Big Debt Requires Bigger Discipline

8:20George Kamel:Well, lesson learned here is if it steals your piece, it's too expensive. That's it.

8:26Dave Ramsey:There's the one-liner. $150 ,000. Just drop the old Instagram quote right there. Boom. I'd tweet it, but I don't think those exist anymore. Nobody. Nobody. There's only one person tweeting. He owns it. Yeah. It's not even. Yeah, that's true. That's true. Can't remember who owns it. Doesn't matter anymore. This is The Ramsey Show.

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10:31Dave Ramsey:Denise is with us in New York City. Hi, Denise. How are you?

10:36George Kamel:I'm doing good. How are you?

10:38Dave Ramsey:Better than I deserve. How can we help?

10:42George Kamel:So I'm entering grad school, and I'm looking at$200 ,000 worth of student debt. I haven't started yet. I just wanted to maybe pick your brain on, like, a plan on how to tackle it, like some guidance that you can give me.

11:06Dave Ramsey:Wow. So you're fairly new to this program, aren't you?

11:12George Kamel:I think, yeah, sort of.

11:15Dave Ramsey:Yeah, okay. because if you weren't, you would know that I'm going to break your heart and tell you not to do this. That's the way you get out of the$200 ,000 worth of debts. Don't get in it. But let's talk about it. I don't want to just be a dream killer. I'd rather kill only nightmares, which is what you're signing up for. What are you studying, pray tell?

11:40George Kamel:So I'm entering into interior design. It's the top program in New York City at Pratt Institute. And a year, it's about$60 ,000. It's$57 ,000 to$60 ,000, and it's roughly about a three-year program.

11:59Dave Ramsey:And you'll have a – I'm not familiar with Pratt. I'm sorry. I'm ignorant. But you're telling me that's a university, and you will have a master's degree in interior design from that university? yes this is not a an industry certified certification of some kind it's a simple it's a true master's degree in academic sense yes okay all right and um you have your undergraduate in what i have it in english okay all right and um you're planning on becoming a world-class interior designer that makes more money than doctors and lawyers in order to pay this kind of money back, right? I'm sorry?

12:49George Kamel:Yes, I would hope, yeah.

12:51Dave Ramsey:Yeah, that would be the only reason that you would spend$200 ,000 unless you're an idiot, right? You'd have to have some thought that you were going to make a lot of money, right?

13:00George Kamel:Yes.

13:03Dave Ramsey:I assume you think you're going to make a lot of money. Maybe I'm making an assumption. Is that wrong? Do you think you're going to make a lot of money or you just think this is worth it for the art?

13:12George Kamel:I know that I will.

13:14Dave Ramsey:I don't, but because I know a lot of people that graduated from there that didn't. I know a lot of people that have master, I have MDs that don't make a lot of money. I know a lot of people that are lawyers that are broke and they went$200 ,000 in debt knowing they were going to make a lot of money. So your best laid plans of mice and men are a problem for you English majors.

13:38George Kamel:have you looked into all of the options for a grad program for interior design I did this is the only one that I actually have a job at the same time and you know pay it off while I'm going so what are you getting paid at the job at the same time I'm getting paid roughly 69 to 72 a year.

14:03Dave Ramsey:Okay. Alright. Since I'm ignorant of the space, and I admittedly am, okay, I'm assuming that this must be an exclusive school that is very highly regarded. A, it's in New York City. B, it's ridiculously freaking expensive. Yes. Okay. So I'm assuming this thing, like, you know, you're getting a degree in the Harvard of interior design. Is that what you're telling me? Yeah. Yeah, okay. Because I would hope you wouldn't spend that otherwise for this because a normal interior designer working anywhere else in the United States other than maybe London, Paris, Tokyo, or New York City are not going to make wages enough to recoup on this kind of an expenditure.

14:49Dave Ramsey:Do you understand? Of course. Yeah, because, I mean, like we had professional interior designers that we paid a lot of money and we built this, you know, 600 ,000 square feet of commercial space we have under here. And they did not make enough to justify that kind of expense to pick the furniture that these kind people are sitting in out here. So that's not how it works out here. You know, we're working for an architectural firm in Dallas, Texas or Nashville or Chicago. You're going to be in New York working for extremely high clients. And so you're asking to join the NFL. You're asking to join the NBA.

15:24Dave Ramsey:you're going to have to be the best of the best to justify this. And if you were my daughter, I would tell you not to do this. Right. I'm not sure I would do it if you had the$200 ,000 in your pocket. But I'm positive I'm not going to talk you out of it. But what I do want to do is I want to leave you with some doubts. And I want you to rethink this and be sure, because 100 % of the time our plans don't work out exactly the way we thought they would. Sometimes they work out better. sometimes they work out worse. But when you take on a$200 ,000 loan from an exclusive anything that you expect to be in the top 1 % or 2 % in the world of income earners as a result to justify the expense, that is a low probability play.

16:13Dave Ramsey:It's like saying I'm going to move to Los Angeles and wait tables until I become Tom Cruise. It does happen, but it's a low probability play. And so I would tell you, don't spend$200 ,000 to become an actor and go wait tables in L.A. until you get your star found. And so this is a hard – this is a – you know, there's not a whole bunch of people coming out of that school that are making a half million dollars a year, kiddo. And you're going to have to make that to justify this expenditure and to pay it back. And I wish you would rethink how what it is that is asking you what it is inside of you that you're trying to scratch, what it is you're trying to scratch, what it is you're wanting to be when you grow up, so to speak.

17:01Dave Ramsey:And is there another way to go do this?

17:05George Kamel:I'm looking at just some research online and there's tons of options out there. And there's a lot of people even saying, hey, this is the most expensive school possible for this field. And so maybe the best, though. And it might be.

17:18Dave Ramsey:It may be the Harvard of the world.

17:19George Kamel:And there might be some networking there that gets you in the door, and there's some pieces of that. But I still don't think it's worth four times the cost when you can do that on your own and get the degree cheaper elsewhere.

17:29Dave Ramsey:Yeah. I mean, I know interior designers around the nation that make, you know, three, four, and own interior design companies that make half a million dollars a year. Some of them make more if they've got a company running, you know, that kind of a thing. but they also learn business skills in the process, and they're not doing that based on where they went to school. They're obviously very good at their craft, but they've also learned to apply it in a way. So it's very, very scary when you think you've got a guaranteed. Anytime someone says, if I go get this degree at this place, I've got a guarantee, I'm 100 % sure they're wrong because it doesn't.

18:07Dave Ramsey:It doesn't work out that way. I'll give you an example. We know after doing all the student loan research, this aside from denise's situation but um that people that say where i go to school matters the if i go to such and such a school it has a good name that's going to get me a job and we know from the research is that's completely false that that when you go to the oncologist and they say you have cancer you don't really ask where they went to school you want to know do you know how to fix cancer that's all you want to know and literally what where you went to school may or may not tell you that it's, are you a good doctor?

18:47Dave Ramsey:You know, I haven't, I don't know where my dentist went to school and he paid a lot of money to become a dentist, but where he went to school did not achieve me as a client. You know, where you go to school matters as little as anything on the planet. 99.99 % of the time. Here's another thing. Okay. If you go to a good school, you get the big jobs, bull crap, 78 % of the Fortune 500, of the top S &P 500, 78%, 8 out of 10 of the CEOs operating the largest companies in America went to state schools. They did not go to MIT. They did not go to Princeton. They did not go to Harvard. 78 % operating Home Depot, operating name brands that you hear that are on the stock market, the biggest companies in America, did not go to prestigious schools.

19:41Dave Ramsey:They went to state schools. So I call BS every time somebody starts this crap with me. And I don't know enough about her space to be mean about it, but I do want her to rethink it. There's definitely other options out there.

19:52George Kamel:She's got to do some homework, do some research, and slow down.

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21:11Dave Ramsey:The Ramsey Show Question of the Day is brought to you by Y-Refi. If you're ready to stop drowning in private student loan debt, Y-Refi throws your rope. Talk to Y-Refi to see if refinancing your defaulted private student loan with a low fixed rate is an option for you. If it is, it's going to help you get out of debt a lot faster. Visit Y-Refi.com slash Ramsey. That's the letter Y-R-E-F-Y dot com slash Ramsey. might not be in all states. Today's question comes from Chris in Florida.

21:41George Kamel:He says, you used to be hardline against crypto, but in the last couple of months, you've said that if you want to spend your fun money on crypto, go ahead, but it's speculation. Have you softened your stance on crypto? What would it take for you to see crypto as legitimate as any other currency, as legitimate?

21:58Dave Ramsey:Dave, have you gone soft on us? Well, let's start with the basics, okay? There is no currency, regardless of how legitimate that is a valid investment. You should not buy the Chinese yen as an investment because your golfing buddy said it was a good idea or some idiot on TikTok. You should not buy the U.S. dollar or the euro and speculate on currency values. That's what Bitcoin is. If it's having a good day, that's what Bitcoin is. Okay? It is not a place to invest. If you want to speculate in commodities like gold or silver or wheat futures or whatever future, that's what currency is. You're speculating.

22:50Dave Ramsey:You're gambling. Then that's up to you. But don't call it an investment and know I haven't gone soft. Anyone who does that, I think, is wasting money. Speculating in commodities, I do zero of. Gambling in Las Vegas, I do zero of. My daughter Rachel, on the other hand, has been known to be at the craps table in Vegas. But she thinks that's fun. I don't think this is fun. I don't understand it. I don't think it's fun. I've got a buddy of mine put, you know, he put$10 ,000 and he's worth about 40 billion or something. I don't know what he's worth a bazillion dollars. And he put like$10 ,000 into crypto just so he could make fun of me because he knew he'd get a rise out of me.

23:32Dave Ramsey:And I'm like, you're an idiot. You just put$10 ,000 on red and spun the wheel.

23:37George Kamel:But he got the joy of getting a rise out of you.

23:39Dave Ramsey:So it was worth 10 grand to him apparently. Yeah. I just, he wanted me to call him an idiot. And I did. So he goes, I got more money than you. I know you do, but you're still an idiot. You just wasted$10 ,000. Yeah, David called you and needed it for free. You don't need to drop 10 grand. I would have done it for talking about it, but you don't even have to really lose the money to do it. But if that brings you joy and you want to speculate, you want to gamble with some of your money, a small portion of it, then do it. But that doesn't change the fact that I don't think it's smart. So I don't know.

24:10George Kamel:That's always been your stance. I think as it comes up more, we always go, hey, we're not mad at it. We're not going to yell at you for doing it. But realize what you're doing is speculating and don't make it a big portion of your world or your net worth or your investment strategy.

24:22Dave Ramsey:The problem comes in when you substitute the word invest. That tells me you put a large portion of your life into this and you're getting ready to screw up your whole freaking life because you're an idiot. That's where your problem comes in. OK, so no, I haven't softened on that at all. Now, what was it take for me to call Bitcoin a legitimate currency? It needs a longer track record that is stable. Okay, let's go to an example. Okay, I have some money on my shelf that a friend of mine, the Special Forces brought back to me that has the picture of Saddam Hussein on it. It was Iraqi money in the former regime that we went in and took out.

25:06Dave Ramsey:Special Forces guy cleans out a room. There's a bunch of stacks of money that's basically worthless colored paper now, right? Because that regime is gone. Now there's a whole new government in Iraq, right? There is a currency in Iraq today. I don't even know what it's called. The chances of me telling you to put money in an unstable, new, unproven currency in Iraq is zero because you're putting money in an unpredictable environment that has no track record. That's dumb. That's Bitcoin. okay it's only bitcoin is cool well it just has better marketing it's the hype has really worked well it's cool and it's what we talk about on tiktok i don't talk about iraqi dinar on tiktok right or whatever it's called that's what the old one was called they probably call the new you're right it's still that okay so um anyway yeah it's the the the non-saddam hussein iraqi dinar right and so i've got some confederate money that from the states of the south during the Civil War.

