Change Starts Today. Don’t Wait Till You’re 65 and Broke

14:57Dave Ramsey:That I would have been paying to some stupid insurance company in extra premiums, but I've had low premiums and I took on the risk. But I didn't take on the risk. I didn't take on the risk for a big thing. Yes.

15:12George Kamel:So it's almost the same as like a catastrophic coverage. Exactly. Not really the same, but more or less.

15:16Dave Ramsey:That's what we used to call it before HSAs came out. We used to call them catastrophics. Yeah.

15:21George Kamel:Yeah, because I'm learning these numbers, and I'm like, I'm giving these guys way too much money. I don't even use it. I'm like, I could be, and we do very well. You know, I have a great, I have like 500 ,000 just like liquid at any time if something, God forbid, were to happen. It's a small price to pay for peace, Louie. That's the key here. I know. Don't think of that as an investment because term life is the same way. Well, I'm not even using the thing. Yeah, because you're alive. Be grateful. Yeah. And so it's not investment. Insurance is never meant to be.

15:46Dave Ramsey:You know, same thing with your homeowner's insurance. You know, you don't carry it for – it's defense, it's not offense.

15:52George Kamel:You're like, well, we haven't had a house fire in six years. Can I drop it? Well, I don't have a crystal ball to tell you nothing's ever going to happen.

15:58Dave Ramsey:Yeah. So healthtrustfinancial.com. Okay. They'll help you shop around. Tell them you talk to us on the air. And they're good guys. Like I said, I've known them 15 years, and that's why they're Ramsey Trust. This is why we do this with them. And they have brokers that will shop different companies and different plans with different companies to find the one that fits your family just right, your family of five, and get it all dialed in here. And let's get the premium down. You take the first dollar risk. In the health insurance world, we call it first dollar risk. And so the more of the first few dollars, the more of the first$20 ,000 or$30 ,000 of risk you can take in any insurance, homeowners insurance, car insurance, health insurance, the more of that risk you take, your premium just goes way down.

16:45Dave Ramsey:Because every time you go to the doctor, you turn in an insurance claim, you're going to pay a bazillion dollars a month for that premium. but if you if you got a thing like i go i i don't even know what i don't know when i have turned in an insurance claim i just go and pay for it because it's not gonna i'm just cash flow it's not gonna hit you know the only time i would ever keep up with it even is if i thought we were in a situation where we're going to hit the deductible and i had to go back and drag the bills together but any kind of medical thing that sharon or i do we just pay for it um let the money grow because it's not a major thing you know and we leave the hsa alone and we you know accept the low premium through ramsey solutions on my hsa plan so and i took my car insurances up to 10 grand

17:29George Kamel:yeah because you again you you don't need as much uh transfer of risk here i don't but you still want to have it to cover the big stuff like well i got a car wreck mainly liability but yeah but

17:39Dave Ramsey:the but the thing yeah yeah that still an expensive car so you know we'll cover i'll cover i don't I'll cover$20 ,000 of it. It's not that big a thing. And then your premiums just plummet. They go way down when you start doing that. But you can't do that until you've got a little bit of money. And so you've got to have the HSA, the savings account portion built up, and an emergency fund built up to cover these higher deductibles. But always be looking at that, folks, and get out of the first dollar of insurance coverage. I want it to cover everything. No, you don't. It costs too damn much. Your premiums are going to go through the roof.

18:14Dave Ramsey:You don't want that at all. And so it's the problem with vision and dental is, you know. It's a wash. It's a wash. What you pay for it, you could have just gone to the dentist.

18:28George Kamel:So unless it's offered for free through an employer or something, sure, take that.

18:32Dave Ramsey:Exactly.

18:32George Kamel:But if you're having to pay out of pocket. And I did find out HSA max for 2025 is$8 ,550.

18:37Dave Ramsey:Thank you for looking that up.

18:38George Kamel:It's close. Good, good, good.

18:40Dave Ramsey:Okay.

18:40George Kamel:It's a great deal. You get triple tax advantages in that HSA. Yeah.

18:43Dave Ramsey:And if you use it, it's a tax deductible claim. And so if I did pay out of the HSA, I don't pay taxes on that money. So the government, in my case, is paying 37 percent. Not a bad deal. You want to stick it to the man. It would have been taxes, right? And so by being a pre-tax plan and a tax-deductible plan, then you get that. So it's the best way to go. And these guys at Health Trust are doing a great job for those of you out there that are facing other health insurance things.

19:47Dave Ramsey:Smart people don't wait for trouble to show up. They think ahead. It's true with money, and it's just as true about protecting your home. That's why I recommend SimpliSafe, because most security systems only respond after someone's already broken in. But by then, the damage is done. That's not a plan. That's a patch. SimpliSafe is different. Their Active Guard outdoor protection helps stop break-ins before they happen. Their AI-powered cameras watch for suspicious activity, and if someone's lurking, live SimpliSafe agents can talk to the person, turn on spotlights, and even call the police. That's the kind of thinking that prevents crime in real time.

20:26Dave Ramsey:Monitoring plans start around a dollar a day. For your first month, it's free. And there are no contracts, just proactive protection. That's why over 4 million Americans trust SimpliSafe. And why? It's been named Best Home Security System of 2025 by CNET. And right now, you'll get 50 % off a new system with professional monitoring. Go to SimpliSafeDirect.com. That's SimpliSafeDirect.com. There's no safe like SimpliSafe.

21:15Dave Ramsey:This is silly, George. What happened? August is national make-a-will month. That's dead serious, if anything.

21:24George Kamel:Got him. Got him. them. I'll be here all week.

21:29Dave Ramsey:Top five reasons people don't do a will. And this is not a lie. This is the actual number one procrastination. Forty three percent of adults without a will say they just haven't gotten around to it. Well, you're going to die. You probably ought to work on it. Number two, perfectionism. Writing a will involves a few big decisions. Just do the best you can. You're not going to get it right. And by the way, someone's going to be unhappy. Just plan on it. It's kind of part of the thing. Thinking you need a certain amount of assets to do a will. No, you need a will. If you're 18 years old, you need a will.

22:01Dave Ramsey:If you don't have a bunch of assets, it's not a big deal, but you don't want the government deciding who takes care of your kids. So you need to name a guardian and you need to do that in a will. Hello. Let the government figure out anything. That's a bad idea. Track record's not great there. Yeah. Yeah. Number four, a belief that everything automatically goes to your family. No, it doesn't. Most of it goes to the lawyers. If you don't do a will, That's not how that works. And by the way, again, some judge and probate is going to decide this. No, you need to write it out and tell people what it is.

22:33Dave Ramsey:Uncertainty about the process. Most people don't know where to start. Well, we can help. Go to RamseySolutions.com slash Will's Quiz. It's a free quiz. RamseySolutions.com slash Will's Quiz. And with that, you'll get 25 % off at Mama Bear Legal Forms to do a quick online will. If you've got a simple estate, it's an easy way to do it. You can do it in one evening. You'll have it completely knocked out. You'll go, why didn't I do that sooner? Gosh, that wasn't even that hard. Well, the other stuff is people forget about stuff like, okay, you're in a coma. Who gets to make your medical decisions?

23:09Dave Ramsey:You need a health care prior of attorney. It's part of a standard will kit. It's one page, but it sure does make everything easier. And you don't have to go before a judge to get permission to treat your husband. Hello?

23:22George Kamel:The last thing you want during that time.

23:24Dave Ramsey:Medical power of attorney.

23:25George Kamel:Financial power of attorney. Financial power of attorney.

23:27Dave Ramsey:Something happens and, you know, they need to be able to move some money around so that you can get your bills paid. Hello. So all these things. And, again, it's not complicated. You've just got to bother to do it. Doesn't increase your chances of dying either. Studies show. Yeah. And studies show that you're going to die. That's detail. We know that's happening. So you're not getting out of this alive. Dalen's in San Antonio. Hi, Dalen. How are you?

23:52George Kamel:I'm doing good, Dave. How are you?

23:54Dave Ramsey:Better than I deserve. How can I help?

23:57George Kamel:So my question is kind of a two-parter. It has to do with combining finances with my spouse as well as for our ultimate goal of paying off our house sooner.

24:08Dave Ramsey:Okay.

24:09George Kamel:So I'm guessing, I guess the number one thing is she and I both contribute to paying on things. I pay the mortgage and she pays some of the bills and things like that. But we currently have two separate bank accounts, but we haven't taken the leap of having a joint bank account. Why? I don't really have an answer to that other than, I guess, just the idea of it feels like it's maybe a lack of control thing. I don't know.

24:47Dave Ramsey:Yeah. Well, here's the control factor. When the two of you put all your money in one account and the two of you, before the month begins, sit down with your every dollar budget, and the two of you have a vote about where the money's going to go, and you lay out where the money's going to go before the month begins, and you both agree to that, then the control is if somebody doesn't do what they agreed, they're a liar. They broke a contract.

25:11George Kamel:Yes, sir.

25:11Dave Ramsey:And so you've got pure communication. Right now you've got half-butt communication because you half-butt know what's going on. But you've got pure communication because it's all laid out on the front end and the two of you together. And here's the actual result. When we surveyed the general public, less than 50 % of the general public down in the 40 percentile range combined their assets with their spouse, combined their incomes with their spouse. When we surveyed 10 ,167 millionaires, 83 % combined their income and their assets with their spouse. And so the result is you have a much higher probability of building wealth and accomplishing your financial goals when you're actually working together instead of acting like your roommates.

26:02Yes, sir.

26:03Dave Ramsey:That's data. That's not a feeling. It's a fact. So that's important. And the reason is pretty simple because you get much more efficient use of the money pointed toward a shared goal that we both have agreed to. By the way, the quality of the communication increases in your marriage, your relationship increases, and the quality of your marriage increases overall. Because you're forcing each other to agree on our fears and our dreams, and we're in alignment on those things. It's a big deal, isn't it, George? Yeah.

26:33George Kamel:Well, and the other thing is it hides things that are just going to cause resentment later on down the line or spending issues. So I'd rather get them out on paper now, have some accountability built in and transparency to where my wife, she sees every transaction alert come through our bank. She knows what's going on. I know what's going on. And that has allowed us to exponentially build wealth because none of us are sitting here, you know, whittling away our money that we've worked so hard for.

26:56Dave Ramsey:It controls how many purses Sharon buys and how many guns I buy.

27:01George Kamel:Copy, yes, sir.

27:03Dave Ramsey:the question is which one costs more ah there's a question that's i'm just telling you i'm curious a pistol costs two purses george i'll just tell you i know what the trade-out is that's

27:14George Kamel:called dave math right there so dalen have you guys combined uh in other ways is she on the mortgage is she on the deed uh yes sir she is on the mortgage kind of how it's been well so kind of how it's been going. I've been paying the mortgage, and she has been taking care of some utilities, but the main thing is that she does have student loan debt. Who makes more money?

27:44George Kamel:Currently, I believe I do. Yeah, okay. So what do you make? I make about$84 ,500 a year.

27:53Dave Ramsey:What do you think she makes?

27:54George Kamel:uh well so she hers varies but she's a she's a she's a therapist and so she makes it based upon patients so it can vary between 800 to 3 ,500 a paycheck it just depends

28:08Dave Ramsey:but i mean like when you're doing your taxes for a year what's the lady make

28:14George Kamel:i want to say i want to say at best hopefully probably about or 84 to 85

28:21Dave Ramsey:Okay, so you got$150 ,000,$160 ,000 income. That's the point. Okay. Okay. And how long have you all been married?

28:31George Kamel:It'll be two years in October.

28:33Dave Ramsey:Who's the more detailed nerd in the bunch, you or her? You.

28:39George Kamel:Yes, sir.

