There Are No Magic Shortcuts To Financial Freedom

24:28George Kamel:Okay. And what kind of debt is the$62 ,000? So when she purchased this home, I feel bad. She moved closer to be near my husband and I, and she bought a home cash. But the home needed a whole lot of renovations, and I think she got in over her head. So a few of the debts are for windows, siding, insulation to the home itself. And then, of course, there's quite a few credit cards. How much is the house worth? She purchased it a couple years ago for about$140. $140 ,000. Okay. And I'm assuming with the renovations and some time, it's appreciated? I haven't done any research on what it's worth now, but I'm sure it's appreciated.

25:23I hope it has, especially with the work that's been done, yeah.

25:26George Kamel:And is she able to work more? She's been trying, actually. I mean, she's like 71, 72 years old. So she is trying to get more hours, though. Yeah. Well, I've been accused of telling the elderly to go back to work, so I'm not going to encourage her to do that. I will. I do think the only way out of this is either here's the options that I see. If she doesn't make minimum payments, it's going to go to collections and people will start coming after her. It's going to destroy her financial world and cause a lot of stress and harm. So I would encourage her cover her bills first, food, utilities, housing, transportation.

26:02George Kamel:Beyond that, keep up with minimum payments. And if she can put any extra, then go for it. But it doesn't sound like she's going to have that unless she works more. The other option I see is she sells this home and downsizes to a different home in cash and uses the profits to pay off her debts. Oh. Because that will free up$1 ,450. Of course, yeah. Now, I don't know what you can find in the area. That's, you know, if she can sell it for$200 and she nets$180, she pays off her debt, that leaves her with$120. I don't know where that leaves her. as far as home buying. That is a whole other topic just because I don't think she would be willing to do that.

26:40George Kamel:And why is that? Well, she purchased a home to be near us. Is there a condo or townhome? She's about to be real near y 'all, like in your back bedroom. No, believe me, we've talked about that as well. And that's not. I know, but I want you to hear what Georgia is saying, Jill. So like every single month she's alive, she's getting further behind. So it's not about love and it's not about care and grandkids. It's a math problem. It's either you work full time, maybe even doing a better job, or you sell the house and downsize. That's the hard conversation you're about to have. She literally doesn't have enough money every month to pay her bills.

27:24George Kamel:Or she lets it all go to collections. Collections comes after her, they sue her, and then one day she passes away and they write it off. Right. That's not how I want to go, personally. No, of course not. I want her to go with dignity and with God. Yeah. Does she have any sort of retirement at all? No. So y 'all are going to be taking care of her anyway, right? Well, I mean, that is why another reason why she lives closer, I think, to us is because I think she, you know, My husband is probably the best person in our family who could possibly, my husband and I, obviously. Sure. How are you guys doing financially?

28:03We're really good. I mean, we're on, you know, maybe steps four, five, and six. So we're working towards paying our home off. Amazing. So, yeah, I mean, we've made a lot of financial mistakes in the past, but we found you guys about a year ago, and it really did change our outlook. so um welcome to the cult dude welcome to the cult it's awesome no i i truly appreciate it um we've had a lot of conversations between he and i about her moving in and although we are willing i think she she's gonna struggle with that she owns animals she has a lot of stuff she's on

28:41George Kamel:like that feels expensive for a broke person yep i know how many animals are we talking is this like Noah's Ark? What does she have back there? Please don't tell me there's a horse. Three dogs and four wizards. Wow. So the dogs are eating good and she's barely getting by. I mean, no, yeah. I mean, yeah. I hope the dogs are eating. I hope they're well taken care of. To be fair, she didn't come from a whole lot. She worked minimum wage jobs her entire life, you know, raised three kids on her own. And like she, this is kind of the, you know, she, this is what she knows. And so we're trying to help her navigate a better way.

29:23But I think the best thing you can do, and this goes almost opposite to what I normally tell people, because I almost always say, hey, money to quote Jade Warshaw is money's not a math problem. It's a psychology problem. I think the biggest breakthrough here for your mother-in-law is going to be, hey, we have a, we have a big math problem that we can't solve. and it's easy to say, well, I can't sell those dogs. Of course you can't sell dogs. Like, I'm not getting rid of that, or I'm not doing this. And it's literally saying, hey, this ends, and it ends badly. With you getting sued by a whole bunch of people, it ends with people coming after your car, after your house, after your dogs, after your lizard.

30:03It's like they will harass you till the end of time. And at the end of the day, you end up living with us anyway because you have no retirement at all, none. And so we're going to get there eventually, right? Because there's not even any money to move her into a home or anything, right? Does she have Social Security? Yes. Okay.