26:07Dave Ramsey:Worthless. Okay? So if a new country pops up somewhere and they have a new currency, it's the same thing as Bitcoin. It doesn't make it cool because it doesn't make it more stable or more palatable or a better investment because it's technology-based and because you think people can spell blockchain and actually describe what a blockchain is, which is an interesting concept. But until it stabilizes, and it ain't stable, boys and girls, it's like riding the worst roller coaster that went off the rails at six flags the one that's on the news where you were left hanging upside down six flags that one right you know and your mother's throwing up and all that right that's that's the one we're talking about here this is not good for some people that's fun apparently though i know use a little fun money on that's right so i'm gonna put a little my money on this but you know chart the volatility of bitcoin and And then smile at me with a serious face and tell me this is a solid investment.

27:06Dave Ramsey:And I'll tell you, you're smoking crack. Okay? Because it's not. It's all over the freaking. So when it stabilizes, I think it will. I think it's here to stay. And I think it'll be a legitimate form of transferring goods and services. Okay? At some point. I think it's here to stay. I think it's not a bad concept. It's not an investment for sure. and it's not a stable currency for sure. So, you know, no, I haven't got soft on it at all. I've actually gotten better at trashing it.

27:39George Kamel:I mean, the longer it's been around, and I feel like your stance since the beginning has been this way. So I don't think you've changed your stance. Yeah, when I had the same stance

27:50Dave Ramsey:when people were putting their money in Beanie Babies too. I actually had people call this show back in the day that had put their kids' college money in Beanie Babies.

27:59George Kamel:How do you, like they just took the money, bought Beanie Babies. Well, Beanie Babies were quite the rage. And thinking, well, it'll go up in value and I'll sell it.

28:06Dave Ramsey:You couldn't get the Princess Di Beanie Baby. Oh, that's right. And it's on eBay right now for$10 ,000. But it's never sold for$10 ,000. But it's listed for$10 ,000. My dog came through the house the other day with one of them in its mouth. But none of them ever produced any value. So it was a fad. It was a thing. Everybody got wild about it. Cabbage Patch Kids, whatever you want to go to next, Xboxes, whatever you're going to line up. It's Pokemon cards now. What are you people going to line up at Walmart for next year at Christmas, right? And so that's what we're dealing with. That's the thing.

28:39George Kamel:You're hoping the next person is willing to pay more than I paid. That's not an investment.

28:43Dave Ramsey:That's a commodity. That's a commodity. And the commodities go up or down based on shortage or oversupply. And shortage or oversupply is caused by greed or fear. So what you're doing is you have too many people chasing too few goods, drives the price up. Basic supply-demand curve from seventh grade econ. And so, you know, if you have a lot of supply and not enough people chasing it, price goes down. It's called a glut in the market, right? It's too available. Nobody cares anymore. There's no scarcity. When the Beanie Babies were going through the roof and people were paying$1 ,000 for a princess die, buying it off each other, on the bet that it was going to go on up is because they actually thought it was going to go on up.

29:24Dave Ramsey:It was shortage and scarcity. Toilet paper during COVID. Remember that? Yeah.

29:29George Kamel:People were selling that stuff on eBay.

29:30Dave Ramsey:Plexiglass. Don't you remember the time you wish you were in the plexiglass business? That was the business to invest in. Man. I wish I was in the mask business and the plexiglass business at one point. Oh, and hand sanitizer. Oh, yeah. That was the other one. They were making it out of like vodka.

29:43George Kamel:They were just anything you could make hand sanitizer out of. You could sell a jug of that thing.

29:47Dave Ramsey:Yeah, that's hillbillies are drinking it. I'm just saying.

29:50George Kamel:The hillbillies made out good. selling their bathtub hand sanitizer.

29:54Dave Ramsey:No, we have not gone soft on it. We've, you know, what we're trying to do, honestly, is we're trying to teach you to talk about it differently so you realize what it is. To quit saying it's an investment, start calling it speculation. And if you're going to speculate on anything, it needs to be with fund money because that means you're gambling. If you're day trading in stocks, what's the percentage of people make money in day trading in stocks? Very few. A few percentage points. Like two?

30:20George Kamel:Yeah. I think over 100 days, only 3 % actually come out. Profitable. Profitable. 97 % lose money if they keep up for 100 days or more.

30:29Dave Ramsey:That's actual research, not TikTok. Okay. So, I mean, if you're getting your financial advice from TikTok, you got a problem. This is The Ramsey Show.

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32:38Dave Ramsey:Lelaina is with us in Denver. Hi, Lelaina. How are you? I don't have to push the button. There it is. I'm a little off. What's up, Lelaina? How can we help?

32:48George Kamel:First off, I want to thank you. I started FPU back in 2011, and it's been a game changer. With that, I've had some fluctuations. Right now, I'm looking to relocate to Denver. I'm in California right now, and it's coming down to the wire, and I feel like everything is not necessarily falling apart, but it's definitely a storm coming in. I am looking to buy a house, but now I'm teetering on whether I should just rent in this new state for a while. I got my pre-approval. I do have some debt that I've incurred over the past couple of years from divorce. And now the transmission is going on my car and it's 10 grand and I need to get another car.

33:35George Kamel:And that will affect, oh, I'm guessing it will affect my pre-approval of my loan since I'm kind of running on a tight budget as it is.

33:44Dave Ramsey:You're talking about you're going into debt to get another car.

33:48George Kamel:What's that?

33:48Dave Ramsey:You mean you're going into debt to get another car?

33:51George Kamel:Well, I have some debt from my divorce.

33:54Dave Ramsey:No, I said it won't affect your pre-approval unless you go into debt to get a car.

34:00George Kamel:Right. So how I calculated it, if I traded my car now, blah, blah, blah, I would end up with like around a$5 ,000 to$7 ,000 personal loan or an auto loan of some sort.

34:11Dave Ramsey:Yes, that will affect your preapproval. Yeah, your preapproval is based on your current debt level, and your preapproval is no longer preapproved. So you are screwing that up. How much money do you have right now? But if you don't need to be buying a house anyway because you're in debt.

34:25George Kamel:Well, okay, so here's the thing. I'm selling my current house, so that will give me the cash that I need to move forward.

34:32Dave Ramsey:What does move forward mean?

34:34George Kamel:mean well i will have the money to pay off my debt and then also put down on the house okay and pay for the moving expenses and all that kind of stuff so i've had the cash when is the is the house sold um no it's going to be listed here in a couple days so i feel like my little whirlwind is whirlwinding and then okay let me stop i want to make sure i'm

34:59Dave Ramsey:I want to make sure I've got the logistics of what you're doing. You're moving from where to where?

35:06George Kamel:Moving from California to Colorado.

35:08Dave Ramsey:To Denver. Okay. And the house in California is getting ready to be listed.

35:15George Kamel:Right.

35:15Dave Ramsey:And you're pre-approved, not counting your new car loan, to move to Denver. But you're not going to need a new car loan because your house is going to be sold.

35:25George Kamel:Right. But I do need a new car like in the next couple weeks. Not a new new car, but a different car.

35:32Dave Ramsey:And you have no money?

35:35George Kamel:Well, the only money that I have is the money that I was going to move with.

35:40Dave Ramsey:Okay, you're going to move and buy a second house before your house in California sold?

35:45George Kamel:Well, it's kind of like that, you know, you sell your house and then you put the down and then the contingencies and blah, blah, blah. That kind of thing. thing.

35:55Dave Ramsey:No, that's not how it works. There's no blah, blah, blah. That doesn't work that way. So what happens is you sell the house in California and you have the money in your hand and then you blah, blah, blah and buy a house.

36:08George Kamel:And then where do I stay in the meantime? You rent. My two children.

36:11Dave Ramsey:You rent.

36:11George Kamel:So renting. So then that's the answer that I need. Renting is probably the way that I need to go.

36:16Dave Ramsey:It's the only way you can do it. Otherwise, you're going to end up with two house payments. You can't close on the new house until your sales. And until you close on the new house you don't have a place to live right so just kind of stay in your house it sells can you wait to move um i don't really have anywhere in between to stay like i can i mean can you stay in california you got a new job or something in denver no i this is kind of my

36:46George Kamel:opportunity to get out of california i've been wanting to do it for quite some time that you misunderstood.

36:51Dave Ramsey:Okay, are you working in California right now?

36:54George Kamel:No. You quit. I work from home, technically. Oh, you work from home. I homeschool, and I teach homeschool classes. Okay, so you have

37:00Dave Ramsey:a job in California. Why don't you just stay there until your house sells?

37:05George Kamel:And stay where? In the house you live in, kid. That I'm selling?

37:10Dave Ramsey:Yeah, it's not sold yet. Why don't you live there until it sells?

37:17George Kamel:Oh, yeah. So that's like my month. I have like a months. We don't know. You're on the market for a week or seven weeks, nine weeks, ten weeks. We don't know. But you live in there until the house closes and you have to leave. And at that point,

37:31Dave Ramsey:you'll have money in your hand, you will be debt free, and you will purchase a home in Denver.

37:36George Kamel:And then, so I will be having to rent for a couple months.

37:39Dave Ramsey:No, honey. Somewhere. You're going to stay in California, in the house you live in, until it sells. When it sells, you will leave with a check in your hand and move to Denver, having bought a house in Denver. But you don't need to go buy a house until your house sells.

38:02George Kamel:See, I guess I'm kind of gray on that whole transition, because if I sell here and have to move out, and I don't have another place on the other end.

38:09Dave Ramsey:Okay, let's pretend you get a contract on it tomorrow, okay? The contract's going to say that the people have to get a loan, and it's going to take about 30 days. You run over to Denver, and you put a house under contract, then contingent upon your house closing. George sold his house the other day. It closes on the 16th. His new home that he and Whitney are moving into closes on the 18th. And we have occupancy in the contract. And they're going to move from one house to the other. he put his house on the market but did not sell it out from under himself and he didn't close on the other one until he had this one done.

38:47George Kamel:Right, the contingencies.

38:50Dave Ramsey:Yeah, the contingency would be on the one you're purchasing, but it'll be a very short one.

38:56George Kamel:Right, and really fast.

38:58Dave Ramsey:Because you're always going to have a contract on your house. It's only contingent upon not your house selling but it closing because you've already sold it at the point we're discussing here.

39:08George Kamel:Right, until I get that money.

39:10Dave Ramsey:So if you get a contract today that says you're going to close one month from today, run over at Denver, buy a house contingent upon the closing of your house one month plus a day from today. So you close on the house in California. A day later, you close on the house in Denver and you move. But not until then.

39:30George Kamel:And a good agent will walk you through this. They'll make sure this is all in the contract and explains it all. And so I don't know if you have one yet, but you need one to help explain all this simply so that you're not making any mistakes.

39:41Dave Ramsey:There is no whirlwind here and there is no blah, blah, blah here. It's just lining up the dominoes and understanding how they fall. And you stay put until you get this house sold because it might take you three or four months to sell it. And you don't need to be in Denver renting and have a house payment in California hoping it sells. You're going to become a motivated seller. And you're going to end up giving the house in California away because you freaked out and took off before you were ready to go. So sit tight until your house sells. When it sells, run over at Denver and find something or run over there and rent something for six months.

40:15Dave Ramsey:I don't care. But you don't need to do either one until your house sells. And, yes, you've got to be debt-free before you buy in Denver from the sale of your current home.

40:24George Kamel:So the only whirlwind is this car situation, and you said you have money set aside for moving. Well, we'll take that money out later from the home sale. Right now, you need that money to get you a used car in cash.

40:33Dave Ramsey:In cash. And or fix the transmission a cheaper way than$10 ,000. I just put a transmission in one of our vehicles here at the office, and it was$7 ,000. But I didn't buy a new one. I had a rebuilt one done. And they quoted me$14 ,000 for a new one. And nice car.

40:49George Kamel:You talked them down?

40:50Dave Ramsey:No. I didn't buy a new one. I had a rebuilt. It was almost half. 50 % off. I'll take it. Almost, yeah.

40:56George Kamel:Yeah. Well, get connected with an agent. Jump on to RamseySolutions.com slash AgentLalena, and we can get you connected with a Ramsey trusted pro who knows what they're doing, who will help make your home a blessing, not a burden, and help you get some calm in your life and walk you through the right next steps. That's what you need right now.

