The Truth About Your Money Is Less Scary Than the Story in Your Head

21:29Dave Ramsey:Lorraine is with us in Arizona. Hi, Lorraine. How are you? I'm doing well. How are you guys doing? Better than I deserve. What's up? My question is more of a what would Dave and Dr. John do? So I'm currently on baby step three with$5 ,000 in savings. My income is$64 ,800 a year. We have a house on the market for$405 ,000, 6.24 % interest rate. We own the house for less than two years. The new bills around us is selling for$350 ,000, and they're offering a really good interest rate. So I don't know how we will compete. We may be coming to the table with that we'll have to bring money to the table to close.

22:15I'm recently divorced, I'm 24 years of marriage, and the house that I'm staying in is 51 % of my monthly budget. And in October, it's going to go up$200 because of taxes.

22:27Dave Ramsey:What's the house? What is owed on the house? We owe$393. Why do we owe$393 after a divorce? I guess you do, right? Well, we still co-own it, so we still co-own the property. Well, why is he not co-paying it? He's moved out, so he's in an apartment. I thought you said you got a divorce. Are you in the process of a divorce or the divorce is final? The divorce is final. He's in an apartment, and I'm in the house. I got that. So the divorce decree has you paying a bill you can't afford. Right. Where are you going to get the money if you have to bring money to the table? That is what would Dave and Dr.

23:12John do.

23:13Dave Ramsey:I don't understand the divorce decree. Is the divorce decree that you're going to get? Yeah, why did you sign up for a divorce decree that said, I'm going to pay the payments until this house that we can't pay, that we can't sell, sells? So we're explaining the difference. So let's say, for example, if his rent is$2 ,200, then I apply$2 ,200 to the mortgage, and we split the difference. But with it going up, now it's even more. So what did you exactly get in this divorce decree?

23:46Dave Ramsey:Is there any, did y 'all get anything but problems? Just problems that we have to uncouple. So you got debt. This is all you got. There's no money in the divorce. Yes, we have debt. Yes. We also have a house in Florida that we're, that's with a property manager and we're renting. And that lease ends May of next year. And we're hoping that the renters will buy the property, but there's equity in that property. What is that? What is that house worth? So it's around probably$375. We owe around$320 on that property. But the same issue is happening there. New bills in the area is offering low interest rates, and the prices is less.

24:29Dave Ramsey:Okay, I can help you with that one. I'm not waiting until next year. I'm going to offer it to the tenant now and get rid of that house. I don't know what you're doing with a Florida house, whether you're broke, a Florida rental house. Right. So you need to get rid of that house now, both of them. need to go now is the answer to your question. And wouldn't it be cool if you got enough equity out of the Florida house if they bought it right now to cover the hole that you're in in Arizona? We reached out to the property manager, and they're talking with them, but they need to make sure that they qualify.

25:01Dave Ramsey:Wait, wait, wait, wait. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. The property manager has a vested interest in this not selling so that the property manager can continue to collect property management fees on a renter. They don't get any unless the property manager is getting a commission on the sale, are they? And he's going to facilitate both, which is kind of weird. So do I retouch the rent for myself? Well, yeah. I don't want them squirreling this sale. Okay, so retouch the rent for myself. Yeah. Okay. I don't even mind paying the property manager or the real estate commission. That's fine. I'm not trying to cut them out.

25:33Dave Ramsey:I'm just trying to make sure a sale occurs. You need to get out of this house. Both. That would be amazing. Yeah, and if you got enough money out of that, wouldn't that be cool to cover the hole that you're in in Arizona and then boom, we're gone, we're done. Right, we're done with both properties. That's going to be my plan. That's plan A. Any other blind spots or any other? Yeah. I don't know.

26:05Dave Ramsey:I'm not familiar with any market in Arizona that has gotten in trouble like that, where the builders, that's very weird. I kind of think you're panicking in the middle of this because you're broke, and so you may be dealing off of bad information. I want you to get a real estate agent from the Ramsey Trusted Group in Arizona and have them come out and look at that house, and let's see if we can get that house listed properly for what it will sell for. I mean, if everything else in the neighborhood is going for$350, and you've got it listed for$405, well, nobody's going to do that. But if there's some kind of a difference between your house and those houses, lot size or attributes of the house or something like that that justifies the difference, then that's a different thing.

26:51Dave Ramsey:But an agent should not list a property$50 ,000 over valuation, especially when it's a divorce and they need to get rid of the stinking house. We need to price it in such a way that it sells. So you need to get another agent to look at that. and I'm also going to contact a Ramsey trusted agent in Florida if I'm you and have someone outside the property management world look at this house and tell me what it's worth and you know even if you pay some commission out to I don't mind paying people to do stuff as long as it gets done it's this thing where everybody's getting lined up to get a chunk of this deal and there's nothing here because nothing gets sold so I need both of these properties gone on ASAP and you guys to move on with your lives.

27:38Dave Ramsey:This is rough. Yeah, the only thing I can think of, Dave, is if there's a HELOC on that property or something. But I've never heard of a divorce decree where somebody, quote unquote, gets the house, but then it's my job to run and sell it because I can't afford it. And that's not a win. It would have been better to do it. The job is we carry the house together that we bought together until it's sold together. But if that would be normal. If your ex-husband decides he needs a$2 ,200 a month apartment and we're going to deduct that from what he's paying in this, then he can go get himself a live in the back of somebody's house until we get this thing covered.

28:13Dave Ramsey:Yeah. Yeah. Bad deal. Yeah. Just a bad deal all around. Bad idea. Yeah. Yeah. Good point. I need a$2 ,200 rent while I've got two houses that I can't afford. While my ex-wife and my kids can't eat. Yeah. That's probably not a good plan. Right. Yeah. Good point. Good point. Jason's in California. Hi, Jason. How are you? I'm doing pretty good, Dave. How about yourself? Better than I deserve. What's up? So we recently had a few things kind of happen that have recently took out our emergency fund, and now we're finding ourselves in some debt. And we're very fortunate that we do have investments in retirement and some property and some assets we can draw on to pay for it.

29:03I was just thinking if there's anything else I should do before we pull out money from investments to cover the debt.

29:11Dave Ramsey:By investments, you don't mean retirement accounts. You just have money in like a brokerage account or a mutual fund. So we have a couple of things. So one, we have some retirement accounts and Roth IRAs. We have about a little over$200 ,000-ish. I haven't checked. We're trying not to look at it. So we have about$200 ,000-ish in other retirement account, about$85 ,000 in just straight investment accounts, so it's not a tax-advantaged account. And then we have a rental property as well. And what was the debt you took on and for what? So we had some issues with the rental property that kind of creeped up on us and had to happen at once, and then a medical issue.

29:56So right now we're looking at about$15K that we need to figure out.

30:01Dave Ramsey:Well, take it out of the$85K. Why would you borrow money when you've got$85K sitting there? So, yes. I mean, at the time we were just like, well, we don't want to pull more money out and pay the extra taxes on it. No, instead we'll pay interest to a stupid bank. No, get it out of there and pay taxes on it and pay the dadgum debt off. No, absolutely not. And, dude, I think this rental property is not a blessing. It sounds like it's a curse. You can't afford it. Well, you know, it's been great. You can't afford to do the repairs on it. Yeah, it was poor planning on us. We didn't have enough set aside to, like, cover a surprise.

30:41Dave Ramsey:Well, no, it's not a surprise. It's a rental property. Nothing on a rental property is a surprise. It's guaranteed. It's going to happen. So I think you probably need to sell the rental house because I think you've got a rental house, you owe more on it than you're not cash flowing enough to screw with the thing. And you're walking around acting like you've got an investment. Sounds to me like you've got a mess over there. But for sure, don't borrow money to fix stuff like this when you've got$85 ,000 laying over in a brokerage account.

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33:02Dave Ramsey:well i'm excited about this idea have you ever wanted to watch us do this show in person Now lots of people come and we've always got 50 to 200 folks outside the window here. We in the lobby of Ramsey Solutions, our studios are on the glass. And so you can come and watch us do the show from one to four central time every weekday, Monday through Friday. But here's an idea. We decided we're going to take the Ramsey show on tour. So we're going to take this show out, put it on us, put it in the theater and let you guys come watch. That's kind of fun. We're going to do that this fall. You can experience live Q &A, raw confessions, crowd debates, and a local debt-free scream.

33:42Dave Ramsey:It's all happening live in your town. Rachel, Ken, and George will be doing the show in Chicago on September 30th. Jay, John, and George will take the stage in Orlando on October 2nd. Tickets are a whole$39. Ooh. And there's only 300 seats, so we keep it small. You guys are going to be asking the questions. We're not taking call-ins. It'll be walking up to the mic, ask a question. And this is the kind of thing that you don't get through the headphones. You don't get this in your earbuds. You're going to experience the whole thing with 300 of your closest friends. So it's going to be a lot of fun.

34:24Dave Ramsey:You've got to be there. So, again, Chicago, September 30th. We're announcing this today. These seats will be gone in a heartbeat. They're only$39. There's only 300 of them, okay? So, and Orlando, October 2nd. and grab your tickets at RamseySolutions.com slash TheRamseyShowLive, or you can click the link in the show notes, and we'll get you on there. John, this is going to be fun. Yeah, I can't wait. It's going to be a blast. My favorite thing to do is get on the road and tiny little theaters like this, people asking questions, Q &A is going to be off the rails a little bit. Yeah, the only difference is we really can't screen your call.

