in the exact same situation.

1:07:53Dave Ramsey:So somebody someday is going to use this money and pay taxes on it. Okay. That's what I was afraid of. Under current tax law, as I understand it, I don't know of any way you could do it otherwise. And the thing is, it's not like you can, like a traditional 401K or IRA, you could roll that to a, if you were willing to pay the taxes, you could roll it to a Roth, and it would grow from that point tax-free. You don't have that option here. You can't move it to a Roth. So it's not going to grow tax-free once you get it out. It's going to grow with taxes once you get it out. So you're going to get taxed on it, and then the next year when you make money, you're going to get taxed on it again.

1:08:34Dave Ramsey:Yeah, that's what we're facing. Yeah, that's the problem. I think I'm leaving it in a variable and just do a rollover to that. Now, the variable does have three features to it. I'm not a huge fan of it, but for you, it's an excellent situation. It has three features to it that are nice. One is most of the variable annuities nowadays have a guaranteed minimum rate of return, which is probably about equal to your fixed. Okay, so if you put it in mutual funds and they used to make 12, but they only made four, they're going to promise you at least five or whatever the number is. Okay? Okay. And so the other thing is that there's a guaranteed principal with most of them.

1:09:16Dave Ramsey:So if you move$250 ,000 in and you leave it in there five or seven years or whatever the number is, and it's worth$100 ,000, they're going to guarantee you the$250 ,000, the original principal. So you're not going to lose principal, and you're going to get a minimum rate of return. Third thing is it's just like your fixed annuity. You can name a beneficiary on it, and it passes outside of probate. It is not part of your federal income tax or your federal inheritance tax exemption. And so if you've got a net worth north of$20 million and you're starting to deal with inheritance tax problems, then this doesn't come up.

1:09:53Dave Ramsey:It's not a problem. It just goes straight to the beneficiary. It's not got anything to do with the will either. You can't change it with the will. The name to beneficiary is where it's going to go, period. and so select the name of the beneficiary carefully because that's where it's going to go and no probate tax no uh federal or there is probate tax on it possibly but there's no federal exemption usage on that so it's really it's got some nice features to it uh but by and large we don't use them but for you where you are now it's a better version than what you got maria is in hawaii hi maria how are you i'm great thank you what's up um so in 23 thank you for taking my call by the way sure we lost uh our home in the lahana fires and um terrifying um and everybody was okay yeah thank god yes our family was fine we lost friends, which will forever be devastating.

1:10:59Dave Ramsey:Wow. What a horrible thing to go through. Yeah. Even after two years, it's still surreal. Oh, yeah. But we were recovering, and we were very blessed that we bought a place, but we're trying to get back to Lahaina, and we're trying to figure out how financially we can do it without going in crazy debt. We're almost at retire age, and we don't want to spend a million dollars. Well, we don't have it. So with that being said, we have two wonderful children. One's in college, out of state, and one is with us, and he's going to school. But they're a little too comfortable. So I'm trying to put everybody on a budget, and I don't know how to do it.

1:11:51Dave Ramsey:more forcefully than you have been yes i mean what what part of the budget uh is going to the kids or because i don't have a line item budget uh for fun stuff for my kids they they take they take care of that right unless it's a family activity so let's take the college kid what what's going on in that situation we pay for everything no matter what it is or when it is she just started working part-time and um and i do i do take 100 responsibility on this it's our fault we made their life very comfortable yeah it is yeah so the bad news the good news is uh that you woke up the bad news is is it's not going to be pleasant for them that's right yeah no and it already isn't because so The conversation would sound like this if it was at our house.

1:12:46Okay. Hey, I owe you an apology.

1:12:50Dave Ramsey:I let you live in a world that doesn't exist. And I've realized that, and I'm not going to do it anymore. So in the real world, there's these things called limitations. Money is finite. In your world, it's not. And now it's going to be finite starting now. here's how much I have calculated that you need a month to eat and to keep a place to sleep and that's how much I'm going to send you I'm going to pay your rent and I'm going to send you this much for food or you're on the meal plan or you're on whatever and this is how much you're going to get if you want to do anything more than that you're going to need to work and they do no no no no no no no quit making excuses stop that stop that I don't want to hear how great they are.

1:13:39Dave Ramsey:They're not great. They have no limitations on their spending because their mother is an enabler. Stop it. It's not their mother. It's their dad. No, it's you. Okay. I'm kidding. You're fun. I'm messing with you. Okay. You didn't really throw him under the bus. So what I did was. I love him dearly though. Yeah. But the two of you, the two of you have to lock arms and say, we are going to bless our children with a new lesson that money is finite. okay what we're doing now is not good for them even if it's good for you even if you can afford it it's not good for them and when they run out of money at college they'll go to work don't bail them out no my son called me my car's broken they last year day i got a call like you got a personal problem i got a call from my son he says hey dad i'm i got a date and i was very excited that he had a date and then he was like he thought that was gonna get the money for the date and i said you got any money?

1:14:36He goes, no, I don't have any money. I said, well, you're not going on a date. Yeah, you're going to the library. I'm not paying for dates.

1:14:44Dave Ramsey:It's not in my budget. Frisbee in the park date until you get a job, buddy. I don't even think he knows what a frisbee is. Well, cheap. You can get one when you don't have a job.