41:13Dave Ramsey:Yeah, this is the old cart before the house thing. When you buy another home before your home has sold, you turn yourself into a motivated seller and you're going to cost yourself tens of thousands of dollars in panicked price reduction to get the other payment off your back. Listen, people, don't do this. You move deliberately and you put the dominoes in order. Until you push the first domino, we don't push the second one. Otherwise, you end up with a set of two payments and a highly motivated, panicked, freaked out situation. And it's not a good place. You know, you have no negotiating power.

41:49Dave Ramsey:And you start taking the worst offers because you're desperate. No negotiating power. Yeah. Yeah, I have a property on the market right now that is debt-free. And it'd be nice if it sold, but I don't care if it sells. You're not desperate. It's the opposite. It's the opposite. So I really don't care when it sells. You want to buy this real estate from a place of strength. I really don't care when it sells. Yeah. I just care what it gets. That's all I care. This is The Ramsey Show.

42:29George Kamel:Hey, George Camel here. Listen, we need to talk specifically about Mama Bear legal forms. Allow me to paint you a picture. You plan a vacation. You make a budget. You book the Airbnb. You build a spreadsheet of activities because you're that person. You fire up the Maps app and boom, trip of a lifetime. So here's the question. If you plan that carefully for a one-week getaway, why are you just winging it when it comes to your will? Not having a will in place is like dropping your family off at a foreign airport with no map, no translator, and no clue what happens next. So when you pass away, sure, your family will be grieving, but they're also overwhelmed, stuck in court, and letting the government decide what happens to everything you worked so hard for.

43:06George Kamel:All because you didn't leave clear instructions. So the good news is, you can fix this in 20 minutes with Mama Bear legal forms. I used them for my own will, and it was fast, simple, and gave me and my family peace of mind. There's no stuffy lawyer's office, no drama, just a few clicks, and your family's protected. Listen, a will is too important to ignore. It's how you love your people well, even after you've yeed your last haw, as we say in the South. So go to mamabearlegalforms.com and handle this tonight. Use the promo code RAMSEY and you'll save 20%. That's mamabearlegalforms.com, promo code RAMSEY.

43:54Dave Ramsey:Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create actual amazing relationships. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host. George Camel is my co-host today. He's a Ramsey personality, number one bestselling author, and the co-host of Smart Money Happy Hour and the George Camel Show. Two big hits on the Ramsey Networks. Be sure and check them out. Phone number here is 888-825-5225. Gina is with us in Chicago. Hi, Gina. How are you?

44:30George Kamel:Hi, I'm okay.

44:32Dave Ramsey:How can we help today?

44:33George Kamel:I'm so nervous. I'm sorry.

44:35Dave Ramsey:It's okay. We've never lost a patient. You're going to make it.

44:39George Kamel:So I'm a nurse. I made a bunch of emotional decisions with my money along with dealing with mental illness between myself and my husband. During COVID, I was making more money than ever during nursing. We ended up buying a home off of emotional decisions to help keep my stepson in district. um we were having disputes about his mother moving him an hour over an hour away um so we ended up moving in his district to help keep him you know in his school um so we were well over our heads with the with the payments um everything came to a head emotionally um dealing with mental illness between me and my husband we ended up um selling our house and paying off our debts um and moving into an apartment wow um sounds like y 'all been through hell yeah and so it was a two-bedroom apartment with three kids and two dogs um we ended up um buying a small home uh again

46:01George Kamel:and I'm just kind of lost as to what to do next. I owe$318 on my house and$30 ,000 on a car loan that was upside down to begin with. And what do you make? I just took on a different position to get a more stable income. and to get benefits with my job and to work night shift to get an extra differential to make more money. So I have two jobs currently, and it'll be about 1.30.

46:45Dave Ramsey:What's your husband make?

46:48George Kamel:So currently he is staying at home with the kids until school starts again, and then we're hopefully going to get, he's going to get a part-time job.

47:00Dave Ramsey:How many kids do you have?

47:02George Kamel:Two of my own and a stepson, so three.

47:05Dave Ramsey:How old are they?

47:07George Kamel:Nine, ten, and fifteen.

47:09Dave Ramsey:Okay, all right. What does your husband do for a living?

47:15George Kamel:He's a carpenter.

47:17Dave Ramsey:Okay, he can make enough to hire somebody to take care of the kids.

47:21George Kamel:I know he ended up losing his really good job due to mental illness

47:32Dave Ramsey:well you keep bringing up mental illness who's struggling with mental illness

47:36George Kamel:both of us really

47:39Dave Ramsey:in what way in what way what kind of mental illness

47:45George Kamel:bipolar

47:46Dave Ramsey:both of you have been diagnosed bipolar Yeah. Or you've just been reading the Internet about it?

47:53George Kamel:No, officially diagnosed. He had an episode that basically where he ended up leaving.

48:07Dave Ramsey:He went manic and got fired?

48:11George Kamel:Pretty much.

48:11Dave Ramsey:Yeah. Okay. If he's bipolar, that's a real possibility if that's really happening. Okay. And he's not on meds. Are you guys not doing your meds? How are you working so much if you're bipolar?

48:21George Kamel:We're all on meds now. We've dealt with that situation.

48:27Dave Ramsey:Okay, so now he goes and gets a job again then.

48:30George Kamel:That's preferably when, yeah. And why is it part-time when he goes back? I mean, we just, I'm afraid of falling into the same situation before. where it's just...

48:46Dave Ramsey:The job didn't cause that episode. The lack of treatment to the bipolar with meds and seeing the therapist caused the episode. Working was not the problem.

48:58George Kamel:It was a little bit of both, though. I mean, between both of us working long hours, we both worked 12-hour shifts. And then it was like we had somebody else raising our children.

49:12Dave Ramsey:That's different than what you're talking about, though. I didn't suggest 12-hour shifts. I just said get a job. Yeah. That's different than 12-hour shifts. I'm not suggesting exhausting yourself. You've got to get rid of the$30 ,000 car payment, and you've just got to get where you can breathe again. Okay?

49:29George Kamel:The thing about the$30 ,000 car payment, I've been, okay, so I don't know if we have no money to buy another car.

49:38Dave Ramsey:Yeah. Well, you don't have any money to buy another car because you keep doing dumb car deals. Yeah. And you're drowning. What, do you have a$900 car payment?

49:48George Kamel:We refinance and it's 570, 545. Oh, for eight years.

49:53Dave Ramsey:Okay. That's hopeful. Not. Okay. So here's the thing. What you guys have got to do is we have to put the things that are in the past in the past and learn from them. and so what we learn from this conversation is when we make emotional financial decisions, you brought that up four times, we make bad ones. Correct. Okay. So what we have to do is we have to put together cold and calculated logical decisions called wisdom and execute on those gradually and steadily while gradually and steadily working and making money. And the gradual, steady income, not 12 hours a day, not 18 hours a day, but the gradual, steady income cleans up the mess and puts the mess of the past behind you.

50:50George Kamel:Yeah, I mean, that was half the problem is that I had a job. I basically took, during COVID, a job.

50:58Dave Ramsey:Yeah, you probably were killing it, but you're also killing you work hours-wise.

51:03George Kamel:Yeah, but it was non-benefited to get the extra hourly pay.

51:07Dave Ramsey:I don't care what the non-benefited is if you're making$250K as a nurse, okay? And we had travel nurses during COVID making that. So I don't give a crap if you've got benefits or not, if you're making a quarter million dollars a year. So that's behind us, though. There's not COVID right now. We don't have a problem with that. Today, you're a nurse. You're very employable. You get to pick and choose what you do. You've picked because you wanted some benefits. Good. probably needs some benefits to keep both of your all's medications going properly. Agreed? Correct. And so I think that was a wise move.

51:37Dave Ramsey:But let's steadily, carefully, not based on the past, but based on the lessons of the past. The lessons of the past are when he's off his meds and he goes off on his boss because he's manic, he gets fired. Well, duh, that happens to anybody that's bipolar. Okay? That doesn't make him a bad guy, but that doesn't mean it's a pattern that has to be repeated either. What was the key thing there? He was off his meds. And so you do your meds, you do the proper staging on that, and if you get that dialed in in the bipolar world, you can be very, very functional. We know that. Dr. John Deloney has taught us that, and we've watched it in financial coaching for years because bipolar really does struggle with money issues.

52:19Dave Ramsey:Because when you go manic, you make emotional financial decisions. That's your definition of it. And there are always bad ones.

52:42Dave Ramsey:Statistics show that half of Americans don't have enough life insurance, or they don't have any at all. I don't understand this, John. Why don't people want to take care of their family? They think they're going to die or something? Well, I used to be one of those guys.

52:56George Kamel:I didn't even think about it. And one of my buddies said, hey, the only reason to not have life insurance is if you hate your wife and kids. And I immediately went and got term life insurance. That's a gut punch. And you're telling me for decades, Dave, I've sat across people who've lost a spouse. They've lost somebody important to them.

53:12Dave Ramsey:Me too. They don't know what to do next. Me too. I mean, you're going to have a crisis here. And, you know, you got two options while you're sitting and talking to a young widow. She's concerned about how she's going to invest all this money properly and not mess this up. or she's concerned how she's going to eat tomorrow. That's exactly right. These are the two options. And take care of your dadgum family, man.

53:31George Kamel:Term life insurance can replace income, pay off debts, cover funeral expenses, so your family can actually have the opportunity to just be sad, to just miss you.

53:39Dave Ramsey:That's exactly what it's supposed to be. It's saying I love you to your family. Term life insurance. Jeff Zander and the team at Zander Insurance makes it easy and affordable. I've used them personally for 25 years. They're the only people I trust. Go to Xander.com or call 800-356-4282.

54:15Dave Ramsey:Mike's in Charleston, South Carolina. Hey, Mike, what's up?

54:18George Kamel:Hey, how you doing, Dave? Thanks for taking my call. Sure.

54:21Dave Ramsey:How can we help?

54:22George Kamel:I kind of got a pension question.

54:24Dave Ramsey:Okay. My company offers a pension of, say,$3 ,200 a month.

54:34George Kamel:And the survivorship for my wife would be$2 ,400 a month. And no question, she outlives me. I'm 58.

54:45Dave Ramsey:I'm death-free. Is she plotting your death, or do we know?

54:49George Kamel:No, but you know what? But she knows she's going to outlive me. Okay.

54:57Dave Ramsey:Sharon keeps telling me this, and I just ask her why she's so sure, but that's what bothers me, so I'm just saying. All right, anyway. Sleep with one eye open. Okay, so$3 ,200 and$2 ,400 or lump sum of how much? Half a million. Lump sum. Yep. Take the lump sum, roll it to an IRA in good growth stock mutual funds. Now, let me tell you, there's two reasons why. And you'll find this out as you crunch the numbers, and I'm going to ask you to go do a formal answer with a good financial person. I'm going to teach you how to do that, okay? But here's the basics. Your pension calculations, by law, by regulation, have to be conservative to keep the pension from going broke.

55:41Dave Ramsey:And by law, they're typically right now right around 7 % rate of return. And so they calculated what your$3 ,200 is worth based on a 7 % rate of return. If you're in good mutual funds, you can earn$11 or$12 on average. That's what the stock market's averaged since it began,$11.8. Okay? And so, A, you would make more for yourself today if your money was invested at a higher rate than 7%. B, when both of you die, all jokes aside, this money dies with you. If both of you die and there's a half a million dollars in a mutual fund, it doesn't die with you. It goes to your heirs. Yeah. So you make more while you're alive and a lot more when you're dead.

56:33Dave Ramsey:So you take it. And those are going to be the reasons. So if you made 10 % on$500 ,000, that would be$50 ,000 a year. You follow me? Yep, yep. That's about$4 ,200 a month without touching the$500 ,000.

56:58Okay.

56:59Dave Ramsey:That's better than$3 ,400. Better than$2 ,400. And by the way, that survives both of you. Yeah. Okay.