28:39Dave Ramsey:Yeah, me too at my house. I'm the nerd at my house. And we call them nerds and free spirits. Who's the nerd? Who's the free spirit? My wife is the free spirit. Who's the spender and who's the saver? I'm the saver. Okay. And she's the spender. Okay, so she's a free spirit spender, and you're a saving nerd. All right. Now, here's what's going to end up happening when you combine. She's going to feel controlled at first by this whole process because she likes to be on – she doesn't like having a harness on her. Okay? But she's going to learn that we're not controlling the spending, but instead what we're doing is designating the spending.

29:24Dave Ramsey:So she gets to – basically, my daughter Rachel is like your wife. She's a free spirit spender. And Rachel finally, when she and Winston started doing the budget early in their marriage, she determined that the budget is not a restriction on her spending. It's permission to spend. because now whatever's in the category that is spending for your wife, she can do without any guilt or worry of retribution from you because you've agreed about it before the month begins. It actually sets her free to do what she does. Now, I'm a nerd spender, so I'm a little different. So I plan out my spending, and that way I know I'm being responsible about it.

30:08Dave Ramsey:So that helps. And my wife wants to plan out our saving because she's a saver. So you get to do your saving. You get to do your spending. Everybody gets a vote. All of this is reflected in our plan, and she's going to help you have fun, and you're going to help her retire and not have to eat dog food. It's a good team right there. Yeah, and you need each other. If two people just alike get married, one of you is unnecessary.

31:00George Kamel:you've got a job, a dog, maybe a Peloton, but no will. Come on, people. It's make a will month time to stop pretending you're immortal and start adulting like a pro. And here's the deal. A will isn't just for boomers with beach houses. It's for anyone who owns stuff or loves their people. And I assume that's you. Because when you die without a will, the state gets to decide who gets what. And spoiler alert, the state doesn't know you. And that means your ex-roommate could end up with your collection of vinyl and the government might get final say on who raises your kids. That's not okay. And that's why I recommend Mama Bear Legal Forms.

31:33George Kamel:It's the simple lawyer-free way to get your will done in 20 minutes. And this August, you get 25 % off for Make-A-Will Month. That's Mama Bear's biggest sale of the year. So stop with the I'll get to it someday excuses. Just get it done today at MamaBearLegalForms.com and use the promo code Ramsey when you check out to get the discount. Again, that's MamaBearLegalForms.com. Offer ends August 31st at 11.59pm. Do not let the government raise your kids or fight over your Mandalorian merch. Make-A-Will today. MamaBearLegalForms.com. Promo code Ramsey.

32:16Dave Ramsey:David is in Louisville, Kentucky. Hi, David. How can we help?

32:20George Kamel:Hi, guys. Thanks for taking my call. Sure. So I'm 29 and my wife is 27. We're both self-employed and our only debt is our mortgage. And it's about 30 % of our gross income. um it's i mean it's been doable but it's felt a little bit tight at certain times especially after our investing and newborn expenses um so my question is is it or would it be smart to sell our current home and invest all that net profit into a Roth retirement and then just start over in a small starter home so um and doing so we'd have 160 ,000 in Roth funds at our age, and without ever contributing, we'd have about$500 ,000.

33:08Dave Ramsey:Your phone's breaking up. Honey, your phone's breaking up. I have no idea what you said. You said$100 ,000 and something,$100 ,000. What did you say? How much is going into retirement?

33:18George Kamel:We'd have about$165 ,000 in Roth funds.

33:21Dave Ramsey:Okay. No, it's not Roth. You can't put it all in a Roth. The only thing you can put in a Roth is a rollover from a retirement. You can't put home equity all in a Roth in one year. You can put$8 ,000 in in a year, but that's the most you can do.

33:34George Kamel:Well, we have a Roth 401k, so we could do around$20 ,000. Each of us, because we're both self-employed and$20 ,000.

33:43Dave Ramsey:Okay, yeah, you can move it that way, but you can't just move$150 ,000 from your house into a Roth. You'd have to do it through some of those vehicles. Why is your business not growing?

33:53George Kamel:I mean, it's growing. We started out to about 100 on average.

34:01Dave Ramsey:Man, your phone sucks. Try again.

34:05George Kamel:It's an iPhone 10. So we started out.

34:10Dave Ramsey:I'm done. We tried. All right, we tried. Open phones at 888-825-5225. If your business, sir, is increasing in profitability and increasing in revenue, you can keep the house and you should keep the house. But I think the problem is not the house and the problem is not the Roth IRAs. The problem is you're not making enough out of your business. So you guys need to make some career decisions. Either this business needs to get up, get running, and increase your income using that, or you need to consider if this business is really viable or not. That's what you're looking at. James is in Denver. Hey, James.

34:49Dave Ramsey:What's up? Hey. How you doing, Dave? Better than I deserve. How can I help?

34:54George Kamel:Well, I'm hoping if you can guide me in the right direction. I am contemplating retiring early, and I'm quite young for what I was born and raised to realize that I just turned 38 years old.

35:09Dave Ramsey:Okay. Okay. What do you mean by retire?

35:16George Kamel:Not grind a day job every day that I'm worried about.

35:21Dave Ramsey:Okay. So you want to sit on your butt for 40 years?

35:28George Kamel:I sit on my butt, maybe hike, maybe golf, maybe get outdoor.

35:32Dave Ramsey:Dave does a lot of that. Yeah, still work.

35:40Dave Ramsey:Okay, there's two questions here that are built into this issue. Question number one is the philosophy of that, and question number two is the math of that. Can you afford to do it? How much money do you have invested and saved? Right now I have about$3.5 million in the market. Okay. Then you can retire.

36:04George Kamel:A couple houses. You've done great.

36:08Dave Ramsey:Congratulations. Now, what were you doing for a living? I was doing technology sales, and I've done quite well. Yeah, you've done fabulously. Congratulations. Very proud of you. That's excellent. So definitely math-wise, I mean, I'm sure you can live on 300 grand a year. Hello?

36:27George Kamel:Sure.

36:28Dave Ramsey:I'm sorry?

36:29George Kamel:No, I said sure, absolutely.

36:32Dave Ramsey:Okay. Then, you know,$3.5 million at 10 % is going to produce that. At 8 % it's going to produce that. And that's not counting your rental houses. So, yeah, so the math question is, yes, you can retire. I will tell you, having met with wealthy people and people who were successful, as successful or more successful than you at an early age, the ones that attempted to do nothing have not had a high-quality life. Golf and hiking just don't do it, man. Yeah. After a few months of this, I'm starting to get that.

37:08George Kamel:I can tell you the pattern. Oh, you've already done it.

37:11Dave Ramsey:It goes from. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Have you already quit? No.

37:21Dave Ramsey:Do we have any phones that work on this planet? How has technology not improved over the last 30 years? Do you do in this, Dave? Yeah, I don't know. So, okay. Anyway, the answer to your question is yes, mathematically, you can retire. and philosophically you can control how much you work and you can increase the number of hikes and the number of rounds of golf. But I will tell you that you will have a much higher quality life and your wife will be happier with you if you are doing something. Even if you start your own business and you work at five hours a day or four hours a day average, you work at, you know, some days you work at three days a week.

38:05Dave Ramsey:I've got a friend that has a house in Aspen, and he has a house in the mountains in North Carolina, and he goes back and forth between those, and he works from his computer running a business. But he doesn't work but, you know, a couple hours a day, three or four hours a day, but he's still engaged, still being creative, still having strategic thought, still, you know, doing something. everything and um so you know in my case i love what i do so i have no desire to walk away from it and i intend to do this until i don't make sense anymore um and then they will take me off the air but um and there's all kinds of plans behind my back to make sure that that happens but um but i mean i don't have any reason to not come down here because it's been i mean i could have quit at 38.

38:57Dave Ramsey:I was done financially. Financially, I was done at 38. Easy, probably before that. And so, but this is God's call on my life. And so I would get great joy from it. It would be ridiculous to not be engaged and put your hand to a plow that causes things to grow. And so that's what I want for you. You've obviously got high capacity, and it would be a shame for the high capacity to be on the end of a fishing pole. and so as your only thing you do with your life. So I don't recommend that for you. And I don't find retirement in the Bible, by the way. I don't think it's evil if you do. I don't think you're doing anything wrong.

39:37Dave Ramsey:I don't think it's immoral. And it may be that just in biblical times people had to work because they were always hungry. But it could be that. And we may have advanced our finances beyond that at this stage. So I'm not making a—it's not a moral statement. It's a matter of the way we seem to be wired as humans. We do better if we've got our hand to something.

39:59George Kamel:Exactly. As I've looked into the, this is the FIRE movement, financially independent, retire early. And this is the exact pattern I've seen. It's short-term fun. Woo! I don't work for the man anymore. And that lasts for two weeks or a month. Then it leads into boredom, which leads into depression, which leads into a search for purpose again, which then leads to the thing you should have been doing all along. Yeah. And that's what people do. They spin up a new business that fires them up. And I think that's what our friend here needs to do is go find the thing that actually gets them excited to go to work.

40:28George Kamel:And then it's a shift in gears.

40:30Dave Ramsey:Bob Buford wrote a wonderful book I recommend to you called Half Time. And he said we spend the first, particularly males, females don't fall to it as much, but we spend the first half of our lives in acquisition and the second half of our lives doing something with meaning. And so and if you don't make that transfer, you have a midlife crisis. If all you do is stay, if you're a 60-year-old and you're still in acquisition mode, you know, you're going to fall into midlife crisis. And so be careful with that. And, you know, I just, I, again, you're right. The fire movement has failed miserably in terms of quality of life.

41:09Dave Ramsey:And so this idea that I'm financially independent, independent from what? You still have human beings you're interacting with. And they're out there. They're called life. and you're going to have to still be a nice person and you're still going to have to, you know, do, you know. But here's the thing. If you have high capacity, there's stuff God needs you to do on the planet. Do something of size. Do something of scale. And I don't care what it is. But now you can do it on your terms. And that's the beautiful part. Yeah, that's how I would go at it. So cool stuff. Thanks for calling in.

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43:51Dave Ramsey:welcome back to the Ramsey show George Camel Ramsey personality number one best-selling author is my co-host today and Alex is Alexis rather is with us in Miami hi Alexis how are you

44:04George Kamel:Hi, Dave. I'm amazing. How are you?

44:07Dave Ramsey:Better than I deserve. What's up?

44:09George Kamel:Oh, so I'm calling you today because I love all the advice, financial advice, and even kind of spiritual advice that you give your listeners. And I've kind of stumbled upon a big chunk of change. And before I make any rash decisions, I'd love to talk to you about it first.

44:28Dave Ramsey:What kind of stumbling and what kind of chunk of change?

44:31George Kamel:Right, right, right, right, exactly. So a few months ago, my husband tried to be a superstar husband, and he bought me a fancy car. It was a 2025 black badge, all black, red interior, Rolls Royce. And he bought it for me in hopes that I would be, you know, having fun in like a mom car. But, you know, I don't want to be, you know, ungrateful, but it's not the color I asked for. It's not the style of car I asked for. What were your demands originally? I wanted a drop-top Bentley. Oh. I wanted to feel the wind in my hair. I wanted to be able to, like, you know, my girls are coming over, we just, like, hop in my car, and then we just skirt off.

45:18George Kamel:I don't like having to, like, remove car seats. Sometimes I get my wife's Starbucks order wrong, so I totally relate to this. I know, I know. I knew you guys would understand. Yeah. So, anyway. Okay. Okay, stop, stop, stop, stop.

45:32Dave Ramsey:I can't breathe. Okay. The household income is what?

45:37George Kamel:Well, my husband does crypto, so there's some months where we make millions of dollars and then some months where we don't make anything. It's just all about how my husband strategizes his time. But he does what he can. Are you punking us? Oh, my God, no, you can look me up. Like, I'm giving you my birth name and everything. No, I'm not punking you. This is real life.

46:00Dave Ramsey:You called me about a$600 ,000 car and your husband's job is crypto, and these are obviously none of the things we talk about on the show. We would never recommend any of this.

46:11George Kamel:No, no, that's why I was hesitant to be live on air about it. But what I'm saying is I'm not in love with this car, and I'm looking to sell it, and we have an offer for it, and I don't. Well, then sell it. Okay, and then what do I do with the money? Just like now have money with it? I don't know.