1:15:23Dave Ramsey:Big news. The Fed just cut rates for the first time all year. 15-year fixed-rate mortgages have dropped to the lowest we've seen in 11 months. 5.71 right now. If you're financially ready, now is a great time to buy or sell. Lower rates could save you thousands over the life of your loan, but you don't need to be on the sidelines waiting on the perfect moment for the dream forever house. Oh, brother, these words we use about housing, it's a house, boys and girls. Get you one when you're ready. Buy an affordable home you love, if possible, when you work with a Ramsey-trusted real estate agent. It is possible.

1:15:58Dave Ramsey:It can happen. These pros are handpicked to guide you through the market and keep your financial goals top of mind. Find a trusted local pro for free at RamseySolutions.com slash agents. Laurel is in Colorado. Hi, Laurel. What's up? Hi. Thank you so much for talking to me. I really appreciate it. Sure. How can we help? Well, I am in a transition period, and I'm trying to figure out what to do for employment going forward. And I was hoping I could get your take. Okay. Tell us about it. All right. So I'm going to go back a little bit in time. In 2019, my husband was diagnosed with an incurable cancer.

1:16:44And the doctors, we went to multiple experts, and they all said he had about a year to live. Thankfully, beyond thankfully, he did great and at about the three and a half year mark the doctors were all totally stunned and said we cannot believe how healthy you are you are doing great we see no evidence of cancer having come back and we left the office feeling like we won the lottery

1:17:11Dave Ramsey:like the lottery of life not the financial lottery Amen, wow what a roller coaster from a one year death sentence to three and a half years of healing Yes, sir. Wow. So, you know, we spent the next couple of months thinking about, you know, what do you do when life has handed you this absolute miracle? And we said, you know what? He's not officially cured until five years. And this is the time to just go do something that is a dream. You know, we were almost debt free at that point. We had good savings. We had jobs that were semi-portable. And so we decided to just spend some of our savings, not knowing how much longer he had, and go live on the road for a couple of years.

1:18:04So we traveled the country. We volunteered in national parks. We helped out in different communities. We worked remotely a little bit. It was absolutely amazing. and by some additional miracle my husband got he got a wonderful job while we were traveling where he makes terrific money and he can do it fully remotely so we've been actually able to instead of pulling money out of our savings to go do this dream for a little while we actually socked away a ton of money while we were traveling what's a what's a ton

1:18:44Dave Ramsey:um about five hundred thousand dollars that's a ton that's good why did you know and we wiped and we wiped out all of our debt so no debt and we almost doubled our net worth so you own a house um well that's actually that's the perfect question because that's where i am right now we just bought a house we decided it was time to settle down again um he was officially declared cured of his cancer, which I could almost cry just saying it. So we are in this amazing place now and we just bought a house that we love. We paid for it with cash because we've been living well below our means and saving money like the Dickens.

1:19:28And we don't have any debt because we made a point of paying off all our debt as fast as possible. I love your show, by the way. So here I am with my husband. He has a great job. He's still making great money.

1:19:42Dave Ramsey:What does he make now? He makes maybe between$250 and$300. And he's fully remote, and you have a paid-for house and no debt. Correct. And how much is your nest egg now? Besides the house, it's about maybe$1.2 million. Okay. So you're sitting on, I don't think you said how much the house is. How much was the house? About$700. Okay. So you got about$2 million net worth. How old are you guys? He's a little older than I am. I'm 49. He's 60. Okay. Okay. Wow. What a great place. I love your story. Thank you, Lord. I can't wait for the question. So what in the world, what kind of question can you have?

1:20:28Dave Ramsey:Yeah, this is crazy. Yeah, I almost feel guilty, like, writing in because I know folks have more serious problems than this. But here's my situation. I put my career on hold for the last couple of years because I really wanted to do this thing where, like, we lived our lives for a couple of years because we didn't know if that's all he had. Yeah. And now that we know we have more time, like, that black cloud is gone. you know we're in this house that we absolutely love it's our expenses are very reasonable you know we we live very modest what's your career leave a ton of money um so i actually have a couple options i'm by trade i'm a lawyer but i'm also a teacher um what do you want to do oh i mean okay so that's you it's like you listen can i tell you something you've been setting this up.

1:21:22And in setting it up to Dave and I, it's almost like you're embarrassed. So stop all that. I am a little embarrassed. Don't be. Don't be. Don't be. You're blessed. So I know you want to do something. What do you want to do? Just say what's at the top of the list. And you can give me number two. Well, give me number one and give me number two. What do you want to do? Say it, Laurel. Okay. So I have three ideas. Give me three. One through three. Quick. Go. What's number one? Okay. So the first one is a job that doesn't pay a lot, but it helps the community because I love doing community work. What is it?