57:10George Kamel:I can roll that into my 401.

57:12Dave Ramsey:No, no, you can't. It would be a separate. No, I wouldn't do that. I would roll it into an IRA. There's no taxes on it if you do that. And it can sit there and grow tax-free. Now, rather than take a three-minute answer on a podcast, but that's how it works. That's the concept. It's a pretty simple concept. More while you're alive, more when you die. If you take the lump sum, it almost 99 % of the time works out that way because of the way the pension is required to do the calculation by law. It's an unfair thing. They can't really compete against this. And that's why there's very few pensions left anymore because they suck.

57:49Dave Ramsey:And so anyway, go to RamseySolutions.com and click on SmartVestor Pros. There'll be several in your area. I know a couple of them in Charleston, by the way, and they've been with me for years. They don't work for me, but I recommend them as people to sit down with and talk to about this and let them unpack for you the two things we just talked about, that you'll make more with it invested, rolled over into an IRA and good mutual funds. And how old are you guys, by the way?

58:20George Kamel:We're 58.

58:22Dave Ramsey:I'd like to retire at 62. Okay. Well, you've got to be 59 1⁄2 to start pulling on this money. So you've got nothing until 59 1⁄2 because you've got to leave it in there, without penalty anyway, rolling it into an IRA. But I would roll it to an IRA and get with our SmartVestor pros in the area and let them sit down. A good thing about a SmartVestor pro, Mike, is they're going to have the heart of a teacher, and you're going to have them talk to you like I just did, but they're going to give you a lot more time and care than I just did.

58:52George Kamel:Yeah, and I crunched the numbers just for fun, and I guess generously that he's going to live to at least 85. And you're right in that the lump sum wins in every case here. I mean, you look at a 10 % return, he would still have the same withdrawal over that time, same, you know, that he's going to withdraw that million bucks over that 27 years, and still have$1.4 million left over to hand over to his spouse.

59:12Dave Ramsey:So if he only took the$3 ,200 is the number two ran. Yeah,$38 ,000 a year. Okay. Instead of taking all of the – at what rate of return? That's at 10%. At 10%.

59:22George Kamel:And even at 8%, he still has an extra$700 ,000 sitting in that account if he died at 85.

59:28Dave Ramsey:So if you take off your amount, not the survivorship of the wife, but the$3 ,200 is what George ran. Yeah. That's an interesting calculation. So apples to apples on the monthly, only we don't have to reduce it to survive the wife. Yeah. Okay. And then let the money grow, and it'll grow to 1.2.

59:46George Kamel:Yeah, 1.4 at 10%, and about 700 ,000 at 8%. And how old has he got to be for that to happen? 85. So just live to 85 if you can. That'd be great. Yeah, that'll help us work out our math here. Really helps our math. And I do hope he lives even longer than that.

1:00:01Dave Ramsey:Yeah. Well, I don't know what his wife's got planned, but yeah.

1:00:04George Kamel:That's barring any other situation.

1:00:06Dave Ramsey:And by the way, folks, here's the thing. You and George, you know, average death age is 76. Yes, it is, darling. It's 76 for males now and 78 for females now. It's not 85. But when you live to 60, average death age is 90. Okay? So, and he's almost 60. So, the average death age includes infant mortality, teenage car wrecks, and whatever, right? So, but if you statistically want to run actual data on somebody that's my age, 65 years old, I'm healthy. the high probability I make it to 90 in today's world. 76 is not the norm. And based on Dave's sheer willpower, I think we might see 100. I may still be doing the show.

1:00:48Dave Ramsey:I'm just saying I could lose my teeth like somebody did on the Grammys. He'll still be doing radio.

1:00:53George Kamel:Rachel has made that clear. Rachel said she might give you a fake Ramsey show, like a little mock show for you. And make me think I'm doing the show. And make you think you're on air. Once you're senile in your 90s, we'll just go. So the Gen 2 has a plan. Exactly. So just know that.

1:01:06Dave Ramsey:How to put the old man out to pasture and he doesn't even know he's there. You'll never know if it made it to air or not. It might just be for funsies. If the third caller's name is still Bessie, we're talking to the cows. Okay.

1:01:16George Kamel:Producer James is going to schedule a lot of great calls for you. For you to have a good time.

1:01:21Dave Ramsey:I have nothing to do with this.

1:01:22George Kamel:Not James' idea.

1:01:24Dave Ramsey:Leave me out of this. Now, that's a plan only Rachel Cruz could dream up. All right. Let's go to Cherry in Ashland while we still have time. Cherry, what's up?

1:01:34George Kamel:hello mr randy and mr george my question is how can my husband and i go about talking to our boss about um number one getting a raise good okay let's switch the way you do that is you switch

1:01:47Dave Ramsey:well stop just switch shoes if you were the boss how would you want to be talked to about a raise

1:01:56George Kamel:um i've listened to a lot of what ken says and i agree with him that ask you for women you're If you're not talking directly into your phone, that's a bad way to ask for a raise.

1:02:03Dave Ramsey:Hold on. You got your phone off somewhere else. We can't hear you. You can't hear us. Talk directly into it so I can hear you. Number one, if you're the boss.

1:02:12George Kamel:Is this better?

1:02:13Dave Ramsey:Yes, much better. If you're the boss and you own a company, when would you pay someone more? A, if you can't replace them, if they make$50 ,000 and the new person, you've got to pay$70 ,000, that means you're underpaying. what the market is, and you would pay what you could replace them for. That's one time. The second reason you would give someone a raise is if they're adding great value and you want to be a blessing to them because you think they're bringing in more than they cost.

1:02:47George Kamel:Okay. So how would that apply in our particular situation? We are not employed by, like, a corporate business. We are employed by a single individual, like a wealthy person, and we take care of his properties. Same exact thing. We've been paid by him for six years.

1:03:03Dave Ramsey:Same exact thing. Have you saved him a bunch of money taking care of his property by getting good bids on the work that's done? Have you done a good job of managing the property so there's not problems because you're there, you're helpful? Then he wants to bless you by paying you more to keep you around. The guy that runs a lot of our properties and a lot of the maintenance programs on our property makes really dadgum good money. But he's amazing too. Right, George?

1:03:28George Kamel:Yeah, there's a direct connection between the value you're bringing every year and your pay. And if you continue to bring value, continue to show that, you continue to be grateful and humble, the raises will show up.

1:03:39Dave Ramsey:Yeah, you just say, you know, if you want to get someone else to do this job, it's going to cost you more than you're paying us, A. And B, we've made you a lot of money and saved you a lot of money by the way we did these three things. We'd love it if you'd consider paying us some more. What would that sound like? And you just make a good case for that.

1:04:05George Kamel:My full-time job is helping people make smart money decisions. But in my spare time, I'm a grill master. Okay, more of a semi-amateur enthusiast. But you know what makes me get one step closer to pro level? Shopping at Aldi. The other day, I threw some Simply Nature organic chicken on the grill and ended up with a meal so good that even my picky toddler asked for seconds. Aldi has become my first stop for groceries because they've got it all, from USDA choice beef to fresh organic produce, everything you need to pull off a gourmet dinner without busting your grocery budget. So stop paying more and just shop at Aldi, where you'll save with the lowest prices of any national grocery store.

1:04:43George Kamel:Find a store near you at aldi.us. That's A-L-D-I dot U-S. Savings based on regional analysis of Aldi versus select competitors. Prices may vary by location, product availability, and the market.

1:05:20Dave Ramsey:Thanks for being with us, America. When tackling debt or building wealth, people can often forget about the other side. There's the offense and the defense. Good defense makes you wealthy, too, and that's called the right kinds of insurance. Insurance is a tricky deal. Don't we all hate insurance? I pretty much hate insurance. It's like if your son became an insurance agent, you wouldn't be, like, proud. I mean, you know, it's like we just hate insurance. There's just something about it. It feels like we're pissing money away all the time, right? Because sometimes you are. That's why you feel that way.

1:05:51Dave Ramsey:Insurance is not bad, by the way, and I'd be happy if my son was an insurance agent, if he was selling the right kind, because it's a good defense. Because you get the right kind of insurance. I mean, you need life insurance to take care of your kids if you die, right? They need to eat. You need good car insurance. If a car gets wrecked, you've got to take care of that. You need a house and homeowner's insurance, so house burns, you've got to take care of that. But then there's all these ripoff insurances out there, and we get caught up in trying to insure everything where we never have anything go out.

1:06:17Dave Ramsey:Well, that's going to cost you out the ear and the rear. Both. I mean, this is bad. Ears and rears. Ears and rears. That's it. So anyway, what we've come up with is our guys in our protection section at Ramsey Solutions came up with the coverage checkup. Yep, for free. You can get your insurance looked at. You fill it all out for free. We will send you back. You're getting ripped off on this. You're not on this. You're underpaying on this. You're overpaying on this. This is a good deal. Oh, you haven't got enough of this, and we'll give you everything you need to know. So good insurance is worth the money and is part of a good financial plan, even though we all kind of go icky.

1:06:57Dave Ramsey:All right. But bad insurance will get you ripped off and you'll never have any money because all you did is insure everything. And the insurance company got all your money. Right. And so they got big buildings and you got a dinky butt house. That's how that works. Right. So we don't want that either. And the guy calling to renew your auto extended warranty. Oh, gosh. You still get on a car. You don't even own anymore. Yeah. That guy. Yeah, the M2. So go to RamseySolutions.com slash checkup. Take the coverage checkup for free. Click the link in the description if you're listening on YouTube or podcast.

1:07:29Dave Ramsey:This is all free. And, guys, we believe in the right kinds of insurance, and we believe in not letting you get screwed on the other. And we don't care which one you do, except that we like you, and we want you to win. You need the right Goldilocks level of insurance,

1:07:42George Kamel:and this will act as your coach. And it's the same types of insurance that Dave and I have. Just right. Just right. Not too much, not too little.

1:07:48Dave Ramsey:thank you for that. Matthew is in Dallas. Hey, Matthew, what's up in your world?

1:07:55George Kamel:Hey, Dave, how are you doing? Thanks for taking my call. Sure. So I've got some home repairs and some sort of pending medical dental issues that are going to exhaust my emergency fund. And I'm wondering if it makes sense to access some of the equity in my house to help cover that, or maybe even a loan against my 401k?

1:08:16Dave Ramsey:Nope, nope, nope, nope, and nope. Nope, and nope. Nope, and nope. Nope. Don't want a loan on the 401k. Don't want a loan on the house. Let's deal with this. So what I would do is I would break these things into, break the issues down into as many different events as I could. Okay, for instance, if there's five different things that need to be repaired on the home, They don't have all that to be done at once. Let's break them down and put them in order of what we would want to do first, what we do second, what we do third. Same thing with the dental. Is the dental all one thing, or can it be done in two different things?

1:08:53Dave Ramsey:Or what period of time can it wait? What is involved? What is the dental thing, by the way?

1:08:59George Kamel:Well, my wife is at the dentist right now, and I think she's got a bunch of implants she's going to need. They're talking$30 ,000 to get all that done. So happy wife, you know?

1:09:10Dave Ramsey:Yeah, happy dentist. No, I'll tell you what we're going to do there is we're going to get what's known as a second opinion and a third opinion and a fourth opinion.

1:09:23George Kamel:Is she in the chair right now? Oh, she's doing a little bit of work today, but, yeah, she'll come home with sort of the prognosis and let me know what we've got to talk about.

1:09:35Dave Ramsey:Okay. The vast majority of dentists in America do a really good job, and some of them are semi-con artists. Yeah, I understand. So we're going to get a second and a third opinion and figure out what the treatment plan is for implants. Because I'll be honest, I've been doing this show 30 years. The number of times I heard anybody say anything about dentistry that was 30 grand was close to zero. Hmm. it does that just boggles my mind i don't know anything about dentistry okay i take a lot of calls from people there's something about the that and so again i am not mad at dentists i have one i have friends that are dentists a lot of them do a great job we help people that are in dentistry all the time there's it's a good it's a good field uh but you know what we've got to do is it's it's a very emotional thing and you need to you know we need to stage this out.