35:00Dave Ramsey:That's right. So if you insist on being very weird, it's probably going over the air. so um you know we can't we can't help you we can't protect you from yourself you know so um where kelly might actually school you up if you called in here right now kelly would say don't do that that's weird you're going to get yourself in trouble or she might say say that really loud because you're going to get yourself in trouble but either way it could happen either way kayla is in canada hi kayla welcome to the show hello i am a long-time listener but unfortunately not a long time doer. My husband and I started FPU over the weekend and we are going all in on the Ramsey plan because our plan has sucked.

35:41We're in baby step two and our only debt is a$55 ,000 personal loan to a family member. And so due to a lot of why our plan has sucked, since we've been married, I've had a bit of trauma around money and basically have been squirreling away a ton of money in different savings, not a ton, but money in different savings accounts. So it's been holding us back from paying off this loan because I can't let go of these savings. And, you know, we've decided as a couple that we're going to pay off from our savings, get it down to$1 ,000. And so that's about$9 ,500. Great. Good for you.

36:19Dave Ramsey:Try something new if what you were doing wasn't working. I like you. Yeah, that's what we're going to do. But my question is, we also have$8 ,000 that we've been setting aside every month in our kids' savings account. You said$8 ,000 a month or a total of$8 ,000? No, no, no, sorry, a total of$8 ,000. So in Canada, every month, we get what they call a child benefit check. It's based on your income and towards raising your kids. And when we had our first daughters, too, when we had her, we decided we were going to put this money aside in the savings account. and eventually invest it. And it's not for education.

36:58We want to save it until she's of age to buy a house because we live in a very expensive part of the world. What's your household income? Our household income, right here, we have our take-home is$9 ,000 base pay a month, and then my husband gets commission as well, and it's been averaging about$1 ,500.

37:20Dave Ramsey:Okay. And your question is whether to use the kids$8 ,000? yeah do you throw that no no okay no you're gonna you're gonna you're gonna your brain is your brain's gonna not like you and your brain's gonna wake you up in the middle of the night saying you stole money from your children and you don't want your brain telling you that um not for eight not for eight grand okay now i gotta tell you i there's i would stop putting the child credit money in that account you are not ethically or morally bound to do that that money's for taking care of the kids and we put that in the budget because we take care of the kids so that's just part of the income of the family just like child just like child support is part of the income of the family same thing it doesn't have to go into the kid's name and you know it costs more than child support it costs more than you're getting from the government with this benefit to raise kids so um you know that you're spending more than that anyway so just put it all into your budget, use the whole thing, and then lean into this and really, you're just getting started, and you're going to knock the remaining$44 ,000 out really quick, or$46 ,000 out really quick.

38:31Yeah, that's the hope. Well, Kayla, can I tell you something? It's going to sound like I'm being mean, but I'm not. I'm just, it's the pot talking to the kettle here, okay? Yep. Part of taking care of your kids is financial. Part of taking care of your kids and your situation is you're an anxious mess and your house is electric, isn't it? Yep. Yes. So part of taking care of your kids is saying that anxiousness, that worry, that constant fretting, not sleeping, snapping at people that you love, you're going to do the work on yourself for that too. Okay?

39:05Dave Ramsey:We're going to send you a copy of Building a Non-Anxious Life by Dr. John. I've been there. Okay. I've actually listened to your book already, Dr. John. Well, good. Thank you. Good. I'm going to send you a hard copy also, just as our gift. Okay. All right. Thank you. You're going to do this, Kayla. You're going to push all the way through. You're just getting started. But no, I don't tell folks to take money out of their children's accounts unless it means the only way the family can eat. And that's definitely not the case for you guys. And the$8 ,000 doesn't really even speed up the thing anyway.

39:34Dave Ramsey:You're going to do it so fast with your great income. If you get this budget cranked down to beans and rice, you're going to be just fine. You're going to be just fine. Melissa's in Chicago. Hi, Melissa. How are you? Hi, Dave. Thank you for taking my call. Sure. How can I help? So I'm 23 years old, and me and my sisters always have this talk about when it comes to dating, how do we tell potential candidates that although we can financially support ourselves as we're doing right now, that that's not necessarily what we want in a relationship without coming off as a gold digger. I'm sorry, not necessarily what you want in a relationship.

40:18Dave Ramsey:What is it you don't want in the relationship? So basically, I want to be able to support myself 100%, which is what I'm doing right now. But in a relationship, I don't want that to be, you know, what is normal nowadays, which is 50-50 living together and splitting bills and things like that, at what point in a relationship do I say, hey, that's not really for me? We're going to combine everything and we're going to take on the world together. And at what point do you make that conversation? Exactly. Yeah, you do that when you find somebody. And then you decide to get married and then you combine everything and go get them.

40:58Dave Ramsey:Yeah, but I mean, at what point in the day? Obviously not the first date. Right. Yeah, yeah. Let me show your credit report. Here's the biggest thing. Here's what I think people are trying to game, and this is a direct derivative of how much dating apps have screwed up human interactions. But you have already made a checkbox for the person you want to marry, which is all well and good, but you in turn have made yourself a checkbox too. Here's the greatest gift you can give somebody that you meet. show up and be fully you. And you're a person who works really hard. And you're a person who at 23 is paying your own bills.

41:39You don't owe anybody any money. And you may be a person who one day...

41:43Dave Ramsey:I'm not dating a guy who lives in his mother's basement and spends 52 hours on call of duty, but hasn't ever had a call to real duty. Right. And you're not a gold digger if you say, one day I want to be a stay-at-home mom. Or one day... That's not gold digging. That is saying, here's a value I have, and I want to be with somebody who is anchored into those same values. Yeah, and I wanted to start off the call with that of being a whole stay-at-home mom, but I just thought that was just jumping to it. No, no, there's nothing wrong with that. But we're just talking together. In other words, you have to be married to someone who is as productive as you for that to work.

42:19And who shares those same values. It's not going to work. If somebody says, oh, I don't want to date somebody who is able to support themselves at 23 and wants to be a stay-at-home mom someday, then run! Run from that person. Don't apologize for who you are. Not a match. Not a match. Don't apologize. You're doing great.

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44:15Dave Ramsey:Welcome back to the Ramsey Show. Dr. John Deloney, Ramsey Personality, is with me today to answer your questions. Jonathan is in Lexington, Kentucky. Hey, Jonathan, how are you? Hey, how's it going, Dave? Better than I deserve. What's up? So I just wanted to run something by you guys. Never really been in this position. So I went through a pretty rough divorce over the recent years, and it's kind of left me with all the marital debt. When was it final? Um, it was final, it was actually finalized, uh, mid last year. Um, so it's been a year. So yeah, yeah. Just about a year. Um, and it's kind of, how old are you at the point?

45:02Dave Ramsey:I am 32. How long were you married? We were married. We were together in total about two years or 10 years, um, married. And how much marital debt did you get with your broken heart? I think I got, it's right around$40. Okay. On what?

45:23Dave Ramsey:Mainly credit cards and then vehicle loans. How much is on the car? On the cars? I think hers was like$20 and mine was, I got it down to like$10. Okay, so you're paying for her car and the divorce? divorce uh yeah because my name is on it and i kind of got stuck with it so what about i mean it's over now but here's a suggestion for those of you out there listening she sells the car we can't afford it we're going through a divorce okay anyway past that now next thing and so you've got about 10 in credit cards yeah and what do you make um so right now Right now I'm just north of 50 a year. What do you do?

46:16I work in solar.

46:19Dave Ramsey:Okay. Right now my actual title is warehouse manager. I'm also in the field doing logistics, all kinds of stuff. Any idea how the bill changing is going to affect your job? What's that? Any idea how the tax credits going away at the end of the year with solar is going to affect your job? Yeah, so the residential customers are going to be the ones that will be... Oh, you're doing industrial solar. Yeah, we do both. Yeah, the residential customers are going to dry up. Yeah. So we're getting hit right now, but yeah, that's going to slow down. Oh, it's going to slow down. You're going to get jammed between now and the end of the year.

47:02Dave Ramsey:It's got to be installed, not just purchased by the end of the year for the residential customer to get those credits. So, all right, so you're making 50K, but you're working like a bazillion hours, right? Yeah, I'm working. I work about probably about on average 50 hours a week. Okay. And like I've tried doing things right. Is she paying her car payment right now? So from what I learned, she got a whole different car. Well, where's the car? She sent it back to the dealership, from what I understand. That kind of defeats the purpose of I'm on the hook for the loan. You just got repoed. Yeah, so I can't really get much communication with her.

47:55She's not the easiest to deal with. I can tell.

47:59Dave Ramsey:So that car, you're not paying anything on that. So you have$10 ,000, you have$20 ,000 worth of debt. You make$50 ,000 and you work all the time. So you haven't got time to spend any money. You got kids? Yeah, so we have one kid, one child. He's three. He'll be four in February. So you're having to talk to her about that, aren't you? Yeah, and even that is a fight in itself. Oh, I'm sure. I'm sure. Okay. all right well baby you don't have to worry about the 20k right now it's going to worry about you later i'll come back to that but right now you got 10k on a car and 10k on that so 20k you're debt free um no wait you're not getting overtime you're on straight salary no yeah i'm hourly but yeah it's overtime oh the overtime is the 50 grand yeah roughly yeah what are you getting paid How much are you getting paid?