1:21:53Name it. Maybe doing like substitute teaching or doing some kind of community education. Okay, what's number two? Number two. Number two would be, you know what, just dive back in, make a ton of money, make our nest egg huge, and just suck it up for a few years and have a terrific nest egg. So being a lawyer is number two? Maybe, yeah. Okay, all right. Number three. And then number three would be somewhere in between so get a job that's like nine to five it pays well it has benefits but also like i come home my job i don't take my job home with me all right so which one of those three is most exciting number four oh well i already know the answer none of the above number four none of the above

1:22:36Dave Ramsey:what do you mean i want a job that pays 250 000 a year that's remote using your law degree and you guys can pick up stakes and go spend four months in europe if you want to well it's my husband who makes that money no no no no no i was talking about you oh dave gave you a fourth i don't know why you think that if something has meaning and is helpful to the community that it has to not pay anything you totally stumped her i know where she's at uh laurel what is the one definitely stumped me. I know because the thing you want to do with the substitute and all that, there's something there. And I was going to say both and.

1:23:18I don't care which one of it's one, two, three, or four. I'm not disagreeing with Dave either. But you've got to determine what it is you want to do right now. And that can change six months from now. You're in the rare situation that you actually can do that, which is why I'm saying both and. But I believe, I think there's a clear winner in the clubhouse. If you couldn't do any of them, you could only do one. Which one do you choose? Say it. Oh, I would do the one that pays less and gives back to the community. I knew that. I knew that. Do you know why I knew that? Because I've done this a lot and somebody always gives the one that they want to do the most first.

1:23:58It's just basic psychology. So here's the deal. Just go do some of that. Go substitute, go teach, go do whatever. And if six weeks in you go, I scratched that itch and I want to do something else, then do something else. Because you are in the rare situation to be able to do that. You do not have any reason. Do you think I am? I guess maybe that's part of my question. Yeah, you are.

1:24:19Dave Ramsey:You don't have to work. I feel a little scared about, like, do we actually have enough? You have enough. You don't have to work. You do. You don't have to work. And for that reason, I think you can pick your battles and choose what you do and how you do it. That's right. And I think there's a lot of things you could do that were, without getting in a law firm meat grinder, you don't have any reason to do that. But with the education level you have, you've got a lot of options that pays better than substitute teaching at the local elementary school.

1:25:06Dave Ramsey:You work your butt off for your money, but your money's never going to return the favor if 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 SmartVestor program. SmartVestor 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 RamseySolutions.com slash SmartVestor to get connected. Ramsey Solutions is a paid, non-client promoter of participating pros.

1:25:42Learn more at RamseySolutions.com slash SmartVestor.

1:26:03Dave Ramsey:welcome back to the ramsey show in the fair winds credit union studio anna is with us in virginia hi anna how are you hi thank you so much for taking my call i really appreciate your time. Sure. How can we help? I'm 62. I've been divorced for 10 years. I've never been particularly great with money. My ex-husband was better with it than I was. We never saved a ton. We never got into a lot of debt, but we never made a lot of money. So we did the best we could. I was working remotely for a company for the past five years, and I was making really good, I mean, good money for me, I would say$70 ,000, which was more than I'd ever made in my life.

1:26:50But I was let go due to a company losing their contract. That was in June. I just got another job, which I'm very grateful for. So I can hopefully ride that out for the next 10 years to retire. I think I could, I'm in very good health. I think I'd be able to do that for, you know, until at least in my early 70s. What are you making? What are you making in this new job? The new job, about$45 ,000. But I also get, because of my ex-husband's very hard work, I have a pension that I get because he works for the Department of Defense. So I get about$1 ,000 a month. That is only until he passes. So he's in great health and all of that.

1:27:34So that is contingent upon his life. Weird way to get you to pray for your ex-husband now. I know. I love him, though. I pray for him anyway. You probably send him a lot of vitamins. I know. I love it. Like, no, don't go on that trip. Something might happen.

1:27:51Dave Ramsey:Yeah. All right, so$45 ,000 from$70 ,000. I know. And I don't think I probably handled – I think I was so excited about having that money that I probably didn't do as much with it, you know, as I could have. Anyway. Okay, how can we help today? I am. Okay. So I have about$100 ,000 between a Roth IRA and a 401k. I have a house, so I own it. I mean, I'm owning. I have a mortgage on it. I only owe$100 ,000 on it, and my payment is about$750 a month, so I have about a 2.75 % interest rate. I don't have any other debt. But so how can I be last, you know, what do I do? Like tell me what to save, where to put it.

1:28:46I've heard about annuities.

1:28:47Dave Ramsey:No. I don't know really much. No? Okay. So I'm very confused about just give me a plan for the next 10 years to get the most out of what I've got left here. I want you to start investing into your 401k or Roth IRAs 15 % of your income, so$7 ,000 a year. Okay. Okay. And do you have a 401k with a match at the new place? I do, 5%. Good. Okay. So definitely go there. If it's a Roth, make it a Roth if they have Roth available. Okay. Okay. And$7 ,000 a year. And any other money you can squeeze out of the budget, we want to throw at the house until the house is paid off. Okay. So don't, like, I was thinking, do I pull all that money out and pay off my house and then start?

1:29:37No. Oh, no? Okay.