46:25Dave Ramsey:Is it not your husband's money too?

46:27George Kamel:No, it is, but, you know, it was a gift to me, so now I'm able to, like, reinvest it or, you know, do something with it that's a little bit more important than just, like, have it sit in my driveway.

46:36Dave Ramsey:I thought you were going to get a drop-top Bentley.

46:39George Kamel:I mean, now I don't even care about a fancy car at all. I just would like to do something a little bit more interesting than have it sit in my driveway.

46:45Dave Ramsey:So you changed your mind.

46:47George Kamel:I mean, time has gone by, and now I'm, like, you know, a little bit more mature, and, you know, things like that aren't interesting to me. You know, having something like that in my driveway is a liability. And, you know, if I've been told to put my money in this way, then, you know, I'm being pulled in many directions of what I should do with a... Sounds like if you asked your husband, he'd want to invest it in crypto. Yeah, but I don't want to do that. Why? I don't understand it. I don't understand it, so I don't want to do it. He can do what he wants, and, you know, this is something that was gifted to me, and I want to make a little, you know, more thought-out decision with it.

47:18Dave Ramsey:Okay. Well, honey, I mean, you're going to have to pick you out of something you want to do with it. there's so much broken about this whole process that I don't know where to begin to help you fix it. Number one process should be that two grownups living together don't have, don't buy $600 ,000 cars without the other one being involved in the decision. For that matter, they don't buy$6 ,000 cars without the other one being made in the decision. And number two, two grown-ups living together share their assets, their liabilities, their incomes, their dreams, and their fears. And so it's not like you have your own little private party account over here as a result of selling a 2025 Rolls Royce.

48:03Dave Ramsey:So that's not how it should work. So I disagree with your premise. And so I would coach you guys to start working together and, And, you know, begin to invest in some real investments, not just crypto. And both of you, for that matter. And otherwise, your life is just going to continue to be extremely volatile. And if volatility is purchasing a 2025 Rolls Royce that is the wrong interior color and then turning around and selling it, If that's volatility, that's volatility. And there's a lot of chaos around this whole process, and none of this is going to lead to peace in your home, peace in your future, calmness.

48:52Dave Ramsey:You guys are just running around 63 different directions. Life in the fast lane should be your theme song.

48:59George Kamel:Yeah, we need some shared goals, shared vision. And so far, your shared goals have been let's get rich quick and have a bunch of vanity, which is fun. but you found out very quickly it didn't last the test of time.

49:10Dave Ramsey:I guess. When you reassessed the situation. I'm not sure how long the time frame was. It feels like it was two weeks, but that's a fairly quick, short period of time to grow up. But it apparently worked. I don't know. So there we go. Hayden is with us in Minnesota. Hi, Hayden. How are you?

49:25George Kamel:I'm well. How are you?

49:26Dave Ramsey:I'm better than I deserve. What's up?

49:31George Kamel:So I am 24, and I would like to purchase an engagement ring.

49:37Dave Ramsey:Yay! Hey! I can go along with that. That's awesome. You got some money saved? Yeah, thank you. I do. When are you going to pop the question?

49:44George Kamel:I have. Hopefully soon, probably within a month or so, once I get all this stuff squared away.

49:50Dave Ramsey:Yeah, I got to have a plan, man. I like it. So what do you make a year?

49:56George Kamel:Last year I made$85, and this year it will be about$85,$90.

50:00Dave Ramsey:Okay. And how much you got saved for the ring?

50:04George Kamel:In a high-yield account right now, I have about$40.

50:07Dave Ramsey:Okay.

50:08George Kamel:A 401K from an employer, about 10.

50:11Dave Ramsey:But, I mean, the 40 is not allocated to the ring. No, no, no. Okay, how much you got to save for the ring?

50:18George Kamel:Well, so that's where I kind of want to figure out. My question to you is how much I should spend on that ring. One month's income. Okay.

50:26Dave Ramsey:Jewelry store will tell you three months.

50:30George Kamel:Do you think so? I would like to. We've had kind of the goal to go on a vacation. Neither of us have ever been out of the country.

50:37Dave Ramsey:Mm-hmm. Well, that would be like the honeymoon, right?

50:41George Kamel:Kind of, yeah, pretty much. So that encompassing with the ring, would you say that that changes things?

50:47Dave Ramsey:No, I just, that's different. We both have a separate savings for that. What I would spend on the ring is$10 ,000 or less. Okay. And what I'd spend on the trip is what I'd spend on the trip. And you've got the money to do both. Okay. All right.

51:01George Kamel:So get her something nice. There is no correlation between the size of the ring and the probability of the marriage being a success, except possibly an inverse correlation, meaning the larger the ring, the better the chance it fails.

51:15Dave Ramsey:But most high-quality marriages are not based on the size of the ring, in other words. So lots of people get married with something out of the bubblegum machine. Sharon Ramsey married me with a.00 whatever chip that you could barely see. and now she wears a headlight. There's no decimal points in that one. Except on the other side. She does whatever she wants now, right? But that's 43 years of putting up with me. You get a ring, so that's it. And you get a ring. Anyway, the starter ring is fine,$10 ,000, and you've saved the money to do it. Shop around, learn a little bit about diamonds. They're not an investment.

51:55Dave Ramsey:That's the biggest lie ever. I bought a bunch of them. None of them have ever gone up. They don't go up in value. The only value is her smile. That's it. That's the only thing that gives me value. The rest of it's just in the box.

52:09George Kamel:Figure out her taste, figure out the budget, and then just go for it.

52:12Dave Ramsey:Diamonds are forever. Diamonds are a girl's best friend. Those are jewelry marketing lines. You need better friends.

52:37George Kamel:Dave, we got a lot of calls on this show where life happens. One day someone's healthy, they're working, providing for their family, and then a curveball hits.

52:45Dave Ramsey:You know, we hear it all the time. A car accident, a cancer diagnosis, a heart attack, and suddenly everything changes.

52:53George Kamel:Yeah, and that's why you've always said that having term life insurance from Xander is essential, because it protects your family if the worst happens.

53:00Dave Ramsey:Yeah, that's right. You need 10 to 12 times your income in coverage. No gimmicks, no whole life junk, just straightforward term life protection. But there's another piece that people often overlook, and that's long-term disability insurance.

53:16George Kamel:Yeah, it's important to understand the difference between them. Life insurance steps in when you die. Disability insurance steps in while you're alive but can't work. So it replaces a large part of your income so the bills still get paid while you get back on your feet.

53:30Dave Ramsey:Now, if your employer gives you free disability insurance, great, take it. If it's discounted there at a better price, take it. But if not, Xander can help you find the right plan. Whether you're single or married, it's not optional. if you're going to be out of work for a while, then you need to make sure the money's still

53:47George Kamel:showing up. And that's why Xander is our go-to. They make it super simple to get the right coverage at the best price, no pressure, no upselling.

53:55Dave Ramsey:I've trusted Jeff Xander and Xander Insurance for over 25 years, and so has my family.

54:01George Kamel:So don't wait. It's fast, it's easy, and it could make all the difference. Go to Xander.com or call 800-356-4282.

54:09Dave Ramsey:Protect yourself, protect your income, protect your family.

54:33Dave Ramsey:Christopher is in Denver. Hi, Christopher, how are you? Hey, I'm doing well. Glad to be here. Good. How can we help? So I'm calling essentially because I quickly accumulated quite a bit of debt in about three months.

54:50George Kamel:Why? And at the same time, from gambling.

54:54Dave Ramsey:Oh. Have you stopped gambling? I have stopped. Gambling?

54:59George Kamel:I have, yes.

55:00Dave Ramsey:What were you betting on?

55:03George Kamel:Online crypto casinos, like blackjack for the most part.

55:07Dave Ramsey:Yeah. And how much debt did you build up?

55:11George Kamel:Built up close to$40 ,000,$37 ,000.

55:14Dave Ramsey:$37 ,000 in three months from gambling. Okay.

55:18George Kamel:Right.

55:18Dave Ramsey:On credit cards?

55:19George Kamel:Total losses were about triple that. But, yes, all credit cards, yeah.

55:23Dave Ramsey:Okay. Your losses were triple that? Yeah, total. That was,$37 ,000 was just the debt. Did you have money before? And the$60 ,000 was savings you went through? Yeah, savings, portfolio, crypto holdings. So I'm curious why it took$100 ,000 for you to figure out this is a stupid idea.

55:44George Kamel:You know, I really thought I was going to get it back. But that's how it goes, man.

55:49Dave Ramsey:Says every gambling addict. Exactly. How old are you? 27. What's your household income, sir?

55:59George Kamel:Well, I'm self-employed. I've been running a company for a little over five years, so it varies dramatically.

56:03Dave Ramsey:but like last year was$88 ,000. You made$88 ,000 last year. What do you think you're going to make this year? Probably$115 ,000. Okay, that's good. Very good. Good for you. Okay, are you single? I am. Okay, and your question is what then, sir?

56:24George Kamel:Well, when I went through this partially because of my self-employment status, I mean, my initial, once I decided I'd had enough and it was time to quit, But my initial thought was I should be consolidating this somehow because, you know, the 25, 28 percent, whatever it is on these cards is unnecessary is what it felt like I should put into a consolidation loan. And I went to do that to probably 14 banks or whatever. I tried everywhere and no one would give it to me partially because of recent behavior and like how quickly it came up and credit utilization.

56:57Dave Ramsey:You're what's known as a bad credit risk because you've been doing stupid stuff. Yeah, that makes sense.

57:01George Kamel:I wouldn't argue with them. That makes sense.

57:04Dave Ramsey:Okay.

57:07George Kamel:So the next place that a lot of them tried to push me was to debt relief programs. New, new, new, new, new, new, new.

57:16Dave Ramsey:The only way a debt relief program works is if you quit paying everyone and you go into default, and then they negotiate lower rates to finally get the credit card company repaid. You don't need to do that. You make$105 ,000, you're single. you need$37 ,000. You need to start paying$3 ,000,$3 ,000 to$4 ,000 a month on these credit cards and make them go away. Interest rate becomes irrelevant when you pay this off in one year.

57:43George Kamel:Yeah, that's a good point. Definitely.

57:46Dave Ramsey:So that's what we're going to do. We're going to work like our life depended on it. We're not going to do anything except work for the next year. We're not going out to eat. We're not going on vacation, and we're going to clean up these credit cards. List the credit cards smallest to largest, pay minimum payments on everything but the little one. And how many cards are involved?

58:08George Kamel:Five, almost four. I've almost gotten rid of the smallest one, but five total.

58:12Dave Ramsey:Okay. So four cards on$37 ,000. So you're averaging about$8 ,000 or$9 ,000 a piece, right?

58:20George Kamel:Yeah, average, I suppose. Who are they with? Who are they with? Chase is the biggest one. He's got about 18 on it.

58:29Dave Ramsey:Okay. Call Chase and tell them you talked to your financial advisor who said to close down the account and never do business with Chase again if they don't lower the interest rate. That we're going to move the balance to somebody else to a lower rate if you don't lower my rate today. They'll drop it. Cool. Okay. And do that with every one of them. They'll drop it. That'll help a little, but interest rate's not your problem. It's behavior shift. You're going to go from an intense gambler to an intense debt repayment guy. Yeah.

59:07George Kamel:Do you have any other debt? I do. I got a car that's about 22 on it and student loans for 16.

59:16Dave Ramsey:Okay. Well, let's put all those on that same list then. Let's just keep going. It's going to take two years then.

59:21George Kamel:Yeah. Yeah, to get it all, that would be great. I think if it was done in two, I'd be a happy guy. Are you done with crypto? Yeah, I've stopped completely since. And I've had other addictive struggles in the past and was able to sort of treat this one the same way. That, you know, I've got a good community around me.