48:53Dave Ramsey:Because it doesn't sound like a lot. 24 an hour. Yeah. Okay. So I started here about a year ago because of the job I did have. From the mass amount of court dates she drug us to, I ended up losing the job that I was making a lot of money at. Okay. So let me stop you a minute. John, I'm hearing in Jonathan's voice a lot of pain. Yep. You're frozen, brother. and a lot of heartache. And it's kind of clouding your brain's math skills, but that's because your heart is so broken that it has flooded your brain.

49:36Yeah, you're not wrong. So you're getting to take advantage of in multiple different places of your life, and I think what you need more than anything right now is to recognize. You ever been to the beach, dude? Yeah, I grew up in Daytona Beach. Okay, so you've been there when you feel like you can't swim anymore, and suddenly you stand up and the water is up to your waist, but you thought it was up to your, like, over your head? That's where you are right now. Yeah. You've proven to yourself in the past that you can work and you can make great money. You're crushing it right now. You're working a ton of hours.

50:09You're trying to hold together, like, being a good dad, even though this woman is wrecking you financially. She's making it very hard to be a good parent, all those things. but if nothing else after this call just in the water you're in stand up you're working way too hard in an industry that is literally going away underneath you with one stroke of the pen in Washington stand up yeah and use the next few months to get back into a job where you can make that kind of money you're that good of an employee you're that good of a man you just got hit right in the mouth in in the part that hurts the most um in your romantic life and in being a parent right yeah yeah um access to my son is i had a price tag put on it um and it's very limited at that even even though i'm doing everything i'm trying to do everything and well listen you're trying to

51:07Dave Ramsey:make somebody happy who's not going to be happy we've already concluded that so i need to put her in a box over here in my mind and just let her sit there. And then let's get back to building up the things we can build up. The things you can control, she's not on the list. The things you can control are what you do with your money, what you do with your time, and what you do with your spiritual walk and your emotional recovery from going through a tragedy of having your heart ripped out and stuff down your throat. I can hear it in your voice, dude. What I'm telling you is you are like 10 times better than you feel like you are.

51:42Dave Ramsey:you are in a much better place. You only need to pay off$20 ,000, and then we'll go back and deal with the repo later that the stupid chick did, and she's going to get hammered with that too. But you can deal with that for pennies on the dollar later. But right now,$20 ,000 makes your life whole. Stand up. It's not that deep. The water's not that deep. You can do it. And work more there. Work more somewhere else. Add hours everywhere. Work like a crazy man. And let's just get this mess cleaned up as fast as we can. Cut up those credit cards, quit using them. Don't go out to eat. Don't go out for a beer with friends.

52:17Dave Ramsey:Just work and work on healing your heart. Make sure you're in church on Sunday. And, you know, that's where you are. So your math is not as bad as your hope. Your hope is really low. Your math is not bad. You can push through it once you know you can. And that's what John and I are both hearing, listening to you. You're in a much better place than it feels like you are.

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54:46Dave 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 in all states. Today's question comes from Molly in California. Molly writes, I have two preteen stepkids. My husband and I recently went through their iPads, which their mom has full access and control over. We saw that the kids have their own Apple Pay accounts and they are free to buy whatever, whenever.

55:27My husband and I don't agree with any of this and think this creates bad habits since she's not teaching them how to save or even how money really works. Plus, the money isn't earned. It's just given. How can we start teaching the kids the right way to handle money? And should we do anything about the Apple Pay accounts? My guess is, Dave, they can't do anything about the Apple Pay accounts other than when they walk in the door, the iPads go in a box. and when they're at dad's house, they get a ringside seat in how money works. And for that matter, how life works. How life works. I always tell parents, when you get divorced and your kids are sharing time at either house, you transition from a day-by-day, hour-by-hour influence to a 10-year influence.

56:14You want that 25-year-old to look back and say, thank God this parent held the line because this parent didn't. You can't win the who is the cool parent or who's the free parent or who's the whatever parent because often they're – and when parents won't be adults and co-parent together for the best interest of the kids, it gets real competitive and the kids are the losers there. Yeah.

56:36Dave Ramsey:The normal situation like this is there's not – the ex-wife is not going to take input from y 'all. Zero. I mean that would be normal. It would be unusual for your husband and his ex-wife to be on good enough terms that he could have a sane discussion about this and say, hey, I know what you're doing there, and we're going to start teaching the kids to work, to save, to give, to spend wisely. And is there any way we could work together on this? And let's talk about these Apple Pay accounts, or is there a way we can – let's talk through instead of them having just unlimited access, because they're not in Congress, so they don't get unlimited access to money.

57:16Dave Ramsey:And so is there any way we can talk – If you could do that, that would be the best thing and get her on board. But you can't fix. Otherwise, you just you can't do anything about the time we're there with her. So they go over, you know, well, I mean, mom allows us to smoke pot. Well, you don't do that at our house. You know, mom allows us to drive her car and we're 12. Well, but you can't do that at our house. And so, I mean, I'm sorry. And you don't need to talk bad about mom, although apparently she's nuts. But but you don't have to tell you. Don't say that to the kids, whatever you do. Don't say that to the kids.

57:47Dave Ramsey:So anyway, all you can control is when they're at your house, as for me and my house. And so, you know, a less extreme situation and a less controlling situation even than you've got is like when grandkids are at my house. I don't know what your mom and dad may do that, but Papa Dave, we don't do that here. This is my house. Well, I'm at Mimi's house. Yeah, well, guess what? Mimi lives with me, and we own this house. And our house, this is what we do. yeah well uh this is one of the discussion this is what we're doing and uh we don't do that here and you can do you might do that over there but you don't do that when you're here and so it's up i can't control what you do somewhere else but when you're at my house this is what you're gonna do and so you guys just keep saying that and you know and i'm definitely picking up the ipads put them in a box when they walk in the door pre-teens don't need to be having unlimited iPad access, even if there's not an Apple Pay account.

58:48But that also means, Molly, you and your husband have to be off the screens when the kids are around. And y 'all are going to have to do things like play board games together or go run around and throw the ball outside. Y 'all are going to have to create a world that feels good to their nervous system and recognize you can't compete with unfettered digital access. You just can't. So we're going to play a long game. Dave, I've seen parents be successful in this very slowly through teaching kids the joy of generosity. Allowing them to do a small job, get paid for it, and then show them how fun it is to give money away.

59:24And other than... And the money that they earned. That's right. They got to earn the money. There's no joy in giving other people's money away. And be a part of it.

59:31Dave Ramsey:I like giving your money away sometimes. I know you do, but that doesn't give you as much joy as giving your money away. It gives me almost as much joy as me giving your money away. But anyway, yeah. But no, seriously, teach your children to work, age appropriately. We don't send four-year-olds to the salt mines. We might send 14-year-olds there just because they're 14. But teach your children to work, teach them to save, teach them to give, like John's talking about, and teach them to spend wisely and actually use cash. So here's a funny one. Rachel was telling me this the other day. so uh the fun uncle uncle mac her uncle uh gets these uh plastic coins from the dollar store they're not real coins they're gold coins but they're not coins they're plastic and spreads them all over the yard and hiding them has a treasure hunt so the you know the pre kindergartners all come in with these coins well one of the kids thinks he can go to the store and buy stuff with it for real and they didn't tell him any different so they went in and he he didn't want to give up the plastic coins but he finally gave up the plastic coins to buy something and then she slipped around and paid with actual money but the kid was parting with those plastic coins like he had really he really was clutching them got them you know they were my it's my money and you mean i have to give up some of my money to buy this toy yeah that's how it works and so he put those plastic coins up there like he was paying for something and in his mind he just purchased something and he gave up something that he treasured.

1:01:03Dave Ramsey:And that transaction, that feeling is so important for a kid. That's a dignity. There's dignity in that. I'm empowered. It's locus of control. I've got control of this. I get to choose to do this. I'm choosing to make the trade of my hard fought treasure that I dug up out of the yard for this toy. And there's a trade there. And I swept the porch and I got this money. I'm choosing to make this trade to buy this child a toy who is not going to have a toy for Christmas otherwise, and I'm going to be the person that gets him a toy, and that generosity breaks loose inside of him, and the DNA of generosity is inside of every human.

1:01:40Dave Ramsey:All you've got to do is source it. You're exactly right. And that's the kind of stuff you guys can do in your home. You can control what you can control, but you cannot control what they do over at Disney Mom. Right. Unfettered access to the Internet. with sex trafficking the way it is, is absolutely asinine. Yeah. It's that line Sean Ryan gave us, man. It gave me that when you give your kids those devices, you're not giving your kid access to the world. You're giving the world access to your kid. And I recently saw somebody said, the day you're ready for your kid to see pornography, that's the day you should hand them a phone and or an iPad.

1:02:25and that should send chills down the spine of every parent. But here we are. This is a real-life situation of a parent who left a marriage and wants to be the cool mom and the it's all going to be cool mom and whatever my kids want, mom. Okay, as for me and my house, we don't do iPads here. I have a prediction.