1:29:39Dave Ramsey:And I want to make sure that money is invested in good growth stock mutual funds. Okay. All right. So here's the thing. In seven years when you're 69, the 100 will be 200 if you don't touch it. Okay. In seven more years, it'll be 400. but that would be 76 years old. Okay. That's if you don't add anything to it, and we're adding at least$7 ,000 a month to it. All of this is invested in good, long track record, growth stock mutual funds, Roth everything. Okay. Roth 401k, Roth IRA, sit down with a SmartVestor Pro. Any other money we can find, we throw at the mortgage. When you're 70, I want you to have a good nest egg based on this,$200 ,000 to$300 ,000 and a paid-for house.

1:30:33Okay.

1:30:33Dave Ramsey:That's what we're aiming at at this point. However, I think you're underemployed, don't you, Ken? I absolutely do because your situation is not uncommon for changes to be made. So what were you doing when you were making 70? I was an executive assistant, but I think, honestly, I was overpaid. I don't. No, not at all. I know that sounds really weird. No, I don't think you were. Absolutely not. What are you doing now? Well, so I was an executive assistant for a medical courier company. So now I'm actually a courier for a different company. So it's a lab company that picks up. So you took a step down.

1:31:17Dave Ramsey:position to get a job. I'm glad you got a job. That's step one. I admire that. I think you go back into the executive assistant world. I'm telling you something right now with your experience, and I will tell you, and what's great about the executive assistant world is your age right now is not in any way a deterrent. That is not going to hurt you, and you may be surprised. I know for a fact, I've got a handful of guys I'm thinking of right now, and their executive assistants are making over$100 ,000. Easy. Wow. Now, I'm not dangling that. And they're in their 60s and 70s. That's exactly right.

1:31:52Now, I'm not dangling that out. These are high net worth. These are larger companies. But I'm telling you, you have got some real experience. I'm going to throw another organization at you. I want you to look up Belay, B-E-L-A-Y, okay? And they sponsor a lot of Ramsey events. I know their owners, They're good people. I've known them a long, long time. They do virtual assistants. They do virtual assistants. And so they are connecting people like you on their website to executives and high net worth people who need help. And you can do your job for these people from there. If you're technology savvy with computers and all that, you should go to their website today, tell them that we sent you, and just talk to them.

1:32:35See about that. But Dave is right. You are underemployed. I think you ought to be aiming where you are in retirement. I think you ought to be setting your sights high to try to be making 90 to 120 in an executive assistant role. That's what you ought to be looking for.

1:32:49Dave Ramsey:And I would start at 80 if you had to. That's right. But I think you were underpaid before, and I know you're underpaid now. So maybe not as a courier, but what you have the potential to make. So there's several elements. We're going to take the nest egg and make it work as hard as we can. we're going to add to it systematically 15 percent of your income right now that's about seven thousand a year but if we double it it'll double right okay the third thing is uh we're going to work on paying off the house with any extra money we can squeeze out of the budget and the fourth thing is we're going to get our income up so we make all of these things happen bigger better faster yes i will look into that that delay uh today yeah all of that but all Other companies locally look for remote positions.

1:33:36Dave Ramsey:Yeah, everybody doesn't have to be in your backyard, but you were doing it remote before. But Ken is right. I mean, we've got a bunch of executive assistants inside of Ramsey that make more than that. Yes. So that work here. And so not unusual at all. And not unusual at all for them to be in your age bracket either. so all of that is true and it makes for you know just a fabulous situation for everyone involved

1:34:47Dave Ramsey:We've all done dumb things with money. I've done them with zeros on the end. One of the biggest mistakes I see people make with money is not having a plan for it. You've got to have a plan. You've got to be intentional, and you need to get a budget. You have to tell your money where to go so you're not wondering where it went. Our budgeting app, EveryDollar, helps you do just that. It's the easiest and fastest way to make a monthly plan for every dollar you've got coming in and going out. Now's the best time to get started before the ridiculous holiday spending season gets here and sucks you in because you didn't have a plan.

1:35:20Dave Ramsey:Don't let that happen. You're done making that mistake. Go download every dollar for free in the App Store or Google Play today.

1:35:44Dave Ramsey:Today's question of the day is brought to you by Y-Refi. If your private student loans are in default, it can feel like nobody will work with you. But Why Refi was built for this. They'll help you explore a fresh start. Go to whyrefi.com slash Ramsey. That's the letter Y-R-E-F-Y dot com slash Ramsey. Not available in all states. Today's question comes from Tim in Pennsylvania. Our daughter is 19 years old and failed her first year of college. She applies for jobs but has a bad attitude that I'm sure shows up in interviews. My wife and I are both successful in our fields, are in baby step six, and have one million in retirement funds, so it's not like she hasn't had a good example at home.

1:36:21What little savings she has is dwindling away from eating out and subscribing to useless phone apps. We've recently told her that she will have to start paying$150 rent starting next month. She says we are being unfair because she doesn't have a job, but we explained if we lose our jobs, the bills still have to be paid and no one gets a pass. Are we being too harsh charging a nominal rent, which will go into a college fund, for her if and when she decides to go back. I am sure this isn't a unique problem. This seems like a generational thing, but we want to help her launch into adulthood. Well, a couple of things here.