59:43Dave Ramsey:Yeah, okay. Well, and in a sense, we're going to use the positive attributes of an addict, which would be focus and singular focus. And we're going to use that on this debt. Cool. You get after it. Don't look up until it's gone. Kill it. And then make it a permanent line in the sand that we never go back for anything. And obviously, gambling is not a method of wealth building. We figured that out too, didn't we? Went through$100 ,000 in just a few months. And ending up with a net of$37 ,000 worth of debt. It's the, hey, I told, I was on a podcast this morning as a guest and the guy was asking me what was going on with sports betting.

1:00:26Dave Ramsey:I said, I think it, we're seeing it almost every, about one, about twice a week we're seeing a call right now where people's lives have been ruined by FanDuel.

1:00:36George Kamel:Yeah.

1:00:36Dave Ramsey:And ruined by MGM Gold or whatever because they're out of control. The advertising is relentless. You can't go anywhere without getting this. The reason is they make so stinking much money. Where do you think they got the money to buy all that advertising? From the losers. That's where they got the money, which is everyone that plays it, right? And so they end up losing. And it's mythology, but it's very addictive.

1:01:01George Kamel:Well, it's become socialized where it's no big deal because we're all watching the game. I'm not at a casino, Dave.

1:01:06Dave Ramsey:It's not fun to watch the game unless I got something on it. Yeah, it is. It's a lot more fun. And now we've evolved. Because, by the way, it's a game. I just need to remind you of that.

1:01:14George Kamel:I didn't know that online crypto casinos. That's a three words that should never go together. That's frightening. That's got to be some kind of seventh circle of hell. Dante is even shaking in his boots. Man.

1:01:27Dave Ramsey:What are your demands? Tristan's in Florida. Hey, Tristan, what's up?

1:01:34George Kamel:Hi there. Thanks for taking my call.

1:01:35Dave Ramsey:Sure. How can we help?

1:01:38George Kamel:I own and operate a photography business. my soon-to-be wife is planning on resigning from her 9-to-5 job and starting to work with me full-time. Since I've been up to this point a one-man show, I have no idea how to structure my finances to pay her to at least have her income come through the business as well.

1:02:06Dave Ramsey:If it's her wife, it doesn't matter. Right. You don't even need an income through the business. The business makes a profit. Y 'all take the profit home and eat.

1:02:15George Kamel:Okay. But as far as like... Whether you get six and she gets four, it's just 10 ending up in that same checking account, right? Correct. So you've got a business checking account already? Yes. Okay. And you have your personal. And you've been transferring money over to pay yourself? Yeah, exactly. Whenever I need money, I just transfer it over, but I try to keep my expenses very low.

1:02:38Dave Ramsey:Same thing. Okay.

1:02:40George Kamel:Will she be increasing the revenue of the business? Yeah. Yeah, that's the whole.

1:02:46Dave Ramsey:I hope so. I hope you all make more. Both of you are working there, yeah. And so what we need to do, the first step is for them, keep everything completely separate. Run the business as if you're running it for someone else. Like George said, a separate checking account. He's exactly right. Okay. And then you pay only business expenses with that account, and you only put money into that account that comes from the business.

1:03:09George Kamel:Right.

1:03:09Dave Ramsey:Okay. And so the net that's in that account, by definition, is profit. Okay. If revenue goes in, expenses go out, what's left is profit. Right. That's the definition from an accounting standpoint. Obviously, you need a good set of books, too. Then I would leave some in the business for retained earnings, the equivalent of an emergency fund in business. We need a little pad in there. And then the rest of it comes home, and that's profit. And you can do that just as a monthly decision, how much we're going to bring home out of there. We made this much profit. We're going to leave a little in the business for retained earnings.

1:03:42Dave Ramsey:We're going to bring the rest of it home. And then we can put that in the checking account. You need to hold a fourth of that out for taxes, 25 % of it out for taxes in a separate account. So you can pay your quarterly estimates and then take the rest of it home. And that's the easiest way to do it. The next step is you could really start making some serious money. You can start paying actual salaries out, but it's not necessary to do that.

1:04:12We'll be right back.

1:04:17George Kamel:Okay, Rachel, the internet officially knows too much about all of us. So much, George. I mean, our names, our addresses, even our relatives' names. And what's crazy is even if you opt out, data broker websites can still get your info. Don't like that. And just a year ago, get this, the average person had about 300 pieces of personal data floating around online. Now it's over 600. It has doubled in a year. You guys, that is so concerning because that info then can be used in phishing scams, impersonation, and even harassment. So that's why George and I both use and love Delete Me. Yes, Delete Me scrubs your personal info from hundreds of these data broker sites, not just once, but all year long.

1:04:55George Kamel:And there's real privacy experts behind the scenes doing this, not bots. So this is digital hygiene we all need. We all need it. And then they will send you a detailed report showing exactly where they found your data and what they removed. And you can even request custom removals if you have something specific you want them to look out for. Exactly. And this is not being paranoid. This is staying protected. And so far, Delete Me has removed my info from 240 listings and saved me 94 hours of time it would have taken me to do it. I love it. And you guys, in a world where strangers can Google your grandma and get enough info to scam her in just two clicks, Delete Me gives you peace of mind.

1:05:30George Kamel:Yes. So go to joindeliteme.com slash Ramsey for 20 % off. And that discount brings their annual plans down to about$9 a month. So go check it out. Joindeliteme.com slash Ramsey.

1:05:58Well, if you've never been able to visit the lobby of Ramsey Solutions and watch us do this show on the glass, which we do from one to four Monday through Friday, you're going to get a special treat.

1:06:11Dave Ramsey:We're going to take the show on the road and let you come and watch us do a show. And better than that, you will be asking the questions from the audience on the live mic. That's fun. If you ever wanted to see the person who's calling in, you're going to see them. They're going to be in the room. Now's your chance. Ramsey Show is going on tour. Experience live Q &A, raw confessions, crowd debates, and a local debt-free scream. It's all happening live. The first one will be September the 30th in Chicago. Chicago, Rachel, Ken, and George. Woo-hoo. We'll be doing this show live on stage with an audience of about 300 folks.

1:06:49Dave Ramsey:Tickets are a whole$39. Ooh. Super expensive.

1:06:55George Kamel:I think the Uber to the venue is going to cost you more.

1:06:57Dave Ramsey:For sure. That's an amazing price. In Chicago, for sure. Yeah. So anyway, you get to come and hang out. But the problem with them being$39 is they're going to be gone in about 20 minutes. So if you want tickets, you probably ought to go by them like quick.

1:07:11George Kamel:Intimate experience, 300 seats in each venue. And so they're going to go fast and it's going to be a blast to go on the road and be amongst the people.

1:07:19Dave Ramsey:Amongst the folks. Orlando, October the 2nd. We're doing two this fall, Chicago and Orlando, September 30 and October 2. And in Orlando will be Jade, John and George. You're doing both of them. Someone had to chaperone John.

1:07:33George Kamel:And so they sent me out there with them.

1:07:35Dave Ramsey:Someone had to chaperone Ken. on the other one. So there you go. Yeah, we got to take care of them. We got to send a grown up. Yeah.

1:07:41George Kamel:Yeah. All right. I'll be headed straight from Chicago to Orlando. It's going to be a fun time. And this is the kind of event that it's going to be hard to experience through radio or video. You want to be in the room for this kind of experience. And if you haven't experienced it live, now's your chance. Because we've never done something like this. Never have. First time I've ever done it.

1:08:00Dave Ramsey:So Ramsey Show Live, Chicago, September 30th. Rachel, Ken, George, J. John, and George, Orlando, October 2nd. Click the link in the show notes if you're on the podcast or YouTube. Otherwise, go to RamseySolutions.com slash events. Jenny's in Idaho. Hi, Jenny. How are you?

1:08:20George Kamel:Hi, Dave. I'm good. Thank you. Cool. How can we help? I'm 61 years old, newly single. I live in Lankham Housing. I have$22 ,000 left over from the sale of my house in Oregon, and I don't know what to do.

1:08:49Dave Ramsey:Newly single. Divorced? Sorry, what did you say? You said newly single. Are you divorced?

1:08:57George Kamel:Yes, sir.

1:08:58Dave Ramsey:Okay. What do you do for a living?

1:09:02George Kamel:I work at a training center and I'm in cashier, but I only get about 25 hours a week.

1:09:11Dave Ramsey:Okay. So what are we doing to get a better job? That one sucks.

1:09:25George Kamel:because of my bad needs

1:09:29George Kamel:I have a bunch of stuff in a storage unit that needs to be sold

1:09:35Dave Ramsey:that one's what I asked I asked what you're doing to get a better job the job you have sucks

1:09:40George Kamel:nothing right now you're a cashier and you can't stand

1:09:45Dave Ramsey:And you've got 25 hours a week, so we need a new job. Yes, sir. That's true. You're starving to death.

1:09:54George Kamel:Not technically, because I still have the$22 ,000.

1:09:57Dave Ramsey:Not technically, but I mean mathematically you don't have any money is my point.

1:10:03George Kamel:That is correct.

1:10:04Dave Ramsey:And the reason is you don't have much income, so we've got to work on your career, kiddo.

1:10:09George Kamel:Yeah, and I have no retirement. Zero.

1:10:13Dave Ramsey:Well, we've got to work on your career, kiddo. You got$22 ,000 in the bank, and you're living in a rental property, and you've sold your house, and you've gone through a divorce. Okay. And you're scared, which is understandable. Okay.

1:10:26George Kamel:Not to mention stressed.

1:10:27Dave Ramsey:Yeah, stressed and scared. No, that's fair. Okay. But let's just pretend for a second. If we could wave a wand, and we don't have a wand, and we're not going to do it. I know. But let's pretend for a second. Let's say you started making$50 ,000 a year.

1:10:45George Kamel:I've never made$50 ,000 a year.

1:10:47Dave Ramsey:I said, let's pretend. Okay. Go with me on the ride, girl. All right, here we go. You're making$50 ,000 a year. You have$4 ,000 a month coming in. You're 61. You have$22 ,000 in the bank. All of a sudden, everything changes. My point of this pretend ride is that your problem is an income problem. Yes. And so when I fix the income problem in our pretend ride or our dream here for a second, all the stress and the fear starts to go away because it all really revolves and goes back to that one thing. And that's our biggest deal here. So have you got some bad knees? Okay, do you have a degree in anything?

1:11:32Dave Ramsey:No, sir. What's the most you've ever made?

1:11:39George Kamel:$36 ,000.

1:11:40Dave Ramsey:Cool. What were you doing?

1:11:43George Kamel:I was working at a municipal airport as a custodian working for the city.

1:11:49Dave Ramsey:Cool. How long ago was that?

1:11:52George Kamel:Two years.

1:11:53Dave Ramsey:Oh. Two and a half years. Not bad at all. Okay. Well. Could you still do that kind of work physically?

1:12:00George Kamel:No, sir.

1:12:01Dave Ramsey:The knees are gone, huh?

1:12:03George Kamel:Amen. Yep.

1:12:04Dave Ramsey:Okay. All right. Because I was about to put you into the maid service business because you can make$25 to$50 an hour cleaning people's houses, but that's probably not going to work here. Okay.

1:12:14George Kamel:No. No.

1:12:15Dave Ramsey:So this is how I want us to be thinking. I want to be thinking about what we can do that gets Jenny's income rocking. And it might be a self-employed thing because that way you can kind of control it rather rather than just looking for a J-O-B. A 61-year-old with bad knees looking for a job is tough. Yes. Okay. But if we dream up something that you could physically do, that'd be pretty cool. Okay. What's another good job you've had in the past?

1:12:48George Kamel:I've been a caregiver. I've been a cook.

1:12:51Dave Ramsey:Oh, those are great.

1:12:54George Kamel:I can't do caregiving anymore, though, because of my knees and my back. Yeah.

1:13:01Dave Ramsey:You could cook.

1:13:03George Kamel:Yes, sir, I can cook.