1:02:49Dave Ramsey:This woman, when her teenage daughter is 13, is going to dress like a teenager. I have a prediction. I see that coming. That's why they call you the prophet, Dave.

1:03:03Dave Ramsey:I had a college professor said, Dave, you have a firm grasp on the obvious.

1:03:10Dave Ramsey:I can see this coming. She's going to be a friend to her children. Good luck with that. You're trying to be a friend to a teenager. They just need love. They don't need friends. Can I tell you this? Their mom and dad. I mean, this is a private moment. I have a couple of riding mowers for, one of them's old, one of them's a newer one. And we're at the end of the mowing season here. We only got a couple of times before it gets cold here in Nashville. And so to have those things serviced, it's insanely expensive. Someone's got to come all the way out there and do it. And so I just ordered the parts.

1:03:46I've never done this kind of work. And my son's 15. And I said, hey, Saturday, you and I, we're going to figure it out. We're going to get the YouTube out and figure it out. We turned on some old country tunes, and we spent about six hours changing all the wires and parts on these mowers. And when they cranked up, we were high-fiving each other. And Sunday night, he said— You were both a little surprised. Well, he was surprised. He was like, Dad, you can do grown-up man stuff. But he told me last night, Sunday night, Dad, this is the best weekend I've had in a long time. It's just two guys, no screens, no internets, no buying a bunch of stuff.

1:04:23We just did stuff together.

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1:06:14Dave Ramsey:William is in California. Hey, William, how are you? I'm doing fantastic. Thanks for coming to work today, Dave. Thank you, sir. How can we help? So my question is, I'm kind of stuck between baby steps three and four. And I guess my question would be, does a defined pension benefit affect baby steps three and four? Meaning, I have a defined pension. For every year of service, I do somewhere where I work at a government agency. I get a percentage of my top rate of pay. Are you contributing? Well, so the city that I work for pays 19 % into my pension. I pay 9%, which I have no control over. That's what I pay is 9%.

1:07:02Dave Ramsey:I understand. But I also do a 457 on the side. So my question is, I'm about three months at Baby Step. I have about three months of bills in my emergency fund. But I'm kind of at a stalemate to where I can't seem to get ahead anymore. Well, you got rid of all your debt except your house. You should have margin. Well, so, I mean, I would say life in the last 12 months has changed because I now have a driver. So car insurance, fuel, that kind of stuff kind of ate up my margin, you could say. Well, how about that driver getting a job? Because she's still a teen and enjoying volleyball, travel ball.

1:07:48Dave Ramsey:Yeah, I guess. Enjoying free gas and car from dad that he can't afford. Yeah, well, I mean, we want our kids to do better than we did, right? So it's not that I don't have money in the bank, and I don't have any debt other than a mortgage. So I want to make sure my kids, you know, enjoy their teen years as long as they're acting like a proper teen. So straight-A student, no troubles. So reward that behavior. Yeah, so on that justification, you could buy her a Bentley. No, I'm smarter than that. I'm not going to waste that kind of money. If you have a 10-year-old car that's paid off, there's no debt assigned to it.

1:08:25Dave Ramsey:Won't hurt her to pick up part of the gas and insurance. It would be good for her and good for you. So anyway, I'll rest my case. As far as your 9 % going in, I would count half of it toward the 15. You need to get your three months done as soon as you can, three to six months of expenses set aside, and then you adjust your budget, and you need to be putting 15 % of your income away. You're putting nine away now. Because you don't have control of it, though, I'm not going to count it as a full nine towards the 15. If I'm you, you can do what you want to do. You are obviously doing what you want to do.

1:09:00Dave Ramsey:So, you know, that's I just yeah, I don't count the pensions full amount, even though they're mandatory, because you don't have control of what it's invested in. If they manage it well, pensions do sometimes go broke. I'm not projecting this one to go broke. I don't even know what it is, but but they do sometimes go broke and you don't have any control of it. the rates of return on the pension are nowhere near as good as if you could put it in a good mutual fund in a 401k or Roth IRA. And long before you do 457s, you do 401ks that are Roth and you do Roth IRAs. 457 is the last on the list. That's simply deferred comp.

1:09:40Dave Ramsey:And it's taxed like a traditional 401k. And it's not the best thing on your list of things to do. So I'd sit down with a SmartVestor Pro, lay out a couple of Roths, one for you, one for your wife. If your wife has a traditional 401K, I might put the money over there instead of in your 457. But as far as your 9 % that's mandatory goes, I would count it as about half. So I'd count it at 4 % or 5%. If we called it 5%, then you've still got to put in 10 % of your household income if you're the only working person. And that's what we're going to do there. So good question. Thank you for joining us.

1:10:20All right.

1:10:20Dave Ramsey:Bailey is in Texas. Hey, Bailey, how are you? Hey, Dave. Thanks for taking my call, man. Sure. What's up? So I'll give a little back story. I'm currently 25. I was living in Dallas when I was 24. March of 2024, I was in a single car accident, leaving a golf course. My first client outing during the week. We drank too much. I hit a tree going 60. I've been living with a spinal cord injury, paralyzed from the chest down about 16 months now. but early in that process we got pushed by lawyers and like ultimately we've worked through settlements and losses throughout this year and over last year and we've reached a settlement of they sued the management company for 12 months but I think ultimately I'll get around 6 I've already committed 3 into like a personal injury annuity which will feed me 14

1:11:24Is this all done? Yeah, like, I'm just, the point where, like, I'm about to get 2.7 in cash. My main question is, like, what should I do? I need to maximize that the most. I've been talking with trust officers, and I want to get some there. No, you don't need a trust officer. Okay.

1:11:46Dave Ramsey:It's now your job to manage this money. to take care of you for the rest of your life. And if it makes 10 % a year, and that's$270 ,000, you'll be okay. Right? And you've got the other money. Right, yeah. And you've got the other money as well. So you need to sit down with a good investment broker and begin to learn about investing. So just go to RamseySolutions.com and click on Smart Investor Pro and find one of the people that we recommend. in. We're not in the investment business, but these are people that we have vetted. And the main thing we do with them, Bailey, is we want them to have the heart of a teacher because their main job is to teach you.

1:12:29Dave Ramsey:So you are making the decision that they're, but, you know, so sometimes even I know a lot about this stuff, but sometimes my smart investor pro will call me up and go, hey, here's something that changed in the tax law. Here's something that changed with the investment landscape. I want to teach you about this. And based on that, you may want to look at this. And I look at it and I go, yeah or i look at it and go nah i don't think i want to go that way okay cool i just want to their their job is to bring me new information and teach me and old information and teach me and remind me of the old information that we agreed to a long time ago that keeps me on the tracks right that's what we're doing yeah sir bailey do you have a lot of people who want to get their hands on this money parents family brothers sisters that's starting to that's starting to happen yeah yeah No is a complete sentence.

1:13:12Dave Ramsey:Yeah. Okay. Okay. You need to get a pastor or some people in your corner that aren't after money that coach you up and allow you to set some boundaries with these other people. Okay? It's your job to manage this money, and it's not your job to help everybody else with it. You've got a mess on your hands, and you need this money to take care of you. Yeah. So would you advise no money in the trust at all? Yeah. Yeah. I don't want any of it in there. There's no reason for it to be in a trust. Why would it need to be in a trust? I've heard just it protects it. Like if I was at Randolphus again, they couldn't touch that money.

1:13:50And that's pretty much the only advantage.

1:13:53Dave Ramsey:Have you got outstanding litigation that may be coming at you? No. Okay. I've got no expenses, no dependents. No, there's no— But you will have expenses one day. And I'll tell you, my oldest friend in the world has had a similar situation as you, almost about the same age as when he got in a wreck. Okay. His health is better than all of ours, except the fact that he's paralyzed. And 25, 30 years ago, I never in a million years would have thought this. And so people will try to get their hands on your money. They'll try to tell you what to do with it. And so you understanding what you're doing with this and then not getting sucked into, we need rental properties and you're an idiot if you don't do this and online gambling.

1:14:43There's going to be so many temptations to –

1:14:46Dave Ramsey:Everybody's got an idea for other people's money, and it's usually broke people that have these ideas. This has to last you the rest of your life. And with medical technology, you can live a long, long, long time. Yeah. Right. So what do you think is going to make me keep the liquid in my account? Like, how much should I take to, like, say, a fiduciary investor or advisor? Like, all of it? Yeah. Yeah. But you're going to put it in there. You are the fiduciary. You're in charge of you. We're not giving this money to a babysitter. Your new career is managing millions of dollars for the rest of your life.

1:15:22Dave Ramsey:Yeah. And so that's what I mean by you've got to get with someone with the heart of a teacher. All fiduciary means is trust. That's all it means. Do I trust this person's input? it. I don't trust anybody to take over this and handle it for you. It's your job to handle it. It's your job. I got me a man, says people right before they lose all their money. No, you are the man. You are in charge. You learn it. You stay on it. You get people in your corner to advise you, but you are the man.

1:16:10Dave Ramsey:If you're tired of living paycheck to paycheck and feeling like you can't get ahead, join one of our free every dollar trainings. There are new trainings every week this month, and they're all hosted by one of the Ramsey personalities. I think Rachel's doing it this week. We're going to be showing you how to stick to a budget, and typically a person finds a good amount of margin, Thousands of dollars of room when they're using EveryDollar so they can get out of debt, start building wealth. We show you how to actually do this stuff. And there's a cool time for Q &A live in the webinar. So it's like this show, except you can actually get through.