1:36:56My personal parenting style on this is I'm not going to fund her for anything, zero, until she figures out how hard life is with a really, really bad attitude. I think that's the first thing. I don't mind you charging her rent and putting more pressure on her to act like a young adult. So I don't think you're being too harsh. I feel like you've probably been a little bit too lax on this situation. But the more you can not bail her out, the more that you can just let her fail. Failure is life's best teacher. And it's going to be hard to stand by his parents and watch it. But I think that's what's necessary here.

1:37:35And there's a lot in that we don't know. There's a lot under the surface here. So really hard to fully go at the source of this, but that's my take on this particular specific question.

1:37:47Dave Ramsey:First and foremost, you and your wife have to be in lockstep. No way can you be separated by this child who is misbehaving. Okay. The two of us have to be unified in our approach. Secondly, real love says not what feels good today, but real love says what helps this child be a successful 30-year-old. What steps can I give her now that she doesn't have to cause her to be a successful 30-year-old? I really don't care what her pain is or her whining is in between. and um i really think that one or both of you have been way soft on this kid for a very long time and now you're trying to make up ground and you think 150 is tough i think 1500 is tough 150 is wimpy yeah because that's what she's got to pay if she tries to leave Okay?

1:38:54Dave Ramsey:So I'm going to take a little different position than Ken. Number one, you're lockstep. Number two, every move that you make is an act of love that is going to help her become the 30-year-old that she needs to become. And so her problem is that she's never really had any problems. And so I'm going to help her have some problems. I'm going to usher problems into her life. I'm going to start creating all kinds of problems. You're paying for her cell phone. Not anymore. I'm going to take it up. We're going to sell it. And if you want a cell phone, you're going to have to go get you one. You're paying for her car gas.

1:39:32Dave Ramsey:Well, not anymore. If she wants car gas, she's going to have to go get a job. And you're paying for everything. And you're washing her freaking clothes. And you've got to stop it. This is not on one-year-old. This is a 19-year-old with failure to launch. and uh no tim this is not a generational thing this is a parenting thing every generation has had people that acted like this and every generation has had productive people this is not a generational thing it's not all 19 year olds are not this way we talk to 19 year olds that are millionaires so you know it's just not true it's nothing to do with the generation it's got to do with your kid.

1:40:13Dave Ramsey:And so what I'm going to do is make her life hard, as hard as I can possibly make it, as quick as I can possibly make it. I want her to become highly uncomfortable because the way she's living her life deserves it. And if she keeps living her life this way, she's going to be a 30-year-old that's a complete abject failure trying to figure out why this world didn't give her what she was entitled to, which is nothing. So I'm going to be really kind and strong and gentle, and I'm going to create all kinds of hell for her until she moves out and gets a job. I really want her to leave as fast as she can go.

1:41:01Dave Ramsey:I want her to go get a job as fast as she can go. I want her to be so uncomfortable that she goes and gets a job and goes and gets a life and starts buying her own milk and starts buying her own bread. And suddenly her character will change. It's going to be the most amazing transformation. But you are going to be called every name in the book because you've made it soft for so long and now you're changing the program. And changing the program is going to feel very unfair. Baby doll, I am sorry. I owe you an apology. We have been too soft on you, and you're quickly becoming useless. And we love you too much to allow you to be useless.

1:41:39Dave Ramsey:And I just love you so much. And so I'm going to help you have some problems because I want you to be an unbelievable success when you're 30. And so we're going to create problems for you. And you're not going to like me for a while, but you need to know I love you. And you need to know I'll always make you a plate of food. But I'm going to create some problems for you. See, the eagle, when it builds a nest, it builds a nest out of thorns, long six-inch thorn bush, thorns. And then it fills the nest with down from anything soft, anything it can find, to where when the baby eagle is born, it is born in complete comfort.

1:42:23Dave Ramsey:As the baby eagle grows in stature and begins to stretch out its little wings, the mama eagle removes the down every day a little bit more from the nest. And every day those thorns get more and more pronounced until it's almost impossible to sit in the nest. And the little baby eagle has to get up on the edge of the nest because you can no longer sit in a thorn bush in the bottom of the nest. And then when the baby eagle's up on the side of the nest, you know what it'll do? it'll start flapping its wings and it will fall and then the wings will start working and it will glide and you know the mother eagle holds her breath wondering if this is the first eagle that can't fly but it turns out it's not it turns out this eagle can fly but it never would have left the nest if it was comfortable

1:43:14Dave Ramsey:and an eagle that doesn't leave the nest eventually is known as a turkey and so little turkey needs to leave the nest It's going to be good for a little turkey. Gobble, gobble. I'm so mean and nasty these days. No, you're not. I was following you, and I thought, well, if the eagle becomes a turkey, then the turkey ends up on the Thanksgiving table. Whoa, whoa. You get baked. People eat it. Yeah, that's it. The world will eat you alive. I was tracking that way. I was trying to get eaten alive. Yeah. You know, we don't serve eagle. That's what I'm getting at. Eagle's not on turkey. You don't see eagles on the Thanksgiving table.

1:43:51Huh. That's very interesting.

1:43:53Dave Ramsey:I know. That's a good point. I hadn't thought about that. I was cracking with you. I was really paying attention. My redneck buddies, they don't go eagle hunting. They go turkey hunting, though. No. That's right. We admire eagles. We eat turkeys. There's a bumper sticker. No, I think it's a great point. And by the way, that was a very good description. But I am all for failure. Let the kid fail. Yeah. Please, God. You can't keep bailing them out because, again, at some point, they're going to figure it out. Whatever was going on when she failed college was going on when she was in high school and was going on when she was in the sixth grade.