1:10:29Dave Ramsey:Now, what home repairs have you got?

1:10:31George Kamel:So it's one monolithic repair. It's foundation that's settling on the house, and it's causing damage to the property. And I've had about three different contractors come out, and I've got quotes from$10 ,000 to$31 ,000, and I'm trying to assess all the housing costs. Perfect. Okay. And you have how much in your emergency fund? I've got$3 ,000. I had$15 ,000, but I spent it all on baby step number two.

1:11:01Dave Ramsey:So you're in debt still? I've got about$7 ,000 in credit card debt, yeah. What's your household income?

1:11:10George Kamel:$190 ,000.

1:11:11Dave Ramsey:Okay, and you need$60 ,000 to clear all this? Yes, sir. Max? Yeah. First dental bid and worst foundation bid is 30 and 30. Did I get those numbers right? Yeah. That's 60. You make 190. I think we can work this out this year.

1:11:31George Kamel:Yeah, that's what I was looking at. I was forecasting it about cash flowing this stuff over the next couple of months.

1:11:36Dave Ramsey:Yeah, you may have to stop your 401k. Have you done that yet? No, you haven't.

1:11:39George Kamel:I have. You have? Yeah.

1:11:43Dave Ramsey:When? Yeah.

1:11:44George Kamel:I stopped the 401k probably a month or two ago.

1:11:49Dave Ramsey:Okay. All right. All right.

1:11:51George Kamel:But you're bringing home$11 ,000 or$12 ,000 a month? Yeah. And how much of that can you put away toward all these savings goals?

1:12:01George Kamel:Maybe$5 ,000. So your expenses are$7 ,000 a month just to keep afloat? Yes. Yes, sir. I think we need to look into cutting some of these expenses. Well, I'm paying off debt. I'm getting rid of... You said you had$7 ,000 in credit card debt. Yeah, I've paid that over... Yeah, currently I've paid a lot of it off over the last few months.

1:12:21Dave Ramsey:Yeah, but currently you shouldn't have$7 ,000 a month in expenses, is George's point. So, okay, we're going to tighten the budget. We've got$12 ,000 a month to work with. We need$67 ,000 to be debt-free, dental-free, and foundation-free. And we make$12 ,000. We make$144 ,000 take-home pay. That's a one-year set of goals. we just force rank these decide when we're doing what and we save into them first you clear the seven we figure out what the two stages or three stages are on the on the dental and you get another bit or two on that for real i'm not kidding you and um then you decide maybe it's not the 30 thousand dollar foundation maybe it's the 20 and so maybe it's a 20 and 20 maybe we have a 40 thousand dollar problem and not a 60 thousand dollar problem you can do this you can cash flow this in a year you're not going on vacation by the way and you're not going out to eat every night by the way, and we're unplugging Prime from your little Amazon button, by the way, and whatever else this money is leaking to because you have some serious stuff you've got to put money to.

1:13:23Dave Ramsey:You have to completely focus your cash flows on 7 ,000 plus foundation plus teeth. You get those things out, but you don't go borrow your way out of this mess. That's how you got in the mess in the first place, and you did call us, by the way.

1:13:38George Kamel:Yeah, you called the wrong guys if you're looking to take out a HELOC. I don't know how long you've been listening to the show, but there's other options. And we just showed you, you have an amazing income and you don't have a lot of debt. And so now we can clean this up. You start throwing six, seven grand at this a month. We're done in less than a year. This whole thing clears in a year. But you've been staring at it as one giant pile all at once. And that's very overwhelming.

1:14:00Dave Ramsey:You're not doing both of these things by Friday. And you don't need to, by the way. So get that priority list down,

1:14:06George Kamel:like Dave said, of what needs to be done. When does it need to be done? Let's get bids on all of it and then make the smartest choice from a place of strength and not desperation.

1:14:15Dave Ramsey:And if a contractor needs to go in there and shore up the wall with some temporary stuff so it holds four more months in order to get the job four months from now, oh, I bet he'll do that. Can you tell I've asked for that before? Yeah, I own a lot of real estate, seen a few foundations fall. This is The Ramsey Show.

1:14:45guitar solo

1:15:20Dave Ramsey:Thanks for being with us, America. Landon is in Fort Collins, Colorado. Hi, Landon. What's up?

1:15:27George Kamel:Wow. I thank you guys for taking my call. It's an honor to speak to you guys.

1:15:31Dave Ramsey:Sure. How can we help?

1:15:33George Kamel:Yeah. So my wife and I, we have three boys. I'm at the age of three. I've been a stay-at-home dad for the last three years so my question is should I re-enter the workforce if it means I spend more time away from my family

1:15:48Dave Ramsey:three boys under the age of three yeah we have 19 month old twins and my oldest is three this is so exciting

1:15:59George Kamel:party man

1:16:03Dave Ramsey:party baby

1:16:04George Kamel:what are you going to do with the kids if you go back to work He sure is.

1:16:06Dave Ramsey:You're going to have to put them in, what, daycare or something?

1:16:09George Kamel:Yeah. So I've been watching them full-time during the day while my wife is at work. She's a foster care worker out here in Colorado. She's a what worker?

1:16:17Dave Ramsey:And I've been working foster care. Foster care. Okay, good. Okay. Yes. And what did you do before all of this family explosion?

1:16:26George Kamel:Well, my background is in church ministry as a worship leader, but I also have a lot of restaurant experience. So I've been working in restaurants for the last several years. in the evenings and on the weekends while my wife stays home with the kids.

1:16:40Dave Ramsey:Okay.

1:16:41George Kamel:And what's driving you to want to go back to the workforce? Well, beginning of this year, as you can imagine, with three boys in diapers, it's been a lot on our strain financially. And God just gave me a wake-up call. We got our finances back in order. Got sick and tired of being sick and tired. And so here we are being on budget for going on seven months now.

1:17:04Dave Ramsey:But that's you taking those evening gigs. right? So is that what you mean when you say enter the workforce? You've already done it? Well, I've been working on the weekends and at night. Yeah, but you're talking about going back full time. Okay. So if you go back full time, what are we doing with the kiddos?

1:17:21George Kamel:So that would be, well, the closest family we have is three hours away. So there was talks of us moving closer, but that looks like that plans off the table for now. We also talked about splitting time, watching the kids, my wife doing like a work from home day one day a week or just absorbing the cost of a nanny and getting more serious about finding just jobs that pay more than a nanny would cost. So anything above that would be pure profit. And daycare is not on the table? I don't think so. It's just we've looked at the child care costs out here and it's just insane.

1:17:59Dave Ramsey:Yeah, three little ones. I mean, you can hire a nanny. Yeah. Probably can come out, yeah. Okay, so your question is, I'm trying to figure out what it is you're wanting to do.

1:18:15George Kamel:Well, I want to—well, I'm being considered for a part-time church position right now, but that will be a match of about 20 hours a week. What would that pay? At the very most, it would be about$29 a year. And what does your wife make right now? She makes$65. Okay.

1:18:34Dave Ramsey:So you would change careers is what you're talking about.

1:18:38George Kamel:Well, no, I did that prior to us having kids. And even like while we've had kids, I've been a worship leader.

1:18:45Dave Ramsey:No, no, I mean, okay. You're not talking about a$29 ,000 and that doesn't afford a nanny.

1:18:53George Kamel:Well, no, that's just for$20 a week. It's basically a part-time gig, kind of like what I've been doing. But I'm talking about getting another part-time, if not another full-time position on top of that. because I'm tired of being this broke.

1:19:05Dave Ramsey:Okay. All right. That's where we are. Okay. All right. All right. Well, 100 % of the time that we go to work, we're away from our family. Everyone. Men, women, babies, teenagers at home, 100%. Okay. And so perpetually, ladies that are working outside the home get guilt tripped about not being in the home. Ladies in the home get guilt tripped about not being in the workplace. Men working in the home get guilt tripped, or men being at home with the kids get guilt tripped for not being in the workplace. And I get this call, or you're in the workplace, and you're going, we're farming out our three kids.

1:19:50Dave Ramsey:And so I think the trick is to achieve a balance called parenting. And the balance is that when you're there, you're there. You're not watching Netflix. And that you arrange your schedules in such a way that the amount of time that one of you or the other is not there is minimal. and then if you've done all of that you don't have you are working you are uh earning some money i'm tired of being this broke we are cleaning up the mess um and we're not destroying our children in the process okay so lots of families both parents work in america most families both parents work in america and uh now not every family has as many tinies as you got you got a bunch of tinies you got a circus going on over there man so that you got you're at a prime time for crazy man this is it's wonderful but um our youngest uh granddaughter is getting ready to turn one next week and so you know we've had these littles running around our ankles for the last few years and we're just watching them parent them it's it's a mess and uh i'd forgotten how much dadgum work it is but uh so you know you're a freaking hero been

1:21:11George Kamel:doing what you're doing i admire you well it feels like someday it feels like some days i I forget, too, but I think that's the sleep deprivation talking.

1:21:18Dave Ramsey:Yeah, well, and the fact that you've not had the English language spoken in front of you all day.

1:21:23George Kamel:You're doing great on this call so far. I'm impressed, Landon. So, yeah, I mean. But it's going to be harder for you because you've been around them 24-7. And so it's going to be more difficult for you because this jump is a little bit further.

1:21:35Dave Ramsey:So if I'm you, which is the way, you know, if I understand your question properly, I am going back to work under two conditions. one i make enough to justify the nanny's hours that does need to be there two we figure out how we can adjust all of our hours to where one of us is there a lot of the time where this is not we're not both gone straight up nine to five every day you know what i'm saying and so if she's there a lot of mornings or she's there she works from home on fridays and um and you know So their kids are with a nanny five hours, six hours a day, four days a week, and you guys can accept that for a period of time, and you are making enough money to make that worthwhile, then you've got two things working.

1:22:27Dave Ramsey:You've got a good touch point on the kiddos, and we're not messing up the kiddos, and we don't have to be freaked out about that. Because you're going to get judgment, you know that, from outsiders, but they don't get a vote. You and your wife are the ones figuring this out. So if I know my kids are okay and I haven't just completely nine to five, you know, left them, which is a concern from your point emotionally, and that's a fair one, and I'm making enough to justify the nanny's hours that is there, then I'm doing this. But it may take a while to line up all those stars.

1:23:02George Kamel:And you probably need to go make$65 ,000,$70 ,000 to make this make sense. Yeah, definitely. To have a take-home pay of$4 ,000 to pay a nanny or to even take care. Yeah, absolutely. And that's the other thing I've been kind of with this shift away from being a state-owned dad. I'm wanting to start pursuing a career in the trades, but the hard part about that is just the distance from our local union is like an hour's drive away.

1:23:23Dave Ramsey:There's trades that aren't union. Yeah. I'm just looking at, like, with electrical trades. Lots of electrical trades that aren't union. Yeah. In Fort Collins, freaking Colorado, it's not exactly a union hub.

1:23:40George Kamel:Yeah, the only true thing that's in this area is a private. But, yeah, there's two unions predominantly.

1:23:47Dave Ramsey:Dude, if you want to be an electrician, you can go to work for a guy at Wiring Houses right now and start learning. Yeah. And you can make really good money non-union.

1:23:57George Kamel:Yeah, the hard part is I've seen that it's just low for the first couple of years until you actually get money. Maybe or maybe not.

1:24:03Dave Ramsey:Yeah. Depends on where you are.

1:24:04George Kamel:I think the long-term benefits are worth it. No, not necessarily. It's only my goals to provide more than my wife would.

1:24:09Dave Ramsey:Not necessarily. There are guys that are blessed in union situations. There are guys that are trapped in them, too. It's not apples to apples. So don't let that be your limiting factor. Trades are starving, and they pay well, whatever the trade is, electrical or otherwise. They're starving. They need you, and they pay really well, and they're probably going to be pretty flexible because you probably could start at sunup and be home by 3.30, and that starts to adjust the schedule like we're talking about.