1:16:43Dave Ramsey:Sign up for free. It's a free EveryDollar training with Ramsey personalities at RamseySolutions.com slash webinar. Jefferson is in Sacramento, California. Hi, Jefferson. How are you? Wonderful. Thanks, Scott. How are you doing? Better than I deserve. How can I help? Better than I deserve as well. So in 2015, I met my wonderful wife when I was in a very tough situation with work and life and drugs, smoking weed and all that. And when I met her, I gave myself to God. In 2016, I got baptized and since then, I've been buying houses, investing on houses, and a little bit later, stocks as well. But when, in 2022, I did a class in AFCO, which is if you want to become like a missionary or do work for God, But that's when I fully gave myself to God and really stopped smoking fully, stopped doing edibles and no bad videos or anything like that, photography and trying to just be a better man.

1:17:54But since then, after I made close to$2 million in the past 10 years, things started getting wrong and the wrong path. And all the investments that I did, everything backfire all at the same time. I lost$10 ,000 here,$40 ,000 there,$100 ,000 there. And then my guys started messing up my work. I had to start putting on credit cards after credit cards. And at that time, we were going vacation and enjoying life as well. But now I'm in close to$800 ,000 in credit cards, including personal loan and business loan. And two houses. $800 ,000?

1:18:35Dave Ramsey:Yes. Were you not working during this time? I was working, but I have not been working fully the past year and a half since the company I was working with. They went bankrupt. Yeah, but I mean, how do you spend$800 ,000 screwing around? I'm confused. I don't even know. It's just accumulated. Oh, yeah, you do. Yeah, you do. Where'd it go?

1:19:03Dave Ramsey:I mean, you said you used credit cards to cover your guys who weren't doing their work. What are you talking about? Yes. So a lot of it went to, like, they broke something at work or lost tools, so I had to buy more tools. I thought you worked for someone else that just went bankrupt. Yes, I was working with them. I was subcontracting with them.

1:19:28okay what business were you in sir uh do construction home remodeling and i have

1:19:34Dave Ramsey:so you had a remodeling company correct and who were you doing remodeling for that went bankrupt what kind of a company was that uh it was it's called zotex and they went off because they were i mean why why were they why were you not just doing remodeling on your own why were you doing it for someone else. Because I have a C-15 license, which means I can do flooring, and I was using their license as partnership to do the full remodel. And I worked with them for almost five years. Now I'm working and studying to get my own. But you did all of that, and then your guys messed up jobs because you weren't watching the jobs, and you had to cover the holes.

1:20:11Dave Ramsey:Because I had four crews, correct. So your business sucked, and it was losing money, handover fish, is where a lot of the 800 went. Correct. vacation as well, at least $150 ,200 and gave to the church as well. You borrowed money on a credit card to give it to the church? No. That's just the money that I made because on every two or three years, I would buy a house and resell it. Okay, do you own any houses now? Now I own two houses and I'm trying to sell one, but the prices keep dropping. So So what is the house worth? It was worth close to$600. Now I drop to$520. And what do you owe on that house?

1:20:59Dave Ramsey:$450. Okay, so you're going to get a little bit out of that. And what about the house that you live in? What's it worth? That one, this one, probably what I pay for,$550. And I owe$530,$520. So you barely get out of it, too. Okay, have you got your business back up and running? or how are you guys eating? How are you paying bills? So that's when things started slowing down and not having work. That's when they started buying food with credit cards, paying bills with credit cards. Yeah, but that's not the 800 grand. It ain't that much food on the planet. The$200 ,000 vacation you borrowed. That's part of it.

1:21:38You went on a$200 ,000 vacation for real?

1:21:42Dave Ramsey:Well, not one in the past 10 years. if I calculate. But while you were making no money because you weren't working and you were going on vacation. When I was working, I was going on vacation and making money. Everything was good. No, it wasn't. You were putting it on a credit card. There's nothing in that story that's good except the part where you came to God. Okay. Yeah. No, it's not good. that's uh that's when last year he went okay so have you got an income now yes or no barely barely does your wife work outside the home now no she takes care of all and how are you eating just or credit cards you haven't figured out the problem yet okay so dude you need to go get some jobs.

1:22:39Dave Ramsey:You need to go get some jobs. You've got to get some income coming in. Wow. I don't know, man. I don't know where to tell you to start exactly. I think the crisis here is in you paying attention to the adult stuff. No vacations, no eating out, and we work. And we pay attention to our work. And then nobody tears up our stuff, Steals our tools because we're on the job Anybody tries that gets fired instantaneously Because we're on the job Because we work and we work and we work And we pay attention to what's going on You don't get to coast And you've been just running around in circles man You're going to have to really get focused And go run these jobs Apparently you do know how to do construction But you suck at the math part And you need to start bidding these jobs At a profit margin And get a profit margin coming in And make some money You've got the ability to do that in freaking Sacramento, big time.

1:23:36Dave Ramsey:So you go get your license passed. In the meantime, you do anything you can do legally with the current license you have, and you work your butt off. And no more vacations and no more purchases of any kind. You don't get to buy anything. You've done all that. That is all in your past. You are now Mr. Frugal, Captain Frugal McDougal. That's you, man. And so you don't buy nothing, and all you do is work and pay bills. and maybe you can turn the corner on this mess. Maybe. I don't know. Dave, what is the, I know this is a deep source of pain. What's the moment when someone says I need to go sit down and at least put bankruptcy on the table?

1:24:16Oh,$800 ,000 in credit cards.

1:24:19Dave Ramsey:Well, the problem is that personal finance or that debt is not the problem. Debt is the symptom. And this guy, his debt is the symptom of about six things. Yeah. None of which are fixed by bankruptcy. Because if it got wiped tomorrow, he'd go figure out another way to borrow money. He's screwing it up like Christmas, man, every six-way of a Sunday. He's spending money like left and right, buying rental properties, buying stock. He's trying to do his ADD. We got stuff going in every direction. We're buying stock. We lost money on that. We bought rental property. We're losing money on that almost.

1:24:50Dave Ramsey:You know, mama's not working. He's not working much. He's not paying attention to his business. And bankruptcy doesn't fix any of that. You're right back in the same mess from the exact same causes once you, bankruptcy treats the symptom. Yeah. Now, if you get in there and you're making$200 ,000 a year and you can't keep the, you can't turn the corner and settle with the credit cards, which you could. But if you, you know, let's say it was$10 million instead of$800 ,000. If you can't turn the corner and you're doing everything right and you fixed all the stuff you were doing this wrong, you might have to look at that someday.

1:25:25Dave Ramsey:I'll never tell you to do it. Yeah. Because 99 % of the time, it's not the problem. Yeah. Most of the time, it's the stuff that's causing it that's the problem, including when I went through it. So I'm no exception. I'm no better. Man, I'm sorry. What a mess.

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1:26:42Dave Ramsey:Welcome back to The Ramsey Show. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host, Dr. John Deloney. Ramsey personality, number one bestselling author, is my co-host today. Katrina is in Canada. Hi, Katrina. How are you? Hi, I'm good. Thanks for asking. Thank you for taking my call. Sure. What's up? So my question today is I am debating on leaving my job to open up a cleaning company. I have currently been working it on the side since I was on maternity leave. I have an 18-month-old, just recently separated and moved away from his father. So it's us primarily, and I'm struggling with child care. So looking at making the switch to open up a bit of time and schedule and actually almost, I think, make more than what I'm making now.

1:27:38So, yeah, that's the outline of my question. I'm confused.

1:27:43Dave Ramsey:What are you doing with an 18-month-old while you're cleaning? So right now, Dad has him during the day, two days a week. And then he is actually paying, in lieu of paying any child support right now, he's paying for child care. So we have two different ladies that we alternate between as we have not been able to get into a daycare. It's about a two-year wait list here. I've actually been on the wait list since I was pregnant. Okay, so you have child care during the day, and instead of working a job, you're going to open a business. Correct, yeah. So right now I'm working Monday through Thursday at my day job.

1:28:19Dave Ramsey:But it has nothing to do with the 18-month-old because the 18-month-old has care during the day covered. For now, yeah. The cost is really high. No, that's not what I said. But I mean, the flexibility that you need for the 18-month-old, you don't need flexibility. You have it covered. For now. He can't sustain it because the cost is really high because we haven't been able to get into a daycare. So it's about double the price of what daycare is to have the nannies. and um for three three days a week kind of so i work monday through thursday and then i'm doing cleanings on fridays and i've had no but you said he was keeping the baby two days a week and the nannies were keeping them three days a week and three days a week is double the cost of daycare wild yeah it's actually they're making more than i am when i ran out the numbers i have all my numbers as well but hold on if he can't if this isn't sustainable for him you're gonna have to take him to court for child support.

1:29:20He's going to have to pay one way or the other. Right. And so he's agreed that if he's not paying for the childcare, he will pay child support, but it's, it's sort of a, it's a bit of a tricky situation. We just separated. It's, we're kind of working it all out, but basically the cost for the nanny per month right now is over$3 ,000. The daycares that I've been looking at are 1600. If we could get, yes, Canada, It's, yeah, crazy. I've been on a wait list for daycare since I've been pregnant. Okay, so let's go back to your original question.