1:44:29Dave Ramsey:That's right. This isn't a first time this has come up. Her little attitude is going to get adjusted out there. Right. Well, I don't think she's ever had to finish dealing with failure. She never had to finish the results of her attitude sucking. That's it. That's right. because that's 100 % of the time a bad attitude will cause you to have a bad life, period. And that didn't start at college, and that didn't start when she was living in the basement rent-free. And$150 doesn't fix that either. That's true. It's not stiff enough.

1:45:33Hey, what's up? Dr. John Deloney here. The new dates have dropped for the Money in Marriage getaway over Valentine's Day weekend in 2026. This is your chance to hit pause on everything in your life and reconnect with your spouse over a long weekend in Nashville, Tennessee. Me and my friend Rachel Cruz will be digging into topics like sex, money, communication, and more. This weekend is happening on February 12th through the 14th. An early bird price to start at$749 per couple, but the prices will be going up soon. Get your tickets today at RamseySolutions.com slash events.

1:46:23Dave Ramsey:Jake is in Texas. Hi, Jake. How are you? I'm better than I deserve, Dave. Good. How can we help? So, me and the wife are about six weeks from selling one of our businesses, and we're going to end up with about$1.1 million in our pocket when we're done. Plus, we get to keep the real estate. So we've got a little bit of a mortgage left and we've got some debt on another business. We're just kind of not sure to take this money and go to the market or to go ahead and get 100 % debt free across the board and then go to the market. We're just not sure. Well, you knew what I would say, didn't you? Well, I knew what I wanted to hear.

1:47:16Dave Ramsey:I just sometimes you just need to hear.

1:47:21Dave Ramsey:I mean, if you answer the call better than I deserve, you already know what I'm going to say, dude. The one point million, have you paid one point one? Congratulations, by the way. It's wonderful to grow a business and have a liquidity moment like that. That's incredible. Very well done. You're a millionaire. That's just so cool. So proud of you. Have you paid your taxes out of the 1.1 yet? That is our net. So I've already calculated all of the fees. Okay, you're going to have that clear of taxation. Correct. Good. Okay, and how much do you owe on the business and owe on your home? The business that we're selling is debt-free.

1:47:59Dave Ramsey:No, no, no, no, the one you wanted to pay off. So we have three auto loans that are about$100 ,000 combined, and then we have some equipment loans, two pieces of equipment that are about$100 ,000 combined. And how much do you owe on your home? We owe$155 ,000 on our home. Okay, so$355 ,000 makes you 100 % debt-free. That's correct. The real estate from the deal you sold is already debt-free. Correct. We will get about$3 ,500 triple net lease on that property. You don't have a payment in the whole world if you write$355 ,000 worth of checks. That's it. Okay. It's a no-brainer, man. I'm debt-free.

1:48:51Dave Ramsey:And, you know, that's going to leave you$700 ,000, you know, to do some investing with. Oh, darn. Yeah. Well, thank you for helping us get here, Dave. You've truly been a blessing to me and my wife. and we never thought we would be at the spot. What kind of business was it that you saw? It was an oil and gas manufacturing company that we started at less than 12 months ago. Whoa! Wow. Yeah. Now the American dream is dead, they tell us. Yeah. The system is rigged. Little man can't get ahead, and you did, didn't you? 12 months. Yeah, man. Dead gum. That's incredible. That's a great story. Very well done, Jay.

1:49:30And by the way, a manufacturing company. You don't see any fancy, glitzy brochures and commercials for that.

1:49:38Dave Ramsey:I didn't hear the word digital. No. I didn't hear it. I heard a building left behind on triple net. Yeah, man. Way to go, Jake. Dude, that's incredible. Explain that to me real quick, the triple net. Triple net is typically done with warehouses or a situation like he's doing, one of the two. And triple net means that the landlord pays for nothing. So if I'm the tenant and I have triple net, I pay my utilities, I pay the insurance on the building, and I pay the property taxes on the building, and I pay anything associated with the building. Wow. So when I write a check to the landlord, it is net, net, net.

1:50:14Dave Ramsey:Wow. All of it. 100 % of that$3 ,500. His operating income after expenses is the same as his gross revenue. Wow. Yeah, so it's like clipping coupons. It's a very nice, sweet little commercial real estate deal. I love a triple net lease. A landlord's got almost no responsibilities. If there's something breaks on the building, oh, repairs, maintenance, you have to fix it. Roof leaks, you've got to fix it. Dumb question here because I'm just now learning about this. What makes that possible in a situation like that? What are the factors that would allow someone to get that kind of a deal? Well, typically it is a single-use building.