1:13:05Dave Ramsey:Okay. There we go. Let's talk about that a minute. I don't know. I'm just dreaming with you here because I do know that 25 hours a week as a cashier is not our plan. It's not going to get us where we need to go. So something's got to change. You agree with me on that? Absolutely. All right, kiddo. All right. So I think you can do this. We've just got to start, you know, I want to stick my head up through the fog of the fear and start looking for the sunshine again and start aiming at something. That's where I'm trying to go with this conversation. Okay?

1:13:36George Kamel:Yeah.

1:13:37Dave Ramsey:Yeah. Because I think you've still got stuff you can do, and I don't know exactly what it is, but I'm going to go figure out something that I start making$25,$30 an hour, and I'm able to do 40 or 50 hours a week, and I'm able to do it with your back and your knees. And that's possible. There's things you can do with your mind and with your cooking. It doesn't always have to be manual labor, right?

1:13:58George Kamel:Right. I love the up cycle. I've got a bunch of furniture that needs to be sold.

1:14:06Dave Ramsey:It's fixed and sold, yeah. Yeah. You ever been on eBay?

1:14:12George Kamel:I am technically challenged.

1:14:16Dave Ramsey:You ever been on Facebook Marketplace?

1:14:18George Kamel:Could someone help you get a little Facebook Marketplace account set up? You ain't grandkids around? Take some iPhone pictures and list it?

1:14:24Dave Ramsey:It's your grandkids to show you how to set up an eBay store and a Facebook Marketplace store. Let's start buying stuff at garage sales and reselling it.

1:14:31George Kamel:I'd love that, but I already have enough stuff here to sell.

1:14:34Dave Ramsey:Well, go ahead and sell it. Let's start with that stuff. You've got a good inventory to get started. Let's get a Facebook Marketplace up and use that to sell the crap off and get that storage unit cleaned out. And then you can go buy a chair for$2 at a garage sale and sell it for$50 on eBay. Okay. And you can make$100 ,000 a year screwing around with that. There's entire businesses around this. I'm excited, Jenny. This is going to be great. But you're going to have to get somebody to teach you this technical stuff. But, hey, I'm 65, and I've learned enough of it to get through it. I mean, there is one guy that works here that fixes all the stuff I break.

1:15:12Dave Ramsey:But other than that, I mean, you can learn how to do it. You can do it. Hey, hang on. I'm going to send you a copy of Ken Coleman's book, Proximity Principle, which will help you with your career idea. But I think you need to start buying and selling stuff on eBay and Facebook Marketplace. Try that out on the side. Yeah. There was a guy one year that made, what was it he made? $800 ,000 only reselling golf clubs. Wow. He would buy used golf clubs at a garage sale, shine them up, and resell them on eBay. And he made$800 ,000 in one year.

1:16:02Dave Ramsey:Our question of the day is sponsored by Why Refi. You didn't take out private student loans hoping to default, but life happens. Why Refi won't shame you. They'll help you explore a real plan to get back on track. Head to yrefi.com slash Ramsey to find out more. That's the letter Y-R-E-F-Y dot com slash Ramsey. Not available in all states.

1:16:27George Kamel:Today's question comes from Spencer in Texas. I have my$1 ,000 emergency fund and my three months of expenses already saved. I'm planning to get engaged soon and have a question. Is that money I made and contributed pre-marriage our$1 ,000 and three months of expenses? or should I take out half of what I contributed and put it towards a joint investment account and have her slowly rebuild the other half of the emergency fund? This way, it won't feel like she's marrying into financial security and all the sacrifice and dedication I made before we got married.

1:16:58Dave Ramsey:A thousand dollars?

1:17:03George Kamel:In the three months of expenses on top of that. So he has both. He's got a fully funded emergency fund. He's saying, should I take out half and make her build it so that she doesn't feel like she's riding a gravy train.

1:17:14Dave Ramsey:Let me help you, son. That ain't a gravy train. It's just an umbrella. It's not like you're some prize.

1:17:23George Kamel:Oh, my gosh. This is wild. No, do not do that at all, unless you want to start off your marriage with resentment.

1:17:30Dave Ramsey:And don't start off your marriage trying to be her parent. Really dumb idea. Yeah, I'm going to make her learn her little lesson, the little lady. Oh, my God, you arrogant. No way, dude. She's going to smack you left away from Sunday. This ain't going to work.

1:17:45George Kamel:It sounds like you're bitter for some reason because you're saying, I made all the sacrifice and dedication. I don't know what she's bringing into this. Maybe she's got some debt. Maybe she hasn't been as disciplined with money as you have. But this is a recipe for disaster if you approach your marriage like this.

1:17:58Dave Ramsey:You've got some pre-marriage counseling to do, honey. And I hope somebody talks straight to you in that process because the words you're using are not going to help you relationally. you're going to struggle and you're going to struggle fast if she's got a backbone that is so um yeah i'd love to see this conversation play out though uh no yeah just for the entertainment yeah yeah yeah but not but not because it's going to be successful no successful is honey you really hadn't done much yet so don't be patting yourself on the back so hard you'll twist your elbow. The second thing is, is you don't want to use language on your spouse ever, especially when you're just about to get married.

1:18:42Dave Ramsey:This sounds like a parent instead of a husband. A husband is a teammate, not a parent. And you're not there to teach the little lady lessons. That's not your role. If you think it is, you're about to have a long freaking life. And so y 'all got some work to do on all this.

1:19:01George Kamel:Yeah, I would not get engaged until you're actually comfortable combining your entire life instead of dangling this as some sort of punishment and thing to be earned. Yeah. How about it's your job to serve your spouse?

1:19:13Dave Ramsey:Oh, that'd be different. Hmm.

1:19:18George Kamel:Because if you're going, well, she's got to put in 50 % and I got to put in, that's going to be just tit for tat scoreboard keeping. That's an exhausting way to live. Yeah.

1:19:27Dave Ramsey:And your job is to serve each other. So that's how this works. We're there for each other. We're not there to keep score. Man, scary. Austin, Wichita Tech, Kansas. Hi, Austin. How are you?

1:19:46George Kamel:I'm good. How are you?

1:19:47Dave Ramsey:Better than I deserve. What's up?

1:19:51George Kamel:So long-time listener. Finally jumped on the plan here in the last month or two. Looking in a year, should have all my consumer debts paid off, and another probably four months after that have my emergency fund saved up. My question is when it gets to the part of saving a down payment for a house, we currently own a home, have a mortgage on it, and our five-year plan would be to find something a little bigger. So would you recommend, I mean, could we count our equity as part of a down payment and should we still save up a down payment or move on to four, five, and six and pay extra towards the house, or how would you go about that?

1:20:33Dave Ramsey:Well, I mean, you're going to sell the house, right? Correct, yes. Yeah, so then you've got the equity in your hand, and that is the down payment. So sure, of course that counts for the down payment. And if you want more than the equity to put down on the next house and you have some savings built up too, I guess that would be ideal, wouldn't it? Yes. What's the house worth? How much equity have you got now?

1:20:58George Kamel:So we owe about$94 on it, and it's worth around$140 ,000,$150 ,000.

1:21:04Dave Ramsey:Okay, so you've got like$50 ,000. And how long before you do this deal?

1:21:09George Kamel:I mean, we're obviously not looking until we get the emergency fund and all that saved up. So it's within the five-year plan, but, of course, it's finding the right. Okay, so five years from now, maybe you owe$75 ,000, and it's worth$200 ,000. Yeah.

1:21:26Dave Ramsey:Okay, which would then mean that you're – I'm just making the numbers up. But, I mean, then you'd have like$125 to put down, and you might have saved up some money too. Okay.

1:21:36George Kamel:The other way to do it is just use the mortgage as a forced savings plan and just start plowing through that mortgage once you guys are debt-free with the emergency fund, and then you have all the equity. Maybe you pay it off before you buy the next one, and you sell that one. You got all the cash from the proceeds minus the fees, and you roll that into the next one. That would be pretty cool. Yeah. Yep, that was definitely an idea. I didn't know if we should go more towards that route or putting it in savings and having it cashed on the house. I'd pay the house down. I'm with George. That's what I did personally, and so that's, you know, I do as I say.

1:22:08George Kamel:That's how I like it.

1:22:10Dave Ramsey:Aaron's in Davenport, Iowa. Hi, Aaron. What's up?

1:22:14George Kamel:Hey, me and my family of six are looking to move to the border of South Sudan and Uganda as missionaries in a few months. And we're trying to decide whether we sell the house or rent it.

1:22:27Dave Ramsey:How long will you be there?

1:22:30George Kamel:Indefinitely.

1:22:31Dave Ramsey:Sell it.

1:22:33George Kamel:Okay. Yeah.

1:22:36Dave Ramsey:That would be easy. Yeah, and I would put the money in a mutual fund.

1:22:40George Kamel:Yeah, what should we do with the money?

1:22:41Dave Ramsey:I'd put it in some good mutual funds and just let it grow. And I assume you've raised support for your missionary endeavor, right?

1:22:49George Kamel:We're almost finished raising support.

1:22:52Dave Ramsey:Okay. So you won't need this money to eat. Correct. Yeah. So I'm just, I would sell it. I don't want to be managing a rental property from Uganda. No, thank you. That's a bad idea.

1:23:06George Kamel:We did have a friend who was going to like manage it for us. That's really scary. Okay.

1:23:12Dave Ramsey:That's how you get the Harley oil changed in your living room. Yeah.

1:23:16George Kamel:Okay.

1:23:16Dave Ramsey:No, no. You know, something where you don't have to think about it because you're entering with four kids. You're entering a completely different culture. And, you know, you're going to be on the cutting edge doing missionary work. And you need to be completely focused on that and not worried about the air conditioner that broke back home in Davenport, Iowa. Okay. You know, mutual funds, they don't have any maintenance. Okay. And so I'm trying to simplify your life so you can focus on ministry, in other words.

1:23:51George Kamel:Okay. Well, thank you. I appreciate that.

1:23:53Dave Ramsey:Yeah, that's what I would do in your situation. If I were in your situation, that's exactly what I'd do. Sell it, pop the money in mutual funds, and then when you – if there is a point that this missionary endeavor is over and you come home, you got much more money than you started with because it's all sitting there in that investment building up. and you take that big old chunk of money and you buy you a house wherever you're going to land when you come home.

1:24:19George Kamel:The thing about that, if that money sat there for about seven years, it could double.

1:24:22Dave Ramsey:It will double.

1:24:23George Kamel:So that's a pretty good deal versus the hassle factor. Well, unless it sat

1:24:26Dave Ramsey:there 14 years, it would double twice.

1:24:28George Kamel:I like that plan.

1:24:30Dave Ramsey:Yeah. And so I don't know how long they're going to be there, but yeah, you sit indefinitely.

1:24:35George Kamel:Forever's a long time.

1:24:36Dave Ramsey:Yeah. Going with that.

1:24:37George Kamel:But to that end, Dave, a lot of people go, well, I'm moving. Should I keep it as a rental?

1:24:41Dave Ramsey:No, that's what we're saying.

1:24:42George Kamel:A lot of people experience that, especially long distance. They They go, well, Dave, it's a good investment.

1:24:45Dave Ramsey:No, it's not. Real estate can be a good investment when properly structured and properly managed. But it is a much higher hassle factor than mutual funds. And so, no, I...

1:25:00George Kamel:You want to be an intentional real estate investor, not by default.

1:25:04Dave Ramsey:Exactly. Exactly. I want to say, okay, I've got this pile of money. I'm getting ready to go on the mission field. Would I go buy a rental house or would I put the money in a mutual fund? I'd go put the money in mutual fund. And I love real estate, but not in that situation I don't.

1:25:47Dave Ramsey:We've all done dumb things with money. I've done them with zeros on the end. One of the biggest mistakes I see people make with money is not having a plan for it. You've got to have a plan. You've got to be intentional, and you need to get a budget. You have to tell your money where to go so you're not wondering where it went. Our budgeting app, EveryDollar, helps you do just that. It's the easiest and fastest way to make a monthly plan for every dollar you've got coming in and going out. Now's the best time to get started before the ridiculous holiday spending season gets here and sucks you in because you didn't have a plan.