1:29:58Dave Ramsey:The original question is, do I quit my job? I've been cleaning on Fridays, and I'm making some money. What I don't want you to do, what I was trying to push against with that whole series of questions is, I don't want you to have the false idea that you get to not work and take care of the kid. you're a single mom you're going to be working and when you say flexibility to take care of the 18 month old i'm saying you're not going to have much the worst thing you can do if you want flexibility to be run your own business because your boss is a jerk fair enough um i just when i worked up if the kid gets sick you still got to go to work when you own the business that's correct yeah the kid gets sick you work for somebody else you might have some pto or something but when you run your own business you know you're this idea that somehow that's going to make everything easier no it's going to make it harder you might make more money but it's going to make it harder right okay so now how many clients do you what are you making on your cleaning now so right now because I'm only able to take the Fridays I'm making after expenses anywhere from$350 to$400 doing that per day.

1:31:16So if I fill up my day with eight hours, I'm charging$50 an hour. My expenses are pretty low because I make a lot of my products. They're all child-safe and pet-safe. So my expenses are pretty low. But when I look at it, if I were to swap, this is sort of what we've been discussing and thinking about.

1:31:36Dave Ramsey:Why are we discussing anything? He's gone. on well because he's gonna potentially instead of paying the nanny that will then become child support so if i balance it out where i can build that that needs to happen anyway whether you do this or not yeah you've got these things all tangled up together yeah okay it's a simple thing you need to make the right decision for your career based on the numbers and the flexibility and it's the child support doesn't enter into it the child support should be an independent discussion. So anyway, what do you make at your day job? So currently I'm at 60 % of my salary.

1:32:17I'm making$36 ,600 per year. Why are you at 60 %? Because that's the only thing I can work currently with the hours that I have available. And so that was my return to work schedule. It could go back up to the 100%.

1:32:33Dave Ramsey:So you make$36 ,000 a year,$3 ,000. You make$3 ,000. a month. Sorry? You make$3 ,000 a month. I bring home$2 ,500 after taxes, yeah. Okay. And so you'd have to fill up one more day to do that. Okay. Can you get enough clients to fill up one to one and a half more days? Oh, yes. Yeah. How do you know? And so I'm not looking beyond that, but yeah. How do you know? Well, because I've had to turn down regular clients. I have very good relationships with a couple of top realtor teams as well. I would get on the phone with them and have a bunch of stuff lined up, not just hope. Because hope is a good way to go broke in running a business.

1:33:16Totally, yeah.

1:33:17Dave Ramsey:And so if you're going to walk away from$3 ,000 a month, make sure you're walking into$4 ,000 a month. Or$5 ,000 because you've got to hold your own taxes. I want you to run five days a week, six days a week. I want you to run cleaning. And then we work child care out and we figure that child support crap out and all that. but I want you to walk into a business that makes you more than you are making now the first month you do it. Not, I just thought I had a bunch of clients, but then it was harder than I thought. And I only had one day and now I'm screwed because I walked out of a paying job and I just was dreaming.

1:33:49Dave Ramsey:No, I don't want you to dream. I want you to actually tack this stuff down and run it like it's a business. So have it all set up, have the clients and you say, all right, I'm going to start with you september 1st and they sign an agreement to that and i'm going to start with you september 1st and they sign an agreement for that and i'm gonna start with you september the 14th and we're gonna sign an agreement for that and i'm gonna start with you and then i'm gonna quit my job effective september 1st and i'm gonna go do this stuff but don't do it on oh i've turned away a whole bunch of people so i know i can know that that that's don't be don't be ditzy and try to run a business.

1:34:23And here's the other thing. I'm telling you the number of newly single moms who try to handshake deals with a guy they're separating or divorcing. Don't do that. Go through the process and get it written down in a legal binding contract. You will find yourself hung out to dry as a single mom. And I don't care how handshake you were trying to do things right now. He'll disappear. I get that call over and over and over and over again.

1:34:51Dave Ramsey:Oh, he already has. disappeared from your life, just not the kids yet. So don't make agreements based on handshakes in the present. Go through the process, get this stuff in writing, legally binding, so that you and especially that baby have some protection moving forward.

1:35:29Dave Ramsey:It's way too easy to put off making a will. And believe me, I've heard every excuse in the book. But not having the time is one excuse we can kick to the curb right now. Because these days, most folks can make a legally binding will on their laptop between loads of laundry. If you're wondering if you can make your will online or if you need a lawyer, we have a quiz to help you figure that out in less than five minutes. Just go to RamseySolutions.com slash Will's Quiz. RamseySolutions.com slash Will's Quiz.

1:36:28Dave Ramsey:Buying or selling a home in the middle of all this drama that's called the real estate market is scary. Because if you get your information from Tic Tac and your broke friends, you live in drama land. The way you cut through the drama is facts, ma 'am. Just the facts. Facts are your friends when there's drama or trauma. Dr. John Deloney says that all the time. You want to learn about the housing market facts, the actual trends? we've got a site up for you to give you what's really going on. Median home prices went up about another$10 ,000 last month. They were$441 ,000. Now they're$439 ,000. So they dropped a tiny bit, basically steady.

1:37:09Dave Ramsey:Number of homes for sales over a million still for the third month in a row. And 15-year fixed rate dropped a bit, down to 5.86 % from 5.95%. So basically everything's flat, that's what it amounts to. And if you want to know more about this, go to RamseySolutions.com or click the link in the show notes and we'll help you. Cassie's on the line in Mississippi. Hey, Cassie, how are you? Hey, how are you, Dave? Thanks for taking my call. I appreciate it. Sure. How can I help? Well, I am at full retirement age in March and I started drawing my Social Security, but I'm still working. So I have income.

1:37:46But I'm thinking of retiring to Nashville, where I have my three grown kids live with my grandkids, and just trying to find out if it's financially feasible to do that. I do own my home in Mississippi. Well, I owe about$4 ,000 on it. What's that home worth? I don't have any other debt. It's about$220 ,000.

1:38:09Dave Ramsey:And what do you make now? That's your job. Currently, I make$60 ,000. What do you do? With my Social Security, I make that another 30. I am Executive Administrative Assistant. How old are you? And I am 67. Okay. All right. And how big is your nest egg? Well, not big enough. I have about$500 ,000 in 401K and IRA. Good. Okay. All right. And that's it. So what does it take you to live a month in Nashville? Well, that I don't know. There we go. There's a piece of information we need. And what part of Mississippi are you in? I'm on the Gulf Coast. Okay. That probably won't be substantially different depending on neighborhood you pick out.

1:39:02Dave Ramsey:Okay? Housing costs will be your main difference, but your cost of living won't be much different than the Gulf Coast. Things like electricity, food, gas, that kind of stuff. Okay? Housing will be your big difference. Right. And you may see some differences there. And, again, that all is neighborhood dependent on how close you are going to be to the kiddos and which neighborhood the kiddos are in in Nashville. So here's the thing. If you took$500 ,000 and invested it with a good SmartVestor Pro, you're old enough to draw against it without any trouble. Right. And if it created 10%, that without touching the$500 ,000, if you lived off the 10%, that'd be$50 ,000.

1:39:44Dave Ramsey:I'm just doing round numbers. Mm-hmm. Okay. And 50 is really close to your 60. Mm-hmm. So you probably can do it. Okay. I mean, you got$80 ,000 a year to live on, and you got$220 ,000 from the sale of your house. You need to get you an inexpensive little condo of some kind and pay cash for it. But I wouldn't have that$80 ,000 to live on if I retired. I would only have$30 ,000 in my Social Security. No, hon, you misunderstood. You said you had a half million dollars. Right, okay. At 10%, 10 % of$500 ,000 is$50 ,000. Oh, okay, gotcha. If it's invested at 10 % to 12 % and you lived off of 10%, that'd be$50 ,000.

1:40:28Dave Ramsey:I don't want you to take that much off. I'd rather it be less because I want you to leave that$500 ,000 alone. I don't want to touch it. But, I mean, if you get$40 ,000 or$50 ,000 a year off of that, or$30 ,000 to$50 ,000 a year off of that, and you've got your$30 ,000 in Social Security, and, you know, you probably, you might even pick up some personal assistant work around here, around Nashville, two or three days a week or something, too. And I think you can make the move. You're just going to have to be careful and watch what you're doing, and you're going to have to have the$500K invested well.

1:41:02Okay. So would you take the sale of my home?

1:41:06Dave Ramsey:And buy a one-bedroom or two-bedroom condo cheap. Pay cash for it. Okay. And that's your retirement home. Gotcha. That's what I was thinking. No house payment. That helps your expenses be low. So you wouldn't consider renting my house? I wouldn't consider renting my house? No, no. You don't need a rental property in the coast and you're in Nashville. Yuck. Right. I want my 60-year-old, 70-year-old mother to have no – I don't want anyone to ever be able to come take her house away from her. Right. Right. Gotcha. Okay. Yeah. All I can do. Load up the truck and head to Beverly, kid. But before you do that, come make some trips and figure out where you might live and what it's going to cost you to live.