1:50:55Dave Ramsey:Right. Okay. Or at least the area that it's encapsulated because you couldn't pay – you couldn't do repairs like on the other end of the building for the other tenant if you're the tenant. So typically a single-use building. Again, a lot of times it's a very simple building like a warehouse, something like that. I don't know of any retail that does triple net. I don't know of any – very few offices do triple net, that kind of thing. Most of those have common area maintenance cam in them, those kinds of things, other ways of covering the expenses. uh but the um but that standalone single-use building the other thing would be if you did like a build to suit like if you built a walgreens if i built a walgreens and walgreens was the tenant walgreens is probably those are probably triple net leases i don't know if they are but they probably are i do know walgreens doesn't own their buildings that they they have local investors build them and then they um they they pay the rent and um and i think they pay all the expenses so this is sweet deal he sells the the company that the building is in but keeps the He still owns the real estate and has a low maintenance or low hassle check coming in, very low hassle.

1:52:03Dave Ramsey:Does that tell us that they were so thrilled to get the actual business that they were willing to play ball? Probably, but it probably is a single-use manufacturing warehouse-type building. Gotcha. Probably a typical way to structure that also. But I don't think he – I mean, I think – but, yeah, they wanted to stay in the building. They had an ongoing concern and a good place to keep going. Yeah, absolutely. Good, good, good. Robertson, Florida. Hey, Robert, how are you? I'm better than I deserve. How are you all doing? Same, sir. How can we help? Well, me and my wife, we are in a good situation.

1:52:37Very blessed. We have some – our two children are late in high school, about to retire. So we're about to be – or about to graduate, sorry. So we're about to be empty nesters. Good. We're looking to buy a second home. We live in Florida. a lot of vacation up in Colorado in the mountains when it's nice and cool in the summer when it's hotter than heck in Florida and we are at a position where we're able to pay cash for that house the thing is I've done many of the steps I like to think that we are well into number 7 but I

1:53:11Dave Ramsey:still have 6 then you're not in 7 the current home that I have As I'm struggling, we do have a mortgage. How much do you owe on your current mortgage?

1:53:28$954 ,950.

1:53:30Dave Ramsey:Okay. And how much cash do you have available to do the mortgage payoff and buy the Colorado house? We currently have about$6.65 million. Available? Available, correct. and we're going to use about 3.5 for the cash on the Colorado house. The issue is, or what I'm struggling with. What's the house in Florida worth? About 4.3. Okay, what's your total net worth? Just over$15 million, and that would not include the value of my business if I were to sell my business. That's just in real estate, cash stocks. Way to go, Robert. personal assets. Okay. Well, you know the story. I pay cash for everything.

1:54:20Dave Ramsey:And in 34 years of doing this show, I've never talked anybody into paying off their house that they called me back mad. Well, that's the struggle. I guess I didn't get to that in 2020. Rates were low. I refinanced to a 15-year 2.25. But knowing that my$10 ,000 a month is only at 2.25 on that particular mortgage, I make well more than that. Hey, Robert, you didn't get rich borrowing on your house. You got rich being smart. That's a struggle. I see that. No, you didn't get rich leveraging your house. 2.25. You didn't get rich leveraging your house. It's not where your wealth came from. Your wealth came from being smart.

1:55:05Yeah.

1:55:06Dave Ramsey:And so you're mystifying yourself with a little bit of mathematics and you're leaving out risk. So if I were you, I would write a check today and I would be debt free. And I would buy a house in Colorado for cash and I would be debt free. And I'd be sitting in my two wonderful properties, enjoying life with$15 million net worth and not a payment in the world. And not trying to noodle around how I'm making 52 cents on the spread on this mortgage. It's just you're burning a lot of calories here over nothing. Truthfully, I'd pay that thing off so fast, it'd be unbelievable. and if you hate it and I'm wrong, you can go get you another mortgage.

1:56:10you Thank you.

1:56:42Dave Ramsey:all generations. You establish the earth and it endures. Thomas Jefferson said, in matters of style, swim with the current. In matters of principle, stand like a rock. Ooh, very good. It's my all-time favorite Jefferson quote, actually. Very, very good. If you died tomorrow, how would your family keep the lights on, pay the mortgage, and afford groceries? If anyone in your life depends on your income, you need life insurance. But how do you choose? Well, term life insurance is the best way to do this. It's the least expensive, and you avoid getting ripped off with bad investment plans inside of whole life or permanent life.

1:57:19Dave Ramsey:You only need life insurance while someone depends on you financially. So if you're like most people, you need a policy that's 10 to 12 times your annual income for a term length of 15 to 20 years. And it should be a level policy, means the premium stays the same. If you want to learn more about this, use our free term life insurance guide. go to RamseySolutions.com slash Term Life Guide, or click the link in the description, and we'll help you out. Sam's in Pittsburgh. Hey, Sam, how are you? Doing well, thank you. How are you? Better than I deserve. How can I help? My husband and I are trying to make a decision regarding my career where I would be transitioning from a public school position to a private school position that is very appealing in every way except financially.

1:58:12My income would be reduced by one-third if we made this decision, and we are currently on baby step two.

1:58:22Dave Ramsey:Is this, you're a teacher? I am transitioning from a service provider to a school counseling position. Is the reason for the move just desire to be in a better environment, or is it really, really bad where you are? It is currently the desire to be in another environment with what seems to be writing on the wall where it's going to get really bad in what my current role is. How long before it gets really bad? Weeks, months at most, but definitely this school year I see being very tumultuous with some of the administrative decisions that have been made. Is it real wear and tear schedule-wise, or is it just something you disagree with?