1:25:02Dave Ramsey:You spend hours researching before making a major purchase like a home or car, but it's also a good idea to put in the work searching for the right insurance coverage. To protect your biggest assets, I recommend using Ramsey Trusted Pros. Whether you're looking for car, home, or any other type of insurance, Ramsey Trusted Providers have been coached and vetted to serve you like we would. Find what you need at RamseySolutions.com slash insurance.

1:25:45Dave Ramsey:live from the headquarters of Ramsey solutions. It's the Ramsey show where we help people build wealth, do work that they love and create actual amazing relationships. Thank you for joining us. America, George camel Ramsey personality, number one best-selling author and host of the George Campbell Show on the Ramsey Networks. He's my co-host today. Maya is with us in Switzerland. Hey, Maya, what's up?

1:26:14George Kamel:Hi, guys. Thank you for taking my call.

1:26:16Dave Ramsey:Sure. How can we help?

1:26:18George Kamel:So I started to listen to you all a few months ago, and I think that I am doing everything roughly in the right order, but I'm stumped on the one point about saving for a down payment. And the reason is I live overseas, as you heard, and my parents basically have set me up to inherit two homes. So I'm not feeling like it would make sense to save for a down payment when I stand to inherit homes pretty soon. So I'm focusing on investing instead, but I wanted to check that with you guys. Are they in poor health? My mother passed away actually two, three years ago, and my father is 85. so I'm actually helping him manage all the logistics with respect to the homes.

1:27:02George Kamel:So they're effectively under my management at the moment.

1:27:06Dave Ramsey:Are you going to be in Geneva permanently, or is this a short stay, or what?

1:27:11George Kamel:I've been here for four years. I like it here, but I don't think I'm going to retire here. I'm 30, so just to give you an idea of also where I am. What do you do? I'm curious. I work for a nonprofit.

1:27:22Dave Ramsey:Okay, cool. I've been to Geneva several times and Switzerland is one of my faves. It's just fabulous. So I'm a little bit jealous right now. It's beautiful. It is absolutely beautiful. And the best train system in the world, man. It's unbelievable. Trains run on time. Swiss time, by the way. Yeah, I mean, it's great. Anyway, sidebar. But yeah, I don't blame you for wanting to stay. The point is you're not going to be there permanently. And if you're investing in good mutual funds, there's nothing that keeps you from when you're 40, liquidating the two houses and some of your investments to buy a home that you want someday.

1:27:58Yeah.

1:27:59George Kamel:Yeah, exactly.

1:28:00Dave Ramsey:The likelihood of you living in one of these two homes until you're 80 is probably zero. But selling one of them to buy your home is probably pretty high.

1:28:14George Kamel:One of them is fully paid off. It's worth about$900. The other, we owe about$500 on it still, but it's rented at the moment for more than the mortgage, and so I put all of the rent towards the mortgage.

1:28:26Dave Ramsey:Good.

1:28:27George Kamel:And then there's a third condo that we have to sell for various reasons in the next year, and so I'm expecting to get about$150 from that. To throw at the rental. And I'm planning on putting that towards the mortgage.

1:28:37Dave Ramsey:Yeah?

1:28:38George Kamel:Yeah, I'm planning on putting that there.

1:28:40Dave Ramsey:But let's pretend for just a second, just mathematically, that there's no emotional connection to any of these. You're going to have a million five in real estate pretty soon.

1:28:50George Kamel:Yeah.

1:28:51Dave Ramsey:And if you liquidated that and bought whatever you wanted three years from now, you haven't lost any ground at all. Mm-mm. Or 10 years from now. I don't care. So you're fine. No, you don't have to save for a down payment, quote unquote. But when you put money into an investment, if you decided the name of that investment someday was add to the down payment, you could. You could do that if you wanted to. But it's not messing up your baby steps. You can just invest. That's fine. Are you debt-free?

1:29:19George Kamel:Yeah, I'm totally debt-free. I have about$75K in high-yield savings, and I have about$50K in a Roth and$35K in a brokerage that I add about$3 ,000 to a month.

1:29:30Dave Ramsey:Yeah, I just run this like you were in Baby Step 7. I agree with you.

1:29:35George Kamel:Okay, that's super reassuring. Can I ask a second question since we're all here? Sure. I was basically wanting to know, I'm thinking about changing careers sometime in the next year or so. And, you know, we're generating rental income from the U.S.-based properties. I have solid savings, as you've heard. Is there anything that I need to keep in mind just in terms of keeping myself financially okay if I had to, for example, get another degree and potentially start over in a new line of work?

1:30:04Dave Ramsey:Would you not work during the school? As long as you have the income to support both things, I'm fine. Okay.

1:30:11George Kamel:Like if you took a year off and went to school full-time? Probably. It would probably be a year to two years, or if I decided I really wanted to do a radical switch, I would get a Ph.D., and that would take several years.

1:30:24Dave Ramsey:I probably would do that while working. Okay. If you're at your age, I would go to work for the university and be a T.A. and get your Ph.D. for free.

1:30:36George Kamel:you would say that i should work even if we are netting somewhere between six to seven k on the rentals a month and that's just money for me to take like my father is yeah i don't want you i don't want you sitting around working on a phd doing nothing it's not a full-time job phd is a process we take calls from perpetual students and what it turns out is it's usually a distraction from something else and they're just sort of in school to keep what would you getting your PhD in? I'm actually considering retraining as a psychologist. It's an area of super interest of mine. And again, there's different ways to do that, right?

1:31:13George Kamel:So you would

1:31:13Dave Ramsey:have to get a minimum of a master's in order to get, you don't have to have a PhD, but it's nice to have doctor in front of your name if you're doing that. But yeah. But yeah, again, that's something you can do while doing some other things and build that up. That's just a decision you got to make. But no, I wouldn't take five years off and live off of the rental income and work on a PhD exclusively. No, I think you probably put your hand to the plow a little bit. It'll be good for you in the process. And be sure you do some practicum stuff around that, get around some of the counselors and things that you think you want to do and make sure for you put all this time and effort into it that you do really want to do it.

1:31:53Dave Ramsey:Not just I'm intrigued by it. There's a lot more money and effort than that to get a PhD. So might get a master's and get open my practice and get started and then work on your phd while you're doing that it might actually help your dissertation so um if you're actually we're doing something in the real world might i don't know we'd have to ask deloney he's the one around here that collects phd he's got two of them yeah i know he's got two more than me and you put together yeah that's okay we all have the same job so what does that say i have a phd in dumb it's worked out i graduated so and you graduated from that school debt free minus a few zeros.

1:32:34Dave Ramsey:Maya, I think you got a good plan. You're working smart. Keep it up. Lean into that and think it through. Sidebar for everybody else. George, we don't recommend buying real estate for a home, A, when you're in debt and don't have any savings, and B, we don't want to be perpetual renters for 50 years, but it's okay to not own real estate at certain periods of time. Especially when you're living internationally. As an example, yeah. And so, but you don't want to, you know, you don't want to miss out on the appreciation of the real estate market for 40 years. You don't want to miss out on the savings that you have in the cost of living by not being a renter.

1:33:19Dave Ramsey:Because rent goes up every year, but payments don't. House payments don't.

1:33:22George Kamel:Yeah, if you get a fixed rate loan, that payment's going to stay the same outside of your property taxes and insurance.

1:33:27Dave Ramsey:And then you get it paid off. And then all you've got is property and taxes and insurance. And you know, that it becomes part of your wealth building plan to be an owner in real estate. So we love real estate. We think you ought to buy real estate. We think you ought to be a homeowner. But there are certain times when you take a break and don't do that.

1:33:43George Kamel:Yeah. The military folks, this applies to them a lot. They're moving around every two years. Do not go and buy a home and then just up and leave or worse, rent it out and have a little rental empire across the country you got to deal with.

1:33:53Dave Ramsey:of houses that are in debt that you became a landlord by default on. That would be a nightmare right there.

1:34:33Dave Ramsey:I was sick and tired of being sick and tired. Bankrupt with a toddler and a brand new baby at home. Scared doesn't even begin to cover it. But I got mad enough to change. I started using God's and Grandma's ways of handling money. That journey became the total money makeover. a plan everyday people can use to take control of their money. Millions have changed their lives following the plan in this book and found hope. Start your makeover today at RamseySolutions.com slash store.

1:35:19Dave Ramsey:If you're tired of living paycheck to paycheck and feeling like you can't get ahead, join one of our free every dollar trainings. These are new trainings every week this month, and they're hosted by one of the Ramsey personalities like George. I did one this week. I had a good time. Did you? Was the Q &A good?

1:35:36George Kamel:I can't speak for that part. I'll have to ask the audience to see what they thought of it.

1:35:40Dave Ramsey:No, I mean, did you get good questions? Oh, really good.

1:35:42George Kamel:We actually put them on audio. We say, hey, jump on there. Oh, that's cool. And we get to hear their voice like the Ramsey show.

1:35:47Dave Ramsey:So it's a lot of fun. Okay, that's cool. It's all free. And you go to everydollar.com slash webinar, and we're going to show you how to stick to a budget and find$9 ,000 worth of margin using EveryDollar. That's the average we're seeing with EveryDollar users that do it the way we teach. and we're learning to teach you inside the app how to do it, and we're going to accentuate that app experience with George or Rachel or Jade, and they're going to teach you how to do it. And$9 ,000 worth of margin, is that like a month?

1:36:19George Kamel:That is a total margin created. So that's if you sold stuff, money you freed up every month.

1:36:25Dave Ramsey:Okay, so reorganizing the existing situation to put it towards the baby steps. Exactly. It creates$9 ,000 worth of oomph. Hey, that's pretty cool. Serious. It's called like a head start. That's breathing room right there. Did y 'all ever do head starts when you're like racing as a kid? The little kid gets a head start?

1:36:40George Kamel:That was always me.

1:36:41Dave Ramsey:A$9 ,000 head start. That's pretty cool. I'll take that. I'll take that. Where I come from. I love a head start. Did you get a head start, George?

1:36:48George Kamel:Always.

1:36:49Dave Ramsey:Always. Did you ever win? Occasionally. Sometimes.

1:36:51George Kamel:I'm faster than I look.

1:36:53Dave Ramsey:I think you're probably little gazelle going there. They're little feet, but they're quick. A little gazelle going. I'm just saying.

1:36:58George Kamel:You ever seen a lizard move? It's impressive.

1:37:00Dave Ramsey:That's exactly what I look like running. Just, yeah, I've seen, there's, no, I can't. Okay, Quinn is in Houston. Hey, Quinn.

1:37:08George Kamel:Hey, how are y 'all?

1:37:09Dave Ramsey:Better than we deserve. What's up?

1:37:12George Kamel:Hey, so long story short, my question is kind of, am I the financial abuser in my marriage, or is it actually my husband?

1:37:19Dave Ramsey:Whoa. Okay. Harsh words have been spoken.

1:37:23George Kamel:Yeah.

1:37:24Dave Ramsey:Yes. Okay. Why are you the financial abuser, does he say? Okay.

1:37:31George Kamel:So basically, my husband earns about$140 ,000 a year. He is also applying actively for positions and has a good chance of getting a job that pays like$165 ,000 plus or 25 % bonus every year. So roughly$200 ,000 a year. He's a software engineer, basically. I, on the other hand, I make$50 ,000 a year at my job. And I do get a little bit of child support from my ex, but it's not consistent. I'm also in graduate school. I still have two or three years left. He claims that I'm the financial abuser because he says that I have more money in my bank account. The reason that I have more money in my bank account is because I actually sold my vehicle because it was going to cost more to...

1:38:12George Kamel:Are y 'all married? We are. We have separate bank accounts. It's a whole thing.

1:38:17Dave Ramsey:It is a whole thing. I think we found the problem.

1:38:20George Kamel:Yes. So we basically had separate bank accounts from the time we moved in together. That was his decision. I wanted joint, you know, even before we got married. We were living together when we're engaged, but he insisted on having separate for the time being, and he claimed that, you know, we would look into getting joint.

1:38:37Dave Ramsey:Yeah, but now you're married. How long have you been married

1:38:39George Kamel:now? Yes, two years.