1:41:50Dave Ramsey:And sit down with a smart investor pro. Go to RamseySolutions.com. and they'll help you do the analysis on the investing and they can teach you about investing and teach you what you can pull off of that. And you say, well, based on that, I think I can live. Okay? And if you had a debt-free house and you didn't have a house payment and you had your$30 ,000 from Social Security and some income coming off of that, what's it take me to live? You're probably not spending all$80 ,000 right now. And Dave? I'm sorry,$90 ,000 that you're making now. I'm telling you, maybe it's just I'm paying attention to it because my parents are older.

1:42:26I have heard the question from what I would call aging parents, should I? Should I move? Should I sell this? Should I be closer to the grandkids? And I'm not hearing the words, can I? And more and more and more, I think there's this idea like, I think I'm going to retire. and if you ask, can you? That question never even popped into somebody's head. And so I always want people to look at the math problem on this thing as well as the emotional relational side. Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. Like, should I move around the kids? Like, before you answer that question at all, ask can you, like mathematically, and then start asking the harder, do I want to move my life, make new friends, and that kind of thing.

1:43:12Be around the kids and whatever. But man, more and more, Or I'm hearing people get to be 60, 70 and just think this stuff happens now. This is the stage I'm in. And there is a math problem to all this stuff.

1:43:25Dave Ramsey:Absolutely. Absolutely. Matt is in New York. Hi, Matt. How are you? Hey, guys. Thanks for taking my call. Sure. Just a little guidance on this situation I got here. Okay. So I have about$6 ,000 loan on my truck that I currently have. And it needs some work. but it gets me back and forth to work, and I do use it to do side work, which is a good part of my income as well. I have also$6 ,000 in the bank, and I was wondering what you feel about switching baby step two and three. Just due to the truck needing work, I don't want to pay off my loan. What's wrong with the truck? Emissions. It's a good running truck overall, just emissions, some exhaust work, That's not a lot of money.

1:44:17Dave Ramsey:A catalytic converter could be a lot of money. The rest of that's not a lot of money. Yeah, I can cheat the system. My plan was to try to pay it off in a year and just... Why? It's only$6 ,000. I know. So you think I should keep the job? What's your income, honey? I just started a union job, so right now I'm taking home$2 ,800, but my bills are$2 ,550. So there's not much room in between to save. Are you married? Basically, but no, not yet. I'm not. Why'd you take a job that's barely keeping you afloat? Make a$30 ,000 a year in New York? Well, I was making probably about$150 to$200 more a week at my other job.

1:45:06But this union job that I got in five years after my schooling, I will make$100 ,000 a year. so that's as a form in our union so that's kind of a lot of starving to death that's five years of crossing your fingers hoping this$6 ,000 truck makes it I know I was thinking about getting like a commuter because it's a lot of miles

1:45:27Dave Ramsey:I think I'm going to get an extra job yeah dude don't do that and I'm going to pay off the truck today because you're going to get an extra car for this commute and something's going to happen in two and a half years and you've got two and a half more years of barely surviving. That's a lot. Hoping the taxes don't go up. Signing up for this union deal might not have been your smartest move. But if you're going to stick with it, you're going to have to have some other income coming in because you're starving to death on that.

1:46:10Hey, George Camel here. So you're thinking about buying or selling your home. It's exciting, but there's a lot to think about, and all those decisions can feel overwhelming. Well, here's the good news. You don't have to tackle the process alone. Ramsey's Real Estate Homebase is the place to find all of your free tools and resources for help to get prepared to buy or sell your home with confidence. You'll find calculators, start to finish guides, a podcast, and even an in-depth video course hosted by yours truly. What's not to love? So if you're ready to take the next steps toward your home goals, go to RamseySolutions.com slash real estate.

1:46:42That's RamseySolutions.com slash real estate.

1:47:03Dave Ramsey:Mo is in Wisconsin. Hi, Mo. How are you? Hey, Dave. Longtime fan. I'm good. How are you? Better than I deserve, sir. How can I help? So, you know, my wife and I, we've been living sort of very conservatively. conservatively, I'm a doctor in training, and now I have a big contract coming up that's$650 ,000 a year. Way to go. Thank you. She makes$100 ,000 a year, and so we're projected to make$750 ,000 after a year of working. Sweet. What kind of doc are you? Yeah, cardiology. Oh, wow. Good for you, man. you've worked hard you've worked hard to get there i'm proud of you thank you thank you the training has been very arduous and i feel like i want a porsche and my wife is in uh is in agreement too that you know i deserve a nice car i deserve a nice car um the thing is is i'm not sure if if i can afford it uh and so that's why i called in today okay do you have any money yeah so i've saved up about sixty thousand dollars which is uh i would say like an emergency fund type situation uh we own two homes one is in florida where i did the beginning of my training and that one is being rented out and it's uh generating one thousand dollars a month after all the taxes and bills are paid does it have a mortgage on it yeah it does it has a hundred and $50 ,000 left on it.

1:48:41Dave Ramsey:And in your current home, what is it worth? That one is$300 ,000. It's worth about probably$450 ,000. We bought it just a year ago, and we have$300 ,000 left on it. So how much do you have in cash to buy your car with? Well, that's the thing. I'm going to get a sign-on bonus of between$75 ,000 to$100 ,000. So I wanted to use that to get the car. So you want to buy a$75 ,000 car? No, the car itself is, I was thinking about a$200 ,000,$250 ,000 car. You remember that part where you opened the show, opened the call, and you said, I'm a big fan.

1:49:27Hey, hold on. What about your med school loans?

1:49:29Dave Ramsey:How much, you've listened to the show. Have you ever heard me told anybody in any situation to get a car payment? No. No. You know, I know you say don't do the car payment, and I'm just searching for, I don't know, some kind of approval or something. No, no, it's crazy. I'm not going to give you approval to do something stupid. I love you too much to tell you to do something stupid. You've done too good a job. Listen, you've been a grown-up for so long. For just a minute here, you want to be a four-year-old, and I'm not going to let you. All right. If you want to buy a$250 ,000 Porsche, I'm fine with that with your income.

1:50:05Dave Ramsey:as long as you are debt-free and you have your emergency fund in place and you pay cash for it. I see. So I would probably wait a year or so until I'm debt-free and then do it. Yeah. That sounds good. And what's the house in Florida worth, you said? It's worth about$250. I'd probably sell it. Okay. Sell it and then even if it's cash-flowing, you know,$1 ,000 a month. $1 ,000 a month is nothing. You want a$250 ,000 car, you make$750 ,000, and you're screwing around with$12 ,000 in Florida. Yeah. It's nothing. I've got a property manager. It's burning too many. Oh, bull crap. It's burning too many calories for what it is.

1:50:47Dave Ramsey:It's not worth it. Okay. I would use that money to build my new life. This is a new chapter. You just close this other chapter. That house is part of it, and you're trying to act like it's some kind of smart rental property thing. It's not. And just start your life fresh. And if you want to buy a$250 ,000 car, you are able to do that when you can pay cash for it. It's a lot, but you could do that. And you deserve it when you can pay for it. Until then, you don't deserve it. I deserve it because I work hard. Wah, everybody works hard. Okay? Your work has paid off beautifully. Again, I'm proud of you.

1:51:28Dave Ramsey:You've got an incredible income, and you've worked really hard to get here. I don't doubt that. But working really hard to get to do something that's not financially smart is not a plan. I want to work really hard, so I want to hurt myself. No, that's not a reward for working hard. No, I want you to get a nice car. I'll tell you what I would do. In the meantime, I'd put that house up for sale, and I'd take some of that signing bonus, and I'd go buy a used Porsche for cash that's not the 250 and get you one and enjoy the ride. Because, honestly, they're great cars. I've driven them, most of them, including the 250 one.

1:52:03Dave Ramsey:And the difference in the 250 when you're driving it and the$75 ,000 version that's a few years old is not much. But the difference in the gastrointestinal distress when it hails outside is a lot. You better have one of those doctor parking spots inside the parking garage. Yeah, dude. The cardiologist spot inside the garage. Hold on. Here's another way to look at this. With this income, in one calendar year, you could have completely paid off your house. You could have no house payment. For the rest of your life. For the rest of your life. And if you give yourself six more months, you don't even have kids yet, I'm assuming, you could have a fully funded, you could have$250 ,000 in cash just ready for that kid to be born into to go to college like you have an opportunity if you will just drive and drive a hundred thousand dollar porsche yeah i think yeah drive a hundred thousand dollar porsche and if you can suffer through that and for 24 months you change the trajectory of everyone in your family and dave i used to always tell grad students with our med students law students if you will just you're three to five minutes three to five years early on this purchase From changing everything.

1:53:21Dave Ramsey:If you delay the purchase that long. And I know you've been working hard, and I know you put in the hours, and you're a smart guy. You can't do this. You can take a heart out of a person and put another one in. You're obviously good at what you do, man. But dude, dude, dude, dude, two years, and you change everything. And let's just be real clear. You called me and asked me if you could get a car payment. So, you know, we can't, we can't, you know. You're not that smart. I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. No, dude. Dave, you know what? You nailed it because I've been there when it's like I would go to all day as dean of students.