30:25George Kamel:Can she get a Golden Girl situation, get a roommate? She's got a big old house to herself? It's not big at all. It doesn't sound big. Well, big enough that it's two bedrooms. Her dogs are real dogs, not small like your dogs. They don't take up a whole bedroom. Yeah. I'm guessing she would be unwilling to get a roommate yeah no for sure I mean she's not willing to give up the animals to come stay with us so I doubt she would be I mean the only thing I can suggest is sitting down and saying we have a math problem here and we need your input not on how you feel about stuff but how you want to solve this because this is all going to go away and since it's going to go away we want to be in the driver's seat of this new direction but a new direction is going to be forced upon us.

31:11George Kamel:And they're all going to be hard choices. But as my friend, Dr. John Deloney would say, you got to choose reality. I want her to keep the house and the dogs and have a farm, have the cake and eat it too. But that's not the reality we find ourselves in when we're$62 ,000 in debt at 71 on essentially a fixed income. Oh, wishing you guys the best, Jill. Good luck with the conversation. This is The Ramsey Show.

31:51Okay, you guys, remember the four walls of a budget. Food, utilities, shelter, and transportation. Right now, I want to focus on food because inflation is driving up the cost of groceries and we're all feeling it. But all these shoppers can save up to 36 % on an average shopping trip, which adds up to be about$4 ,000 a year for a family of four. $4 ,000. Aldi has what you need at prices that won't bust your budget. From bread and milk to organic produce, fresh meat, and affordable must-haves. So stop paying more and start shopping smarter at Aldi, where you'll save with the lowest prices of any national grocery store.

32:31Find a store near you today at aldi.us. That's A-L-D-I dot U-S.

32:52George Kamel:If you're tired of living paycheck to paycheck, feeling like you can't get ahead, feeling like money's tight at the end of every month, you got to 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, myself included. We're going to show you how to stick to a budget and even find$9 ,000 of margin using EveryDollar so that you can get out of debt and start building wealth. Plus, you can ask us any question during the live Q &A. Don't miss it. Sign up for free at everydollar.com slash webinar. Allie joins us up next in Grand Rapids.

33:26George Kamel:How can we help today, Allie? Hi there, you guys. Thanks so much for taking my call. Sure. Sure. So my question today is my husband works full time, 40 hours a week. I work part time, about 16 hours a week because I really value staying home as much as I can with our three babies. I have a six year old, four year old and almost one year old. My question today is I have much higher earning potential, but I really struggle with the idea of working full time and not being more home with my kids. We do have some debt that we'd like to pay off, so my husband and I are more strongly considering this switch, but just wondering your thoughts.

34:13How much debt? $32 ,000. It's only student loans, and of course they're for my student loans that I use to get to where I am today. What's your part-time job? I work part-time as a nurse practitioner. Okay. So that's the earning potential. You could flip a switch tomorrow, huh? I could just switch, be a full-time nurse practitioner and make six figures. So often whenever a couple calls or somebody in a partnership calls and says, we are trying to decide between this or this, I always want to challenge you to throw three or four ideas on the table just to see because it ends up, it's easy to get boxed in and you end up boxing yourself in a situation.

34:59and that usually leads to some frustration and resentment because he's sitting there going to work 40 hours a week saying, dude, we could be out of this debt if she would just get off her butt and, and you would be at work going, I can't believe my stupid husband doesn't make any money. And cause you're, cause it's an either or instead of saying something like, Hey, what would happen if you flipped a switch for six months and just burned a hole through everything, paid all this stuff off and cleared everything and then flip the switch back off. Sure. Okay. You know what I'm saying? It's just option three or option four is fill in the blank or option five is fill in the blank.

35:34George Kamel:Yeah. Are you guys open to let's explore all the options here? Would you guys be open to both working full time and having the kids in daycare for a period of time? I mean, yeah, I guess that's so hard for me because I had this vision, right, for how I wanted to raise my kids. And so it's always hard when it kind of deviates. But we also value having financial freedom. So I guess that's a good point. We could just both work full-time. We are trying to homeschool, which of course is – my oldest goes to a hybrid program, so he goes two days a week. So then it does require someone to be home. I would just explore all the options and look at the math of it and go listen we could be debt free in four months if we did this daycare with two full-time or dad stays home full-time and now you go full-time and that changes the equation too less income but you still get to accomplish your vision so there's a lot of compromises here that can still accomplish your family's vision and remember none of this is forever yeah I always the thing I see couples be really successful at is I always like to think in terms of grad school.

36:41Everything is for a season. And if you have a deadline, like we want to have no debt and$50 ,000 in the bank. What must be true for us to get that? And then we will all exhale and then figure out, you know what, them being in childcare or them being in a local public school wasn't as bad as we thought. We quit being on YouTube so much because we were working and it turned out it wasn't that bad. Or we hate every single second of this And the moment we cross that$50 ,000 thing, your husband quits his job or whatever the thing is. But if you do it aimlessly, it's real easy to be like, oh, this is the rest of my life.