1:38:41Dave Ramsey:Okay. So you're an abuser because you have more in savings?

1:38:47George Kamel:Just more in general. So he claims that he has to use all of his income that he makes. He has about maybe$10 ,000 in savings, and his checks are roughly$7 ,000 a month.

1:38:58Dave Ramsey:So he makes$200 ,000, you make$50 ,000, and he has to pay more of the bills, and that makes you the abuser?

1:39:04George Kamel:Yes. Well, right now he's not making$200 ,000, but he has a potential. I know. He's going from$144 ,000 to$165 ,000 plus a 20 % bonus.

1:39:11Dave Ramsey:I know the story.

1:39:12George Kamel:So you transferred all of your money to his account. Now he's the abuser because he has more than you? No. I didn't transfer my money to his account. It's an example. I'm saying I don't understand how that's abusive to have more money in an account than someone else. I agree. I agree. And he claims that he has to use all of his money basically to pay all the big bills. He went and got a very expensive car payment before we got married. I advised him not to do that. I told him he should get a used vehicle. Okay. All right. Let's stop. Let's stop.

1:39:42Dave Ramsey:The problem is that you guys have done this all wrong. There's no abuse here. It's just stupidity. Yeah. I don't know. That's the only way to say it. No one's getting it. That was harsh, George. I'm sorry. Sell the pony. Oh, my gosh.

1:39:57George Kamel:You guys are like Venmoing each other, going tit for tat and scoreboards, and you had more than me this month. All right.

1:40:02Dave Ramsey:So, okay, number one, this is not abuse by either one of you, and that is not a word you should use about your spouse. Yes. Okay, unless there's some extreme emotional or physical harm being incurred. And there's not anything like that going on here.

1:40:23George Kamel:If he takes all of your paychecks and gives you an allowance, we would call that there's some financial abuse. If he wouldn't let you buy food or something, then that would be abuse.

1:40:31Dave Ramsey:But that's not going on here. This is just an argument because you guys have two separate lives, and you can't decide with your roommate who needs to buy the mustard.

1:40:43George Kamel:Right. Yeah.

1:40:44Dave Ramsey:And so if you cannot sit down in the next few weeks and have adult discussions about having a real marriage, which is a combined income where we change our names, we don't have his income and your income. We have our income. We don't have your savings or my savings or your car or my car or your debt or my debt. We have our problems and our opportunities and our savings and our income. And then you combine everything and you do a combined budget to reach towards the goals that we both believe we want our future to look like, which would include paying off his stupid car or selling it. It would include working a plan to get out of debt and have an emergency savings.

1:41:34Dave Ramsey:It would include having some money set aside to do some fun things with. It would include generosity. That these are decisions as a married couple that we are now making together because you are no longer roommates. If you cannot change your language and the spirit of this discussion to that kind of combination, that the two of us are going to join arms and it's us against the world. and we are going to go win together, then you will need to sit down with a marriage counselor.

1:42:07George Kamel:Right. And we are in marriage counseling now, but he's been actively plotting divorce with his mother, who does not like me. Okay. It's been a whole thing for years. Now we're getting to it.

1:42:17Dave Ramsey:Now we're getting to it.

1:42:18George Kamel:Yeah.

1:42:18Dave Ramsey:Okay. So there's no financial abuse going on. We have marriage problems.

1:42:23George Kamel:Yeah.

1:42:24Dave Ramsey:And we have mother-in-law problems.

1:42:27George Kamel:Oh, yeah. She was determined from day one. and she did not like me. Okay. Did he tell you that she's plotting divorce? He's given me access to his phone. He told me I could go through anything I want because there was a past of porn addiction. So I found emails that were between his mother and he where he was claiming that I am coercively controlling him, that I'm financially abusing him, and she was talking to her about how she's going to pay for his retainer for his lawyer.

1:42:55Dave Ramsey:Okay. If you guys don't have marriage counseling, both of you going to a good counselor to begin to work through this and carving his mother out of the discussion, you're not going to make it.

1:43:08George Kamel:Right.

1:43:09Dave Ramsey:So all of the other stuff doesn't matter then.

1:43:12George Kamel:Right.

1:43:13Dave Ramsey:Yeah.

1:43:14George Kamel:That's kind of where we're at is that he claims that he, because we agreed to go no contact with his mom because of some things she'd been doing.

1:43:21Dave Ramsey:Yeah. And then he violated that. And he's, you know, you guys are not. working together he's work he's developing a plan to leave if that is not truncated he's going to

1:43:31George Kamel:leave right and the only thing that he only does that because he's upset no it's not it's not true

1:43:37Dave Ramsey:he's a child he's being a little boy and he ran to his mommy yes that's what i've been telling him

1:43:44George Kamel:and it makes me feel incredibly isolated and so i'm kind of i don't know if you do not both start

1:43:49Dave Ramsey:going to marriage counseling the net result is you're not going to make it six months

1:43:53George Kamel:Right. We've been doing it on and off. We've got a new one recently. I think she's good.

1:43:58Dave Ramsey:He's not going.

1:44:01George Kamel:Yeah.

1:44:03Dave Ramsey:Listen to me. If you two are not together in a marriage counselor's office soon and regularly, you're not going to make it six months, honey. You don't have a language to talk to each other right now. Right. All this is, every time you look at him, it's a battle. Every time he looks at you, it's a battle. There's nobody working towards something. We're all working away from everything. All of your language has been that since you've been on the phone.

1:44:29George Kamel:Separate accounts do not solve problems. They just conceal them. Joint accounts don't solve problems, but it does expose them. And that's a good thing.

1:44:38Dave Ramsey:Gets to the root of the problem in the marriage. And that's, you know, the whole discussion started out as a separate account discussion. And it turns out that wasn't the problem. It was masking the real problem. The real problem is mother-in-law. Well, that's never happened. If I had a nickel. That's never happened.

1:45:08Dave Ramsey:Why is it that when warm weather hits, people start losing their common sense? They swipe credit cards left and right saying, I need a vacation. I deserve this. but by August, they're stuck cleaning up a mess. Listen to me carefully. You don't need to spend five grand on beach trips and theme park tickets to make family memories. Here's the deal. Instead of having the summer you deserve, have the summer you can afford. That means planning ahead with the Every Dollar Budget app. It helps you track spending and give every single dollar a job. That way, you make sure the essentials are covered and have some fun without making a money mess.

1:45:49Dave Ramsey:Look, you gotta start bossing your money around or else it'll always be the boss of you. Download every dollar today.

1:46:25Dave Ramsey:Taylor's with us in Fresno. Hey, Taylor, what's up?

1:46:29George Kamel:Hi, George. Hi, Dave.

1:46:30Dave Ramsey:Hey, how can we help?

1:46:32George Kamel:So I'm wondering if I should go to Italy while I'm saving for a house and for a car.

1:46:40Dave Ramsey:Sure, as long as you don't want to buy the car or the house as soon.

1:46:44George Kamel:Exactly.

1:46:45Dave Ramsey:Because it's kind of like that math trade-off thing, right? yes italy's cool i mean i want to find out so how much is it going to cost um about seven thousand dollars okay so how long does that delay your goal on a house

1:47:04George Kamel:um i'm planning on saving 200 000 just to get in that 25 of my take-home being my mortgage so probably only by six months okay so you're only saving a thousand trip cost your house purchase six months say that again if you go to italy you buy the house six months later than if you don't go to it yes so what are you gonna do the reason well the reason why i am really questioning it is just because i've been trying to be intentional about like where my money is going and what i'm saving it you are being intentional Then I'm taking the money that I was saving for a house and a car, and now I'm spending it on Italy.

1:47:47George Kamel:That's why you should separate your goals now.

1:47:48Dave Ramsey:But you're intentionally doing it, and you're thinking about it, because we're making you look at what the tradeoff is. And if you can accept the tradeoff, and you still want to go to Italy that bad, then you'll go to Italy. Is it worth seven months? Delay in purchasing a home. Okay. What do you make?

1:48:10George Kamel:I make about 98.

1:48:12Dave Ramsey:How old are you?

1:48:14George Kamel:I'm 37.

1:48:15Dave Ramsey:Who's going with you?

1:48:17George Kamel:It's a good friend and a group.

1:48:20Dave Ramsey:A group. Okay.

1:48:22George Kamel:Yeah, a group.

1:48:23Dave Ramsey:So somebody else pulled the trip together. Correct. And interjected it as an interruption to your plan.

1:48:31George Kamel:Well, I mean. It is. Yeah, it's an opportunity, and I do want to go.

1:48:35Dave Ramsey:No, it's an interruption. It's an interruption. Yeah. And that's okay. See, the thing about intentional is you weigh out the differences. When you're not intentional, you go, woo-hoo, Italy. But damn the question, right? And you didn't do that. Which means you got your freaking act together. I'm proud of you.

1:48:57George Kamel:Well, it's because of you, so thank you.

1:48:59Dave Ramsey:You said, I can do this, but it's going to cost me. Which is like an adult statement rather than a child statement of, I work so hard and I've always dreamed of Italy. Bullcrap. We all work hard and everybody's dreamed of Italy. Shut up.

1:49:13George Kamel:And most people put it on a credit card and worry about it later.

1:49:15Dave Ramsey:You're actually feeling the full cost because you're paying cash for this thing. I'm not sure I would do it because you could go to Italy anytime. They're not moving it. It's still going to be there.

1:49:25George Kamel:Yeah, I think I'd miss out on the opportunity of having like a group to go with. You'd miss out on the opportunity of having this group. Correct.

1:49:33Dave Ramsey:There'll be another group.

1:49:36George Kamel:I've been several times. It's still going to be there. You'll miss out on six months of building equity in that home and appreciation as well.

1:49:41Dave Ramsey:So there's always another side. Either one's okay, but don't act like that this is, oh, God, there's only one chance. No, that's not true. It's not true. To get to go this particular time at this particular moment with this particular group is going to delay you. Not it's my only chance to ever get to go. If I don't go now, they're going to close Italy. They're not. They're still going to be there. Okay, so don't get into that drama mode. Keep yourself above this like you started the conversation, and then you'll make a good decision. I'm okay if you delay it as long as you do it on purpose and you've weighed out the problem, and you did it without a fatalistic thing like they're closing Italy.

1:50:20Dave Ramsey:They're not.

1:50:23George Kamel:I'm currently keeping my savings in a CD. Do you recommend that? Because before I just had it in a regular savings account.

1:50:31Dave Ramsey:That's fine. I would keep it high yield. High-yield savings probably make as much or more than a CD with no penalties for pulling it, so I'd probably look at that. But, yeah. Is that what you do, Jordan?

1:50:40George Kamel:Yeah. I just do high-yield savings. How long is this home goal savings plan? Is this two years, seven years? I, at the end of this year, I'll have$100 ,000, and I can save$36 ,000 a year, so I would think it would take me three more years. Okay, here's the thing. You said you were saving$36 ,000 a year? Yeah. So that means that this Italy trip is not costing you six months. That's true. Like two months. Well, if you're saving three grand a month, it's about a two-month delay. Yes. So now I can stomach this a little more when I actually put the facts around it and go, okay, it's going to take me two months to save up.

1:51:16Dave Ramsey:I missed out on the$100 ,000 until now. That's also very impressive. So I think you need to go.

1:51:24George Kamel:Yeah. So honestly, I have all this money saved. Yeah, I think I would go. I'm planning, honestly, because of you, Dave, because I started listening to you like four years ago.

1:51:32Dave Ramsey:Yeah, but I think I would go. I think the tradeoff is not bad at all.

1:51:37George Kamel:Okay. If this was consumer debt, baby step two, we'd say, no, you need to be intense. But you've moved from intense to intentional once you get out of baby step three, and you've done that so well. So we're not here to tell you don't go on vacation. You're not broke. You just need to be okay with the tradeoff, and maybe you make up the difference. And you go, you know what? I'm going to work a side gig to make up that six grand over the next year so that I don't feel as guilty about it. You do you. but just make peace with whatever decision you make.