1:54:05Then I would go to a crisis call in the middle of the night. And then I'd wake up. My grown up is used up. And I want to be a four-year-old. And I just want to get a bag of Twizzlers and some gummy bears at 4 a.m. on my ride home. And it's like just. Chase it with a Mountain Dew. Just be a grown-up for a few more minutes, right? Yes, you're right. My adult gets all used up, and I just want to act like a kid. And you can do that. You can afford it. I can do it. But, man, it just costs you. It just costs you. Yeah. That's a great way to put that, Dave. I've never thought of it that way. Well, we all do it.

1:54:33I mean, we run—it's— I've been under control. I've been under control. I just want to hit that guy, right?

1:54:38Dave Ramsey:And it's—oh, yeah, that one. Yeah. But, yeah, the— You never struggle with that. The cost of that. Yeah. I've been nice. I've been nice. I've been nice. He really needs his nose broken. But that's a real thing. And what I'm trying to tap into with all these docs, because they get this doc-itis thing, is they do, they're such a grown-up for so long. Because, I mean, while he's been doing fellowship, residency, med school, you know, the guys he went to high school with a decade ago started partying. Oh, yeah. A decade ago. They're already in the lobby to see him because their hearts are huge, right?

1:55:24Because they're about to explode. Yeah.

1:55:27Dave Ramsey:And so he's got an extra 10 years of being a grown up. But he also gets the payoff of$650 ,000. That's right. $650 ,000 income. And I don't want a doctor who's underpaid, so I want my doctors to be paid well. Pay my cardiologist as much as you can get away with me. I want them to be paid a lot. So I'm happy for you, Mo, and I'm just going to call on the grown-up Mo that's down inside there to stay alive for a couple more years. And if you do that, you're going to be in a lot better shape. You're going to enjoy the car more because it won't feel like a guilty pleasure. Instead, it'll feel like something you earned.

1:56:02Yeah, you're awesome, Mo, dude. You're awesome. Thank you.

1:56:35Thank you.

1:56:48Thank you.

1:57:19Dave Ramsey:I have noticed that to be true. Jeff's in Mesa, Arizona. Hey, Jeff, how are you? I'm good. Thanks for taking my call, Dave. Appreciate it. Sure. How can I help? Well, I just retired. I'm 64. And trying to decide we're living in a 30-year-old home, and we need to do some remodeling and how to go about doing that. We've got about$80 ,000 in a Roth. I got about$40 ,000 in a high-yield savings, but being on a fixed income, you know, my wife's working part-time just trying to figure out, do we do a HELOC? That's your entire nest egg? What's that? That's your entire nest egg? Is it$80 ,000? No, I have, well, yeah, nest egg.

1:58:06I'm on a pension, so I get a pension. How much is your pension? $4 ,700 a month. and then I'll have my social security come in pretty soon.

1:58:22What kind of work are you going to do on the house?

1:58:26Bathroom remodels and a kitchen remodel and some paint. We paid cash for some new flooring last year and some new windows.

1:58:37Dave Ramsey:That's what you're going to do this year. Last thing you need is debt. you have no nest egg to amount to anything and you're living on a four thousand dollar pension and um you can't afford to have a payment you don't have any room for that and uh so yeah i mean you're going to do these repairs a little bit at a time with cash you do you know break the repairs down into different projects and save up and okay now we're going to do the bath and save up and like you did the other stuff you saved up and paid for it and um and you said you're 64 Yes. What did you used to do? I was a school teacher.

1:59:15Dave Ramsey:Okay. All right. Personally, what I would do if I woke up in your shoes is I would take a bunch of students as tutoring at$50 an hour, and I would let that help me save up and do those repairs. Okay. What did you teach? I taught physical education and social studies. Okay. All right. And you've obviously had a lot of years in the classroom. And the good thing about tutoring is you can pick and choose the parents. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I still have my teaching certificate. Yeah, true. Could you go back and double dip? I can go back and substitute teach, and that will bring in probably$1 ,500 a month. Yeah.

2:00:03Could you double dip? Yep. Some states allow you to go back and you start over as your first year of service, but you can get your pension plus become a first year. You draw a first year teacher salary again. Can you do that? I have to separate for one year and then I can go back and do that. Because if you did that and let's say you you I don't know what the first year salary is where you work, but it's thirty five K. That's a bathroom. The next year is another bathroom. And then two years is your dream kitchen. I mean, that wasn't how you drew it up, but, man, you could be 67, 68, and have everything paid for with cash, and then finally be done, man.

2:00:42Dave Ramsey:Or run a nice little tutoring business that creates about the same income. Yeah. Either one. Something like that. That's personally what I would do. Reverse is sitting there and going, I'm 64. I'm doing nothing. Oh, I'm taking out a loan. No, I'm not doing that. And the collateral on the loan is the very house I'm trying to retire in. Yeah. Yeah, that scares me even more. Yeah, that takes some of the joy out of this idea of retirement. And let me say this. My guess is it makes these bathrooms that we, quote, unquote, have to remodel way less have to. And it may be one bathroom that we need to because there's some plumbing issues and whatnot, but you can put one off just for the statics or whatever.

2:01:24But it'll slow down the trajectory if you've got to pay cash for it.

2:01:28Dave Ramsey:Yeah, that's a possibility. That's one way to do it. But, no, I would not take that alone ever, but I really would not take that alone in your place. That's really, really scary. Bailey's in Missouri. Hi, Bailey. How are you? I'm doing okay. Good. How can we help? I've got a question for you, and if you need more information, just let me know. But I'm 29. My husband just turned 36. we just started listening to you guys in may and we're i mean we're all in we're we're trying to do all the things we're just feeling a little stuck yeah a lot a lot of the reason because both of us work for the public school education system and we can't opt out of our our pension so that's almost$1 ,200 a month that frustratingly we can't get to.

2:02:29We just bought a house in February, and that's one of our biggest expenses. It's technically under the 25 % like your rule, but we're looking at anything to squeeze the budget because we can't even get$1 ,000 extra a month. We have$270 in student loans between the two of us. And you're both teachers. Well, I'm not a teacher. I'm not a physical therapist. I just work for the school district. What do you make? I make$85 ,000 a year, and he makes close to$70 ,000.

2:03:12Dave Ramsey:So we've got$150 ,000 income. Can you do work on Saturdays and Sundays doing private PT clients? I also just started listening to you guys do first steps. So it's like baby through three years old. Great. Yeah. And he's trying. He's doing side hustles. Right now he's in football season. He's a football coach. Okay. Yeah. I mean, you've got a lot of student loan debt. I mean, obviously. Jeez. And that's the PT debt. A lot of it's yours, probably. Actually, yeah. Yeah, he's got a little bit more than I do. Oh, a lot of them was wrong. Okay, cool. He went back for a specialist stupidly just to get up on the steps on a teacher's salary, admittedly.

2:04:06Dave Ramsey:And it didn't, the ROI on that's not there, obviously. Okay. Correct. Well, we got$150 ,000 plus side hustles, or$50 ,000, and we need to tear into$300 ,000. And so if you throw 100 at it a year, because your side hustles allow you enough to live on, that's three years of beans and rice, rice and beans. I'm with you. This is a plan. Let's do it. This is strenuous. You do have a mess. Yeah. I mean, we only take home 70, or sorry, 8 ,200 a month. Like, we have so much going out with pension and ISO, Social Security on top of the 13 % they require. Okay. But are you getting a tax refund? No. Are you putting any money in that is not required into any kind of retirement?

2:04:59Oh, no. No.

2:05:01Dave Ramsey:Only the required amounts. Okay. Yeah, you're just getting docked left and right. and so any side thing you can do to to try to get dug through the i mean because again we need to find 100 a year and your 8 ,000 at 8 ,300 is 100 a year and and so if we can make enough with side hustles to live on we throw that whole hundred at it and we're done in three years but that's really beans and rice and that's a lot of extra work for three years but i mean you've been 10 years and making this mess, so three to clean it up is probably not bad. Yeah. Yep. Is there any possibility that you can leave the school system and make more?

2:05:43Honestly, it's a very nice gig for me because... I know, it's a nice gig, but you can't afford it. No, no, no. No, it is... 85 is not bad. That's very good pay. That's good pay for a P.T. I get paid. Okay. For having summers off that I can work extra. Oh, I forgot about that. Yeah, y 'all are both going to be just working full time at a couple different places in the summer. And that's a way y 'all can really get ahead, huh? Yeah, I think so. We do have two under two. Ooh, man.

2:06:17Dave Ramsey:Well, that's what it's going to take. You're going to have to burn the candle, kiddo, because you made a big mess, and now you're going to need a big shovel. That's what it amounts to. I think you got the right stuff. If you're analyzing it the right way, I don't have any argument with what you're looking at. Thanks for the call. That puts us out of the Ramsey Show and the books. We'll be back with you before you know it. In the meantime, remember, there's ultimately only one way to financial peace, and that's to walk daily with the Prince of Peace, Christ Jesus.

2:06:53Up 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. The 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. Okay, maybe we'll have some deep dish. You mind if I finish the promo?

2:07:26Is 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 going to go pack now. Thanks, George. Please do that. Go. Pack. Hey, George, speaking of packing, is this like sweater weather or is it not that cold yet in Chicago?

2:08:02What 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.

2:08:39That's how we got those PhDs. Yeah, that's probably where you got that jacket. Okay. See you on the road, John.