1:26:20Dave Ramsey:Don't let that happen. You're done making that mistake. Go download every dollar for free in the App Store or Google Play today.

1:26:42Dave Ramsey:welcome back to the ramsey show george camel ramsey personality number one best-selling author is my co-host i'm dave ramsey sarah is in phoenix hi sarah how are you i am blessed how are you better than i deserve how can i help

1:26:58George Kamel:well i'm not sure if i have a husband problem my kid problem or a selfish problem um i am the breadwinner in my family. I have 19-year-old twins who are going to a local community college on a presidential scholarship. I feel like I have failed them because I was never able to save for their college. My daughter wants to become a doctor, and she's saving every dime she's making for her dream, and my son's undecided at this point. So they both live at home, and I pay all their living expenses. Of course, they pay when they go out or or whatever outside of that. My problem is, well, besides I feel like I failed them, my husband and I haven't been on the same page for many years.

1:27:50George Kamel:You know, I know what it takes to earn a dollar and I've worked two full-time jobs in recent years to get out of debt.

1:27:58Dave Ramsey:Did you say two full-time jobs?

1:28:01George Kamel:Yes.

1:28:02Dave Ramsey:Wow.

1:28:02George Kamel:Yes. Yeah, we were about$100 ,000 in debt. When I got laid off in 2011 due to my job getting outsourced, I'm in software development, and that's when a lot of jobs were getting outsourced, including mine. So, yeah, we piled up debt with daycare. And you worked two jobs and got rid of the debt.

1:28:25Dave Ramsey:And so what's your question about him? I don't understand. Yeah.

1:28:28George Kamel:Well, so when I was pregnant with my kids, he hurt his back and 19 years ago. 19 years ago. Yes.

1:28:37Dave Ramsey:Okay. And actually for the first probably seven years, he literally was in

1:28:44George Kamel:severe pain and has had multiple surgeries on his back. He's been addicted to Oxy and all the other pain drugs. His last surgery was 2017, maybe, in which was a game changer. He is now opiate-free. He does smoke weed. Can I say that? Sorry. To manage the pain, but that's all he really does to manage the pain. And he gets his Social Security, and he's happy with that. and how old is he 65 right now 65 yes okay and he's not working he's not worked in 19 years right wow right but since 2017 it was simply just because he didn't want to right and so i'm not denying he doesn't have back pain now he does and yeah welcome to being 65 but i have back pain right yeah

1:30:00Dave Ramsey:i mean he's obviously been through a lot and and he's clear but he's clear of the drugs and He's clear of that. So why do you think he has no ambition? Because he gets his Social Security and a small check from his prior employer.

1:30:17George Kamel:You know what THC does to the ambition centers to the brain, don't you? Now what?

1:30:23Dave Ramsey:It shuts them down. There's no such thing as an ambitious weed smoker. They're all mellow and perpetually hungry. Yep. Gaining weight, too, huh?

1:30:41George Kamel:No, he's been pretty much the same over the years. Good.

1:30:46Dave Ramsey:Okay. That's good. Because that doesn't help the back, obviously. But, yeah, that generally goes with the munchies.

1:30:51George Kamel:Yeah. So you're clearly building resentment for the last 19 years now because you've been carrying the load, you know, mentally, physically, to take on the work. What is the actual problem at hand we're trying to solve right now? because it sounds like there's multiple things. You feel bad as a mother for not cash flowing your kid's dreams. You're angry at him. He doesn't have the ambition. Are you still trying to accomplish a financial goal that you're working so hard for? Or is this all you know? I want to retire one day. And, you know, he just bought a brand new truck. With cash? Well, two-thirds of the cash.

1:31:33George Kamel:We have a...

1:31:34Dave Ramsey:And you went along with that. So you get what you tolerate. Since 2017, you've tolerated this, and he didn't buy a truck without your knowledge. You went along with it. Did you co-sign for the truck? Yes. Yeah. So you've got to decide. You can't gripe about this stuff when you freaking participate in it. Okay? So 2017, his back's okay. The pain is down. He's able to go to work and you don't push the issue eight years ago. So and, you know, he wants to. But he just bought a new truck. No, he didn't. We just bought a new truck. You went with him. You signed the papers. You can't blame that on him.

1:32:21Dave Ramsey:You did it. So, yeah, you guys need to sit down with a good marriage counselor because you're quickly losing respect with the guy you're going to spend your twilight years with. and so um yeah he he the the you guys need to get aligned on where you're going with your dreams and you're not you do have but what you have is a marriage problem that's what you have it's not a husband problem it's a marriage problem but you get what you tolerate and so um the difference is at our house where was i doing that sharon would have confronted that about 35 seconds after she felt like i should have gotten a job she you know her idea of hard work she grew up on the farm and so she would have been going what do you what are you what's your butt doing on the couch while i'm working this don't play and i mean we we speak hillbilly at our place it's pretty direct so you know that's not you know so that that's what it is you've been tolerating this for so long that it's become normalized and he bless his heart he probably thinks it's all okay It ain't okay, by the way.

1:33:28Dave Ramsey:I agree with you. But your part that you played in it is by allowing it. So I think the two of you need to sit down with a marriage counselor immediately. This is not going to go well if you don't. Because, you know, you're going to go into your later years and you're going to get increasingly pissed. And that's not a way to spend your old age. So, yeah, that's what's going on. Yeah.

1:33:51George Kamel:And it sounds like he might have lost some purpose. He might be depressed. And so he got to find his mojo. That'll do it. That'll suck out all the ambition.

1:34:01Dave Ramsey:That'll do it. That was the sound of ambition leaving the room. I heard it. Yeah. So sorry, boys and girls. I know that offends some of you, but oh, well, it's, this is actual data. It's not just Dave's moralistic opinion. And, um, you know, yes, I'm old and yes, pot's been around longer than you. So that's how this works. So, yeah, it's just more normalized these days. When I was a kid, it was like a dangerous drug and we were all going to hell. But now it's like a normal thing. So, you know.

1:34:34George Kamel:But it has real effects.

1:34:35Dave Ramsey:It does.

1:34:36George Kamel:One of those consequences is you're not going to be like, I'm going to go run a marathon now. Let's go. Yeah.

1:34:42Dave Ramsey:I'm going to tackle the world and open a business and I'm going to go be somebody. Said no weed head ever. Thank you.

1:35:29George Kamel:Hey guys, Rachel Cruz here with a big announcement. The Ramsey Show Live is going on tour. This is your chance to no longer just listen on your daily commute, but be in the room where life change happens. We're removing the wall between caller and audience so you can take part in money confessions, hot takes, and more. Plus, you'll hear live callers get answers to their pressing questions. I'll be in Chicago on September 30th alongside George Camel and Ken Coleman. Then George, Jade Warshaw, and Dr. John Deloney will be in Orlando on October 2nd. Tickets start at$39 and are limited to just 300 seats in each city.

1:36:07George Kamel:So don't wait, especially if you want one of the 50 VIP tickets that includes a meet and greet, the best seats in the house, and more. It'll be a night full of hope, community, and the kind of energy you can only get in person. Get your tickets today at RamseySolutions.com slash TheRamseyShowLive or just click the link in the show notes.

1:36:43Dave Ramsey:Jess is in Charlotte. Hi, Jess. How are you?

1:36:47George Kamel:I'm good, Dave. How are you?

1:36:49Dave Ramsey:Better than I deserve. What's up?

1:36:52George Kamel:Yes, sir. So I'm kind of in a mess, but I feel like I'm still young and learning. So I have about, you know,$3 ,000 in credit card debt. And I've sold my car and tried to consolidate some other debt. And I took out a personal loan. But that is at a very high interest rate, and it's about$8 ,000. And then I have at$72 in student loans. and I'm 72 ,000 72 ,000 yes sir okay yeah and I'm pretty much my current job is current causing a lot of health issues and I I'm not supposed to have like a second job technically but I have a small cleaning business that you know I do make good money but I can't do it full-time out of fear of you know leaving my full-time and not well why is your full-time causing health issues it's just a lot of high demand and and a lot of you know trying to get people in trouble behind

1:37:52Dave Ramsey:their backs and things like that and that doesn't cause health issues it's stressing me a little bit

1:37:58George Kamel:um i even ended up in like the emergency room so it ended up in the emergency room because of anxiety um more like heart like issues they're thinking it was they were thinking cardiac cardiac but not is stress-related.

1:38:14Dave Ramsey:More like a panic attack.

1:38:16George Kamel:Yeah, could be. But, you know, I'm only 33, so I shouldn't be...

1:38:23Dave Ramsey:What do you make at the stress job?

1:38:26George Kamel:About$70 ,000.

1:38:29Dave Ramsey:What do you do?

1:38:32George Kamel:I work in, like, human resources. In what? In human resources.

1:38:37Dave Ramsey:Human resources. Yeah. So you're the office all the stress comes and sits in.

1:38:46George Kamel:Yeah. In case you can say that.

1:38:49Dave Ramsey:Yeah. How big a company?

1:38:53George Kamel:It's pretty big, way over 500 employees, way over 1 ,000, actually. So it's pretty big.

1:38:59Dave Ramsey:Is leadership not doing anything about the toxic environment?

1:39:04George Kamel:Not as much as they should. Changes have been made, but it's difficult, and it's going to take some time to get control of it, to be honest, in my opinion. Nah, just start firing them.

1:39:18Dave Ramsey:Are you in a position to do that?

1:39:21George Kamel:I'm not. I'm not. I can get control of it in about an hour and a half. I bet, but it's so much red tape. It's only 500 people.

1:39:33Dave Ramsey:That's not red tape. I got 1 ,100 working here.

1:39:36George Kamel:Yeah, well, it's over 500. It's a huge, it's massive.

1:39:41Dave Ramsey:Well, is it over 10 ,000 or over 500?

1:39:45George Kamel:I would say it's over 2 ,000 people.

1:39:50Dave Ramsey:Okay, that's a little different than 500.

1:39:53George Kamel:Yeah. I'm so confused.

1:39:55Dave Ramsey:Okay. Okay, so you're in a job that sucks and you can't do anything about it, but it pays good. Yeah. So you need a new job, huh?

1:40:05George Kamel:Yeah, and I've been trying. I'm trying really hard. I am. I'm applying all the time. But, I mean, I guess as of right now, I'm just, I think the debt is a lot as well. It's just, but I don't know if I can't just quit because that'll make it worse.

1:40:19Dave Ramsey:No, you can't quit. You're broke. Yeah. But you do need a new job that pays the same amount and doesn't have all the good trash in it.

1:40:27George Kamel:Yeah, absolutely. If you didn't call us, what was going to be your next move? honestly to pull my retirement from retirement and pay off what i can and then try to scale my

1:40:39Dave Ramsey:cleaning business a lot glad you called us first yeah that's borrowing money and you're going to be hit with your tax rate plus 10 so you're going to be hit with about a 30 or 40 percent hit and that's like saying dave and george i want to borrow money at 40 percent interest to open my cleaning business no bad idea so why do they not allow you to work on the side um it's just

1:41:01George Kamel:in the clause. I think this should be, I think what they're saying, it should be your primary focus and you can't have anything outside of it, like a part-time job. And then sometimes we have to work overtime, so eight to five could easily go from eight to six or seven. Okay.

1:41:25Dave Ramsey:Well, I don't think you've got a methodology to jump straight to the cleaning business because I don't think you can grow your cleaning business big enough that you're comfortable walking away from a$70 ,000 income. Yeah. So you've got to walk into another job that does not have the contractual obligation to have no side hustle. And then you take your side hustle and you grow it until it gets big enough that you've got some confidence. Right now, it's a dream. It's not really proven. Yeah. Because it's a small amount of money. It's nowhere near$70 ,000.

1:41:59George Kamel:Yeah, absolutely.