1:59:13I'm going somewhere with this, so why I'm digging. What are those decisions going to cause for you specifically? I am worried about ramifications to my professional reputation based on decisions that are out of my hands because it is my role to provide the service. But I didn't get to decide, be a part of these decisions and the way it was changed. But I'm the face of the service to the family. And I do have that concern, especially as someone who, you know, I have at least 20 years until retirement. I have a long road to go, and my reputation matters, and it affects my job and my liability.

1:59:56Dave Ramsey:Now, what do you do? You're a school counselor? Is that what you're saying? Yes. Well, my current role is very closely related to school counseling, but I'm finishing my school counseling certification right now with the hopes of transitioning into school counseling anyway. And this position has opened up that does not require me to be finished with my certification. What do you make? But I'll be able to finish it. What do you make? I currently make$74 ,000. And you'd make like$50 ,000. I would make$50 ,000. When is that? Yeah, the$74 ,000 also, I'll be making increased salary on the teacher steps because I do have a teacher contract.

2:00:41And eventually the classes I take will also bump me up some of my salary. All right. So when do you anticipate you're going to be done with Baby Step 2? if you were to stay where you are? That is a fantastic question. We have tried to plot it out where by May, which is also towards the end of the school year, and when I would be finishing my certification.

2:01:06Dave Ramsey:So it doesn't affect baby step two. I'm sorry. Oh, you make it by the end of May if you do the job change. You make it by the end of May. I'm sorry. If she stays where she is, they get it done in May. If you don't stay where you are, when do you get it done? That's our question. I just learned the salary this morning. I hate to keep interrupting. I apologize. But I'm having these thoughts. So are you planning to stay to the end of the school year regardless? This position, I would be transitioning in October. Oh, immediately. Okay. So instead of May, it's going to be September or October of next year before you're debt-free.

2:01:49All right. And then another quick follow-up on what you told us. If you take this cut and go to a private school, how long or if ever will it take for you to get back to the 70 that you're making now? I don't know if it would ever happen because it's based on fundraising initiatives and things like that, how they can increase salaries. I just don't – I haven't heard enough. I just haven't heard enough, and I may be not understanding how it affects your reputation. but I would hate for you to take this job right now. Private schools are always going to be there. Those positions are going to be there.

2:02:24A third pay cut while you're in the middle of Baby Step 2. I've advised people before to do it if it had some extreme situations to it. I don't see it, Dave. Do you feel something different? I'd almost stick it out is my point. And get done with the school year and knock out Baby Step 2 and then look at it. But if it's going to harm your reputation.

2:02:46Dave Ramsey:I mean, it sounds like there's an ethics breach. Yeah, that's what I know. I can't figure it out. Yeah, but what they're asking her to do is against her moral code. Is that what we're hearing? Yes. Yes, I see some writing on the wall where there's going to be rather large ramifications, and I actually worry about the long-term position security. Okay. All right, well, then I always want you to do what's right. Let me just say that. I didn't quite pick up on that it's that serious. But if that's serious. I don't want to stay where there's an ethics problem or I'm asked to be engaged in something I ethically can't do.

2:03:25Dave Ramsey:I can't stay. But I also don't want to create that in my mind if the other is just more comfortable. And I don't think I'm hearing that, but I'll just warn you against that. Okay. Okay. It's like, I really want to go over there because it's my people and I'm more comfortable there. And so I'm going to blow the drama up over here in my head. I have the ability to do that. So I have to guard against that, Sam. I'm not saying you're doing that. I'm just saying I can do that. So guard against that. Thank you. If you're going to take it, the other thing, yes, I'm going to take it. But I'm also going to look for ways to supplement my income utilizing my career field.

2:04:11Dave Ramsey:Yeah. Is there independent tutoring or independent counseling you can do with your certification that's legal or independent help you can provide a student that parents can pay for on the side akin to a teacher doing tutoring? Those kinds of things. There probably is. Yeah. And I'm going to look for some kind of side hustle that's in the field that supplements and almost gets me back up there. And it's probably going to mean some extra hours, but that's the tradeoff for getting away from the slime and getting into a good area. I agree. That's the strategic question, Sam. How do I replace the one third that I'm giving up?

2:04:55That's the goal. That's the goal.

2:04:58Dave Ramsey:Yeah. And so, you know, it just blows my mind that people can get paid$40 or$50 an hour for math tutoring. Now, that's not your field. Okay. But they are our reading help, helping people with remedial reading as side tutoring. The money that can be made doing that. I even know one guy who's coaching high school and middle schoolers independently in his backyard with basketball skills. He played D1 basketball. Sure. And his side hustle is doing that. Yeah. And he's, you know, a personal trainer for up-and-coming basketballers, and he's making 50 bucks an hour doing it. It's, you know, so that's the kind of thing I'm always looking for in this situation.

2:05:44Dave Ramsey:Good question. I hope it works well for you. That puts us out of the Ramsey Show in the books. We'll be back with you before you know it. In the meantime, remember, there's ultimately only one way to financial peace, and that's to walk daily with the Prince of Peace, Christ Jesus.

2:06:06Thank you.