1:52:04Dave Ramsey:Okay, so you have made really good decisions. I want to recap only one part of the conversation, okay? The one thing everyone needs to avoid, including Dave, is the idea that there's only one time to do something. There's this one tiny opportunity, and if I miss that, that's almost never true. It might be true of a wedding. You might miss the wedding or something like that, okay? That's possible. But, you know, a group going to Italy, there's not only one time in your life. You can go a lot of different times, and you might find a group you like better later. It's possible. So you don't want to trap yourself into this one-time thinking because that adds drama to this, and it adds too much weight to the Italy trip.

1:52:50Dave Ramsey:The Italy trip is not a bad idea, and a two-month delay in your home purchase, especially as good a job as you've done overall, because you're like killing it, girl. I mean, you're doing really good. I'm so proud of you. Given all of that, I think you should go. If it was me in your shoes, I would go.

1:53:08George Kamel:You know how rare Dave Ramsey greenlights a trip to Italy for$7 ,000, Taylor? You just hit the jackpot.

1:53:14Dave Ramsey:Just go. No, I mean, it's where she is. She's there. Don't you think? She's done such an incredible job.

1:53:19George Kamel:Yeah, most people that want to go to Italy are whining, and they're going to put it on credit, and we have to talk them off a ledge. We're trying to convince Taylor to go because of how good of a job she's done.

1:53:27Dave Ramsey:Well, she's going to go.

1:53:28George Kamel:And if it delayed the house purchase by a year, I'd say, whoa, that's a lot. Two months, she's going to be right there and she'll probably get a raise as hard of a worker as she is and make up the difference.

1:53:38Dave Ramsey:Yeah.

1:53:39George Kamel:But this all comes down to opportunity cost. We talk about this a lot. What is it going to cost me? If I go buy that car, that means I can't fund this retirement account. And so you just got to weigh the options. And none of these are bad things.

1:53:50Dave Ramsey:Tradeoff. If you spend all your money on interior decorating or purses or guns or whatever it is you spend all your money on, then you don't have any money. It's kind of a math thing. Or travel. It's kind of a math thing. I will tell you guys this. Sharon and I are at this stage these days to where we are really enjoying living like no one else on the travel stuff. And we've always done some travel, always throughout our lives. you know except when we were broke broke but i mean once we got to where we could afford it we've always done some but um now we're at the stage to where uh the live like no one else thing is kicking in and i strongly advise that you you know it's it's one of the benefits of working your tail end off and saving you so that you can go enjoy some of it and um that that's for after your baby step seven you know you're moving on live like no one else and give like no now so that later you can live like no one else and give like no one else.

1:54:50Dave Ramsey:So, but, but if you, if you blow it all and say, well, I, you know, I'm, I'm 24 and I have to go to London. No, you don't. London's going to be there. They're not closing it. It doesn't close up.

1:55:03George Kamel:What's that FOMO and the friends and the pressure and I'm going to miss out and I'll see the Instagram posts.

1:55:08Dave Ramsey:And if you, if you, if you do what your broke friends do, guess what you're going to get broke. That's it. Pretty simple.

1:55:15George Kamel:I'd pursue the JOMO instead, the joy of missing out. Because you know you've got your plan. You've got your goals. You're doing you.

1:55:21Dave Ramsey:Yeah. I think Taylor's going to Italy and she's going to enjoy it. Send us some photos, Taylor. I think she's going to buy a really nice house when she gets back, by the way.

1:55:29George Kamel:Both and. Yeah. Both are possible when you follow the Ramsey plan.

1:55:32Dave Ramsey:This is The Ramsey Show.

1:55:46Thank you.

1:56:23Dave Ramsey:This podcast is brought to you by the show of the show of the show of the show of the show A truthful witness saves lives, but one who breathes out lies is deceitful. That seems redundant to me. If you breathe out lies, of course you're deceitful.

1:56:43George Kamel:Sometimes the obvious must be stated. Back in the Bible days.

1:56:48Dave Ramsey:I might have to go look up a different version to make sure I understand that scripture. Because apparently I don't understand it. a truthful witness saves lives. Now, I do understand that. Because like when you tell somebody the truth on this show, sometimes it sounds harsh. Yep. Like that's not abuse, that's stupid. But we're trying to save you. But you're, you know, that saves lives. I'm not breathing no lies. We get to the bottom of what's really going on, right? Rupert Murdoch said, I'm not an economist, and we all know economists were created to make weather forecasters look good. That's good.

1:57:20Dave Ramsey:My line, Rupert, is weather forecasters and economists are the only two people that could be wrong most of the time and still keep their jobs. That's my line. So true. But I've been using that one for a long time on Fox and other things. They're like, Dave, what do you think the economy's going to do? I'm like, oh, weather forecaster. I don't know.

1:57:35George Kamel:That and talking heads, which are economists.

1:57:38Dave Ramsey:There we go. There we go. There are those. Brian is in Raleigh, North Carolina. Hey, Brian, what's up?

1:57:44George Kamel:Hey, Dave, how are you doing? I'm$20 ,000 in credit card debt. I am currently renting, and I'd like to pay that off and save for a home. Good. And I don't know where to start. Well, getting rid of the debt would be a great start. What do you make? So take home after taxes for my job is about$4 ,700.

1:58:11Dave Ramsey:Did you say$2 ,700?

1:58:14George Kamel:$2 ,700 for my job, and then I get about$2 ,000 a month in VA disability. for a total of$4 ,700.

1:58:22Dave Ramsey:Thank you for your service.

1:58:25George Kamel:Well, I appreciate that. Thank you. What caused the$20 ,000 in credit card debt? I was unemployed last year and kind of blew through my savings and was living like I had a job on a credit card and savings, and it's caught up to me. And I'm treading water with my floaties on, but if they pop, I'm kind of...

1:58:47Dave Ramsey:Are you single in 26? Excuse me? Are you single and 26? I'm not married. I live with my girlfriend and my brother. Okay, so you're single, and how old are you? Yeah, 30. Okay, you got close. Okay. All right.

1:59:03George Kamel:Is this split up amongst a bunch of credit cards? It's currently on two credit cards that are almost maxed out.

1:59:11Dave Ramsey:What's coming out of your check?

1:59:15George Kamel:Right now, about$510 a month. I have a Discover card that I've put a hold on.

1:59:22Dave Ramsey:What's coming out of your check? Taxes? Health insurance? Oh, yes. 401k?

1:59:28George Kamel:Taxes, health insurance, 401k, all that stuff.

1:59:30Dave Ramsey:So you've got money going into 401k?

1:59:33George Kamel:Yes, sir. I'm at a new job. How much is going into the 401k?

1:59:37Dave Ramsey:The bare minimum that they... Automatically signed you up for, 3%. Automatically signed me up for right now, yes, sir. And then every year they do a profit share at the end of the year. That's real nice if you weren't broke. Okay. Yeah. So we're going to stop the 401K. Okay. And we're going to take anything else out of that check except health insurance and taxes and make sure you have the right amount of taxes and the right amount of health insurance and everything else needs to come home. We're going to get on a detailed written budget. And we're going to increase our income.

2:00:08George Kamel:So what can you do to make more than$2 ,700 a month? Well, I'm in a sales job, so I do have some commission that comes in. Great. What are you selling?

2:00:24George Kamel:Construction supplies.

2:00:25Dave Ramsey:Great. Awesome, because it's getting ready to boom, get ready. There's another forecast from The Economist. Yeah. I still think it is, though. All right, so we're going to do anything we can to increase our income. We're going to do anything we can to make the income behave. We're not going out to eat, and we're not going on vacation. and we've got$4 ,700 a month, probably closer by the time this is all done to$5 ,000 a month, and we need to pay off$20 ,000. So$2 ,000 a month of that$5 ,000 going to credit card debt, you will be debt-free in 10 months.

2:00:59George Kamel:Okay. How much is your car payment? I don't have a car payment. I've got a paid-off vehicle. That was a trick question.

2:01:08Dave Ramsey:Okay. What were you getting ready to say, sir? I interrupted you.

2:01:11George Kamel:I've got a paid-off vehicle and a company truck, but that vehicle is about to need some maintenance.

2:01:17Dave Ramsey:Okay.

2:01:17George Kamel:About$1 ,000 in labor. I've got all the parts.

2:01:21Dave Ramsey:Good, good. That's not a problem. Okay.

2:01:23George Kamel:So how much can you throw at the debt currently based on your expenses? How much margin do you have? Do you have$2 ,000 you could throw at it? Once I rein it in, yes, at the end of the month I do. My current problem is my finances are kind of skewed because I guess I would call myself head of household. I pay the rent at the beginning of the month, and then my brother and my girlfriend pay me as they get paid later on. So I come out of pocket pretty heavy on the first.

2:01:58Dave Ramsey:They need to get ahead of that, and they need to pay their part on the first.

2:02:02George Kamel:I know. You're the landlord. You set the rules. Payments come in on the first. That's it. Yeah, I know. Yeah. They're typically pretty good about it, but because I am in a little bit better position.

2:02:14Dave Ramsey:You're not in a better position. You're deeply in debt. You maxed out two credit cards. Yeah.

2:02:19George Kamel:I don't want to know what their situation is, if that makes you look good. But we've got to clean this up fast, and I'm thinking this takes less than 10 months if you get serious about it. You cut some expenses. You increase that income.

2:02:30Dave Ramsey:This debt is gone. I want you to list your debts, smallest to largest, the credit cards. What's the smallest credit card? about 10 grand 10 yes you only owe 20 well the next credit cards 11 grand give or take so you have two i have two two credit cards yes okay okay all right so we're going to attack the 10 grand two grand a month five months it's gone that frees up that payment so apply that plus all

2:02:59George Kamel:the margin you're throwing at it to the next credit card that one's gone another five months or less. Wait, does that mean I stopped paying?

2:03:05Dave Ramsey:No, you pay minimum payments is all. Interest rate is not your problem. Your problem is cash flow. And so we're going to get all the cash we can pile up every single month by tightening everything down to nothing. No going out to eat, no vacations, no luxuries. You have a freaking mess you're cleaning up and you're very intense and intentional. When you do that, you will get out of debt. You cannot fix this with math it's not a math problem it's a sacrifice live on beans and rice rice and beans problem

2:03:39George Kamel:can i um i have one question for you uh what it like what if i was to balance transfer all of that and then really hammer that one card it don't matter it would same outcome yeah yeah because

2:03:54Dave Ramsey:the interest rate the interest rate over 10 months on this is not is not relevant the actual interest okay let me show you what i'm talking about okay 10 in a year on twenty thousand dollars is two thousand dollars okay you're not going to be in there a year you're going to be in there an average of a half a year and so we're talking about one thousand dollars in interest one thousand dollars does not fix a twenty thousand dollar problem and worse that

2:04:21George Kamel:balance transfer will cost you three to five percent of the balance and make you think you actually did something to where you get comfortable and go well zero percent now so i can kind of take my time with it i want you to feel a fire when there's 29 apr on that card you're going i got to get out of this and never touch it again you just sell so much stuff the kids think they're

2:04:37Dave Ramsey:next the dog is hiding and your roommate's considering moving out that's your girlfriend so that's extra awkward yeah i mean you're really you need to get with it and roll up your sleeves and get pissed off about this and get rid of this debt and when you do it when you get that kind of attitude about it, the math quits mattering. If you're going to keep the debt for five years, then I can't help you, but a balance transfer might. But that's a dumb way to do this because you're going to be in debt the rest of your life screwing around with it. Instead, this incredible focused intensity, like you're running for your life, and then you cut up these stupid cards and you never touch them again for anything, that'll get you out of debt and keep you out of debt, sir.

2:05:16Dave Ramsey:George and I will sign you up for every dollar, including Financial Peace University, and we're going to put you in there and show you how to handle this. And then if the girlfriend becomes a wife, it'll become a good thing. And the two of you can learn to work together at that point. Until then, you're not working together. You have a roommate. And that's better keep everything separate, brother. You're going to have a problem if you don't. That puts us our 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.

2:05:55Thank you.