1:42:00Dave Ramsey:Yeah. So you need a new job first that pays you what you make now or more, that's not got the horrible environment, and does allow outside work, and then you begin to work on your other stuff. Meantime, you do have$70 ,000 plus a little bit coming in from your side hustle, your illegal side hustle, and that means you can begin to attack this$3 ,000 credit card.

1:42:24George Kamel:Okay. Which means no more switching around the debt, consolidating the debt. We're just going to attack the debt. We're going to move through it. Yeah, you got to bust right straight into it.

1:42:32Dave Ramsey:You do make$70 ,000. I mean, hello, girl. You're bringing home$4 ,000 or$5 ,000 a month? Thank you. Yeah?

1:42:37George Kamel:Almost, yeah, just about. How big was your tax refund last year? Not much, honestly.

1:42:44Dave Ramsey:Okay, good, good. And you're not investing right now at all?

1:42:48George Kamel:I am into my retirement.

1:42:50Dave Ramsey:Yeah, I would stop your retirement temporarily and let's attack this debt head on.

1:42:54George Kamel:Okay. And, well, see, I'm forced to do my job. we can't not do it because it matches it, so we have to take out a certain amount.

1:43:03Dave Ramsey:No, you don't. Not unless you're in a governmental position or working for the railroad. Okay. And you're not in either one. You should know that. You're in HR. There's no such thing as mandatory retirement in a private company.

1:43:22George Kamel:Okay. Okay, I'll definitely look at that. And I guess my thing is, I think my biggest one is the consolidation debt. Right now it's like at$8 ,000, but the interest rate is crazy. The biggest one is you need to cut up a stupid credit card and get it cleared,

1:43:35Dave Ramsey:and then you work on the$8 ,000. $11 ,000 cleans up a lot. Okay. And$11 ,000 out of 70-plus cleaning toilets, you can get there pretty quick. The interest rate only makes. If you stay out of restaurants and you don't go on vacation. And I'm going to send you a copy of Ken Coleman's book, Proximity Principle, which will help you actually get those applications through because just sending an application randomly is of no value when you're looking for a job. That's come up several times in the last couple weeks with me here on the air, George, and it seems to be a thing. Like we had one guy said, I sent out 160 applications and no one called back.

1:44:14Dave Ramsey:That's because all you did is fill out applications. We filled under 200 positions at Ramsey last year, and we had 15 ,000 applications. Do you think we looked at all of those? No, we did not. So how did it get out of the pile? Some way or another, someone differentiated themselves other than just blindly filling out stuff digitally just to throw it against the wall, see if something sticks. And one way is you know somebody that works there and you go, hey, at least give my buddy a look here. He or she's good, right? And that's called the proximity principle. And I'll send you a copy of Ken Coleman's book.

1:44:53Dave Ramsey:But just sending out applications is a complete waste of calories. Don't bother. No one's going to call you and go, you know, out of 22 ,000 people, you're the one. No, that doesn't happen because you're not the one.

1:45:08George Kamel:Well, all the resumes look the same now because everybody's just using AI to write the resume. And then it filters out the AI resumes. And so we're back at square one. You've got to know someone.

1:45:17Dave Ramsey:One of the things we do. AI is used at Ramsey to filter out AI. How fun is that? It's come full circle. The robots are fighting the robots. Yes. Someone needs to take them down. It's a beautiful thing. Yeah, that's good. So, yeah, that's what you've got to do. And meantime, I think I'd be having some frank discussions with leadership if there's so much toxicity and stress sitting in an HR department that their culture sucks that bad inside the organization. I'd be having some conversations with leadership about what we can do to clean this up. Like, who needs to be fired?

1:45:52George Kamel:Yeah, it should not feel like a reality show over in HR.

1:45:55Dave Ramsey:Yeah. And I can fix that. Let them take their crap somewhere else.

1:46:24Thank you.

1:46:54Dave Ramsey:If you're tired of living paycheck to paycheck and feeling like you can't get ahead, join one of our free EveryDollar trainings. These are trainings that are happening every week this month, and they're always hosted by one of the Ramsey personalities. George, when's the next one you're doing? I got one tomorrow. Whoa.

1:47:12George Kamel:So if you're watching this on August 19th, join us on the 20th for the webinar.

1:47:16Dave Ramsey:We're going to show you how to stick to a budget, and in the process you're going to find thousands and thousands of dollars a margin. Use every dollar so you can get out of debt and start building wealth. And you can ask us any question during the live Q &A, which is rather entertaining and fun. By the way, did we mention it's free? Go to RamseySolutions.com slash webinar. Lisa's in Vegas. Hi, Lisa. What's up?

1:47:39George Kamel:Hi. Thank you so much for taking my call. So we are a one-income family, and my husband and I, he's a stay-at-home parent for now while our kids are young. That's a choice that was really important to us. We have a rental property that brings us about$500 a month. And we decided last year to, well, a couple years ago, to start a company. The company did okay, but did not work out all the way. And between some investments that didn't work out and that company, right now we are$75 ,000 in debt with a HELOC.

1:48:20Dave Ramsey:You lost$75 ,000 on this startup?

1:48:24George Kamel:Yes. Yes, we had several things that didn't work out, and we also were not wise with our money.

1:48:32Dave Ramsey:Wow, that's an ouchie.

1:48:35George Kamel:Yeah, yeah. And then our car died in November, and because we had this T-Log, we couldn't use our regular credit union for a low-rate interest loan, and all of our savings had been used up in that. So now we also have a$285 monthly payment on a car that's worth about$10 ,000.

1:48:58Dave Ramsey:What do you owe on the car?

1:49:01George Kamel:Just about$11 ,000. No, so it's about$10 ,000.

1:49:05Dave Ramsey:So how much can you get out of the rental property?

1:49:08George Kamel:So the rental property, the equity that we could get out of it would be$186 ,000. Good.

1:49:17Dave Ramsey:Sell it and pay off all your debt.

1:49:20George Kamel:And that's kind of what we wanted to know. We really want to get...

1:49:24Dave Ramsey:Yeah, when you lost the business, you lost the rental property.

1:49:27George Kamel:Okay, got it.

1:49:29Dave Ramsey:That's what happened. You just didn't admit it because you borrowed it.

1:49:32George Kamel:Uh-huh.

1:49:34Dave Ramsey:So, yeah, now you've got a high-interest car loan. You've got to quit borrowing money, girl.

1:49:39George Kamel:Yeah, we're trying. No, you're not.

1:49:41Dave Ramsey:You just turned around and bought a car. You're not trying hard. You've got to stop borrowing money. It's killing you.

1:49:48George Kamel:No, we just started your program over the last month, and we've done everything that you've said. Good. So we're heading that way, so thank you. Good.

1:49:57Dave Ramsey:Please, please. I mean, I want you to win. What do you make?

1:50:01George Kamel:I make about$80 ,000.

1:50:03Dave Ramsey:Okay, good. And with no car payments and no HELOC payment, can you guys make it?

1:50:10George Kamel:Oh, yeah, absolutely. We're completely fine. Prior to that, we were almost debt-free other than our mortgage.

1:50:17Dave Ramsey:How much is owed on the mortgage?

1:50:19George Kamel:So our personal mortgage, we owe$228 ,000.

1:50:24Dave Ramsey:Cool. Okay. Well, I'm going to fully fund it. I'm going to pay off all my debt out of the$180 ,000. That's going to use up$100 ,000 of this, or it's going to use up$90 ,000 of this. And then I'm going to build an emergency fund of three to six months of expenses.

1:50:43Dave Ramsey:And that's probably$25 ,000 here. Something like that.

1:50:47George Kamel:Yeah, we're thinking about$30 ,000.

1:50:49Dave Ramsey:And then I'm going to put a big chunk on the house and let's start talking about getting this house paid off.

1:50:55George Kamel:You'll knock that mortgage down to like$150 ,000 and start knocking that out. One of the questions I had also is, well, one of our main goals to getting out of debt is we want to be able to save money for our kids' college. And so our oldest is about to turn 10. So we have about eight years.

1:51:14Dave Ramsey:If you want to take five grand each and get the college fund started with your SmartVestor Pro, that'd be fine. Okay. And then let's chunk the rest of it on the house and make sure we're doing our 15 % of our household income now into retirement. That's baby step four. Kids' college is five. Six is pay off the house. And so that's what it's going to put you because you're going to be out of debt and have the emergency fund with the sale of the rental. The good news is you had something that bailed you out. the bad news is if you don't learn your lesson next time there's not going to be something to bail you out so you really have to draw a line in the sand and say okay that 2025 year that was the year we promised we're never borrowing money again for anything freaking ever no matter what it's a big shift if you commit to that you're going to be just fine no matter what comes your way well stuff comes your way it's going to be hard it's not as hard as going into debt and not having a rental property to sell to get out.

1:52:10Dave Ramsey:So you'll be in a pinch next time. No payments with an emergency fund. You'll be in a different position. Yeah, you'll be in a sweet land. That's an awesome thing. Absolutely. Cody is with us in Seattle, Washington. Hi, Cody. How are you? I'm good.

1:52:23George Kamel:How are you doing today?

1:52:24Dave Ramsey:Better than I deserve. What's up?

1:52:26George Kamel:Excellent. I have a fun marital debate for you guys to try and sell for me and my wife. Okay.

1:52:31Dave Ramsey:Okay.

1:52:34George Kamel:We are debating on whether we should pause 401k investing to pay off the house.

1:52:44Dave Ramsey:How much is owed on the house?

1:52:46George Kamel:400.

1:52:47Dave Ramsey:What percentage of your income are you putting into 401k? 15%. So you're doing what we teach. Okay.

1:52:56George Kamel:But there's a slight catch to that, though. I don't know if this matters or not, but our employers, they don't do matching. They just do profit sharing at 15%. That's why I was on the side of let's just do it and pay the house off and be free of this. What's your household income?

1:53:16Dave Ramsey:$250 ,000. Okay, so it's only$45 ,000 a year. Yeah. $45 ,000 a year doesn't solve a$400 ,000 problem.

1:53:31Dave Ramsey:I mean, if you stop your 401k, you benefit 45k. You owe 400. That's a 10-year plan.

1:53:41George Kamel:Well, we're currently on track to pay it off, and we just started throwing after we paid all our debts and everything off. Yeah, how much are you throwing at the house now?

1:53:53Dave Ramsey:How much are you throwing at the house now? 100k. 100k? a year. Okay, so you'll be done in four years without this, and if you do this, you'll be done in two years. Yes. That's the only difference? No, not quite. Yeah, it's about an 18-month difference, actually. It's not a full two years. Okay, and how much is in the 401ks now? 700. Okay, and how old are you guys?

1:54:22George Kamel:I am 38, and the wife is 35.

1:54:26Dave Ramsey:Okay. All right. You've done a great job, by the way. Congratulations. There's not a wrong answer to this. There's no answer in this that puts your face in the stupid column. I mean, this is, both of these are smart things, both ways you're going to end up ahead.

1:54:40George Kamel:You'll either be a multimillionaire or a multimillionaire. So it's just, that's your call. That's your call.

1:54:46Dave Ramsey:Yeah. So what we're arguing about is not philosophically stopping a 401k, what we're arguing about is 18 months faster or 20 months or 24 months faster. That's all we're arguing. It's two years faster or not.

1:55:01George Kamel:Where are you putting the 45k in profit sharing? Because you can't, I mean, you'll max out a retirement plan pretty quick.

1:55:07Dave Ramsey:No, it's 45k. He's putting in 15 % and then they're throwing 15 % in on profit sharing on top of it. That's why the thing's grown so fast. Did I understand that right?

1:55:16George Kamel:Yes, that's correct, Dave.

1:55:17Dave Ramsey:Yeah, and you get the 15 % from the company whether you put in anything or not, right? Yes, sir. Okay. And you've already got 700 in there. Yes, sir.

1:55:31Dave Ramsey:It's a technical argument. And truthfully, the core answer is it doesn't matter. You're going to be a multimillionaire or you're going to be a multimillionaire. Like George said, that's the core answer. It's because you've done such a good job on everything else. And so the only argument is 18 months or 24 months, which one do we want to do?

1:55:53Dave Ramsey:And my tendency is just to stick with the baby steps because they worked so well. And I would just take a little bit longer and pay off the house and not worry about it.

1:56:04George Kamel:And at your age, that level of missing out on investing 20 years from now.

1:56:08Dave Ramsey:That's a lot.

1:56:09George Kamel:That's a lot of money. You're leaving it on the table by not investing.

1:56:12Dave Ramsey:And make sure all that's Roth so that it's growing tax-free from this point forward. But, yeah, I'm probably going to just stay right where you are with the 15 % and take four years pay off the house instead of taking two. But it's, truthfully, I'm not going to be mad at you either way.

1:56:35George Kamel:What's up, guys? George Kamel here. If you've been thinking about making a real difference in your community, this is your moment. People are drowning in money stress right now, and you can be the one who helps them by leading a Financial Peace University class. It's totally free for you, and we hook you up with all the tools and support you need. So if you're ready to help people ditch debt, save money, and actually sleep at night, go to fpu.com slash lead to learn more. That's fpu.com slash lead.

1:57:18Dave Ramsey:Our scripture of the day, Galatians 6, 9, Let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up. Max Dupree said, We cannot become what we want by remaining what we are. Mara is with us in St. Paul, Minnesota. Hi, Mara. How are you? Good.

1:57:39George Kamel:Thank you so much for taking my call.

1:57:40Dave Ramsey:Sure. How can we help?

1:57:43George Kamel:So my husband and I are 33 years old, and we are on baby steps four, five, and six. Good. Through my husband's job, he has some RSUs as part of his compensation, And so we are looking at using a large portion of those to start doing some non-retirement investing. And I just wanted to get your thoughts on a wealth manager versus a financial advisor. We've only met with a wealth manager so far. And I had a little bit of pause just in how they kind of actively manage your money for you.

1:58:27Dave Ramsey:Okay, explain what they were doing.

1:58:31George Kamel:Well, this was just an informal first call with them. But from what I gathered, they would have access to our accounts, and they would actively be choosing what type of investments. No, thank you. That's what I thought, knowing that I'm a longtime listener of yours.

1:58:53Dave Ramsey:No, thank you. Um,

1:58:55George Kamel:yeah, I did your job, not theirs.

1:58:57Dave Ramsey:They don't, they don't get to mess with my money without my permission.

1:59:01George Kamel:Okay. I did meet with one of your smart investor pros about five years ago, or we both did. Um, he was a financial planner and it was kind of just a one-time touch point where he, um, gave us some recommendations on what to do with our 401ks at that time. but he really didn't try to pursue any type of follow-up. So we're looking to have more of a relationship, which I am understanding.

1:59:29Dave Ramsey:A smart investor pro should be an ongoing relationship that they teach you about investing. They never do a transaction without you first having approved it, and you are in charge of your money. But they're there to advise you, to help you, and to teach you. and so my SmartVestor Pro has been a personal friend for 25 years, and he'll just call up and go, Hey, Dave, did you know that such and such is happening with the tax changes? And I went, Hmm, that's interesting. He goes, You know, you could move that over there. I went, Oh, that's a good idea. Okay, thanks for calling me. Yeah, let's do that.

2:00:03Dave Ramsey:And that's how the conversation sounds. But that's after me functioning with him for 25 years. But in no case am I giving them the keys to the car and telling them to drive wherever they want to go.

2:00:15George Kamel:Yeah, okay. I'm trying to just sort out. I think, again, we met with a financial planner. I think we're looking for more of a financial advisor this time where he's, like you said, advising us how to do things with money and teaching us. Yes. But not.

2:00:30Dave Ramsey:A lot of it might be semantics. I think your smart investor pro is really what you're looking for, I think, in this situation. And you just, again, you're doing some non-retirement investing in some good mutual funds. You're going to pick the mutual funds. You're going to pick the strategy that you're going to use. You're going to want low turnover mutual funds because you're not going to be taxed as you go because low turnover means they don't sell the stocks inside of it, doesn't activate the taxes. And when you do take the money out, if you left it in there at least a year, it's going to be taxed at capital gains rate rather than ordinary income rate.

2:01:02Dave Ramsey:So that's a low turnover ratio set of mutual funds is a great way to position this particular portfolio. But you need to go sit with someone and learn all of that and then agree to that. And then they say, OK, here's some examples of some funds that do that. Yeah, let's go with that one. And I don't like that one. And I like the track record on this one. And tell me what I'm missing. And they can talk to you. But in no case are they driving the car. This is not Ferris Bueller's day out with my money.

2:01:29George Kamel:Yeah, what that leads to is you call us three years from now and says, my financial advisor did all this crazy stuff for my money and I had no idea. You're going, why weren't you involved?

2:01:38Dave Ramsey:Yeah. Yeah. So that's what this is the definition of how a SmartVestor Pro works. And that's why we have them. And that's why we vetted them to do that. And so, you know, I would just jump online and interview two or three of them in your area and find the one that matches your all style and your personality the best and that you have the most comfort with. Explain exactly what you're looking for. But again, you are making 100 percent of the decisions with your money. When you don't do that, you're about to get screwed because you've got someone that doesn't have as much money as you making decisions for your money.

2:02:12Dave Ramsey:That's dumb. No, we're not doing that. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Please, no, please, no. So good question. That's interesting. All right. Jake is with us in Los Angeles. Hi, Jake. How are you?

2:02:24George Kamel:Good. How are you, Dave?

2:02:25Dave Ramsey:Better than I deserve. What's up?

2:02:28George Kamel:Yeah, thanks for taking my call. So I'm a 25-year-old PhD student in aerospace engineering at the University of Southern California. And my question is, or I guess some quick background is, I've been following your advice for about six or seven years now. I finished my undergrad degree in aerospace engineering debt-free four years ago. And then I got my master's degree in aerospace engineering at USC two years ago debt-free as well. Wow. And a lot of my friends who didn't get a scholarship finished in, you know,$100 ,000,$150 ,000 of debt. And they'll be spending, you know, a long time paying that back.

2:02:59George Kamel:But my question is, so I've been in the PhD program for four years. So I got my master's degree two years into that. And I got the master's degree for free because the PhD pays for your master's degree tuition. So I kind of followed your principles and made sure that I didn't go into debt for that. Good for you.

2:03:13Dave Ramsey:But my question is, sorry? I said good for you. Well done.

2:03:19George Kamel:Yeah, thank you. So my question is, yeah, so I've been in the PhD program for four years. um i kind of see and there's not really an end in sight as far as when i might finish it might be a year two years from now um and i'm not necessarily gonna be making any more money and it's a very multifaceted decision but um i'm just kind of curious you know from a financial perspective whether i should drop out or not because on one hand i do have a four-odd scholarship and it can get me the rest of the way through um but i'm not necessarily gonna be making any more money and i'm kind of missing out on the opportunity cost of you know they pay us about 90 000 free tuition but but that doesn't really do much to pass a certain, you know, taking more classes doesn't really help that pass a certain point.

2:03:58George Kamel:But they do pay us about$45 ,000 for living expenses as part of the scholarship. But if I was in industry, I could have been making, you know, $100 ,000 or$110 ,000 the last couple of years. And if I stay in the program a couple of years longer. Why did you enter the PhD program? Yeah, that's a really good question. So for me, kind of the two careers long-term that I'm kind of bouncing between are the PhD program in the first place was so I could get the free masters and I can kind of decide from there what I want to do. So I didn't want to go 100k in depth, but I want to go to USC. And then once I got here, I kind of figured out if you want to become an astronaut, which obviously is a very far-fetched goal, you kind of need the PhD to do that as a civilian, as a non-jet pilot.

2:04:40George Kamel:So that's kind of the reason I kind of continued. And USC obviously is a good school socially and everything can be that, but you probably don't want to hear. But then there's this other side of me which wants to go be an entrepreneur. You don't really need a PhD for that. And financially, I'm just kind of, you know, throwing away opportunity costs. You know, I could be making a lot more salary and I could be, you know, starting side hustles and stuff like that, which I can't really do right now. So you got to do dissertation to close it out.

2:05:08Dave Ramsey:And what is the, what's the shortest possible timeline? Because you said the timeline's a little bit vague, Why?

2:05:18George Kamel:It's different for every PhD, and that's kind of the way. Some PhDs are very clear cut, and some are not super clear cut. I would say the shortest is probably about a year, but two years might be on the table as well.

2:05:35Dave Ramsey:Why would it take longer than a year?

2:05:41George Kamel:I would say it just depends on the progress of the research. I made a lot of progress the last year or so,

2:05:45Dave Ramsey:So you're down to your dissertation. That's it.

2:05:49George Kamel:Yeah, most likely.

2:05:51Dave Ramsey:Have you just lost steam on it?

2:05:52George Kamel:You're just not excited about it anymore? Okay. Yeah, I'm not as excited. And I'm also, again, there's just kind of the... You're itching for some real-world experience.

2:06:02Dave Ramsey:I'm not sure. I have a couple of friends that have funny stories about their dissertation periods.

2:06:11Dave Ramsey:but the impression I got from them and their stories was that the dissertation is a little bit like writing a book the first time I wrote a book I learned this, well actually it was about the third time I wrote a book before I finally got this advice from a real publisher that knew what they were doing he said, you're never going to get finished you finally just stop and print it so you're never going to get finished you need to finish this you need to put it on a timeline And if you can be done in a year, I would stick it out and knock it out.

2:06:41George Kamel:You're 25. You're not running out of time.

2:06:43Dave Ramsey:I'm going to knock this out in a year. I'm going to finish this. I'm going to limit the amount of research. I'm not going to go down all the rabbit holes. I'm not going to win an award on the dissertation anyway. I just want the Ph.D. I'm going to finish this. That puts us out of the Ramsey Show in the books. We'll be back with you before you know it. In the meantime, remember, there's ultimately only one way to financial peace, and that's to walk daily with the Prince of Peace, Christ Jesus.

2:07:07George Kamel:Up next, we are headed out to Chicago and Orlando for the Ramsey Show Live. Yep, you heard me right. We are taking this show to you. This is going to be everything you love about the Ramsey Show, except you get to be a part of it. Part of what, George? The Ramsey Show Live. That's what I'm telling them about. Ramsey Show Live in here? Nope, we're doing it on the road. You're going to Chicago with me and Rachel Cruz September 30th. Are you free? The Windy City. I like it that time of year. You know what else I like, George? I like the deep dish. Oh, okay. Maybe we'll have some deep dish. You mind if I finish the promo?

2:07:41George Kamel:Is that okay with you? Okay. Okay. Appreciate that. Questions and answers, real conversations, and I'm sure a few surprises here and there. George, are you in here talking about TRS Live? I am, Jade. I'm trying to talk about it. Nice. So that means it's actually happening, right? It's happening. If I could tell the people, I think it could actually come to fruition. Listen, just tell me when and where. You don't know? Okay. We're going to Orlando. You're going to join Dr. John Deloney and I October 2nd. Yes. Okay, great. I'm gonna go pack now. Thanks, George. Please, please do that. Go. Pack. Hey, George, speaking of packing, is this like sweater weather or is it not that cold yet in Chicago?

2:08:17George Kamel:What is happening? Can I please just get to how they buy the tickets? Geez, I thought it was a good question. Okay. This is not an arena tour. This is a one-night-only event in Chicago and Orlando. General admission is only$39, plus there's a VIP experience if you're bougie like that. But here's the thing. There's only 300 seats available, So get your tickets now at ramsysolutions.com slash events. Hey, how come you get to go to both cities? I just go where they tell me, man. Hey, have you been there the entire time? Maybe. Okay, and also, are you reading a children's book? I'm expanding my mind, George.

2:08:54George Kamel:That's how we got those PhDs. Yeah, that's probably where you got that jacket. Okay, see you on the road, John.

2:09:07Thank you.