37:18And then you end up burned out. But having some like a very clear, let's do a sprint. I'm going to flip this switch. I'm going to work Saturdays and Sundays, which means you're not golfing either, honey. And you're staying at home. And we are going to hammer this thing in four months. We owe nobody anything. We are free and then we will reassess. Sure. Okay. No, that makes sense. Do you find that generally it's pretty easy to flip the switch for folks? Not for professional women, no. It's a nightmare. Okay. You will feel like if you are searching for this to quote unquote feel right, it is a nightmare.

37:58And there is billions and billions of dollar industries that are designed to prey on that insecurity. Right.

38:06George Kamel:And you're going to get judgment either way. I can't believe you're working full-time and not home with your kids. I can't believe you're an NP and you're not working full-time and you're home with the kids. Either way, you're going to get it from the people you love the most probably. I can't believe your husband's staying at home. I can't believe you just dropped those kids off in daycare. I can't believe all those women went before you to pave the way and you can't win, which means the only way is to just don't play that game. Right. And you and your husband decide. Let's do it best for our family.

38:35Yeah. what's best for our family and you may have to grieve some of those pictures temporarily I wanted it to look like this it doesn't or right this second it doesn't but next year it will here's what it's kind of like this is a trite example and I'm going to get some hate on the internet and that's fine it's like finding going like on a weekend trip to New York City and finding an amazing coat and it's June like I can't put this on for six months but it's still a great coat. So it may be that I can't homeschool my kids and work part-time and teach the science class in the homeschool cohort because I've got a graduate degree.

39:15I can't do that until next year, but it doesn't mean it's not a great dream. It's not a great coat, or I don't want to say out loud. I really wanted to homeschool all my kids and stay at home, but dude, I miss the adrenaline rush of being in the hospital. I miss it so much. And people tell me that means I don't love my kids very much and that's not true. And I would tell you your kids will benefit from a mom who feels whole and fulfilled and healthy and well than an exhausted mom who hates the life that she has imagined for herself that she's trying to grind her her her claws through right.

39:50George Kamel:What is your current household income? Currently we bring home about 80k. And based on that how much longer will it take to pay off this 32K of debt? Well, we're kind of grinding it out right now. And based on our being more aggressive, we'll be able to get all of our debts, well, probably in the next three to five years, depending on some things, but about three to five years. Okay. I can tell you right now that plan sucks in my book. Yeah. You're going to hate your life. Five years of paying off debt when you two are very capable. I think we can do better. So I would look at what is the two-year version of this look like?

40:31George Kamel:No, what's the one-year version? 18-month. If you can go full-time NP and clean this up in less than a year, think about it. You just gained four years of your life back of this debt payoff sacrifice. I'd rather see you sacrifice for a year versus five. And I'm going to make – can I say something awful? Sure. Because I know you're now officially a part of the industrial mom guilt complex where everyone's just telling you things. and it's just, it's like a walking around with a wheelbarrow full of guilt. But what George just said is powerful, but that also means your kids get four more years with non-anxious, emotionally regulated parents.

41:09Sure. That somebody else is not telling y 'all what y 'all are going to do with your family because of choices y 'all made 15 years ago, 10 years ago to go to this college or buy this car or whatever. it's an opportunity to give your kids regulated parents which is in this current world is dude that's the currency i think yeah okay so good so feel guilty about that i do i do have concerns that i would be more anxious in a full-time role like because of the stress of what it is you only have hard choices about that you only have hard choices right every choice you make is a hard one so make the hard choice it's going to get you where you want to be as fast as possible.

41:50Sure. No, that makes sense. And if every day you're driving to work and you're having to reapply your mascara because you hate being away from your kids, you will never borrow money again. That's very true. Right. That's very true. And we'll grind it out. And there's a, there's a price to pay for. We made these decisions back in the day, or I made these, or he did or whatever. And we're having to pay for them right now at the expense of our dream. But man, we're going to get this thing done as fast as possible. I want y 'all to come up with the nine-month plan because I think y 'all could do that.

42:21George Kamel:I like the aggression, John. That's about $3 ,500 a month. We can find that margin. This thing's over before we know it. Done.

42:43I've been doing this show for over 30 years, and some of the saddest calls I have taken

42:50George Kamel:are from situations that are completely preventable. Yeah. And what's so hard is I feel like one of those, especially the ones that I'm like, oh, it's terrible. People that call in and their spouse has passed away suddenly and they don't have life insurance. We actually took a question of a lady and she had three kids pregnant and husband didn't have life insurance. And I'm like, I can't even imagine. Or even if it was opposite, right? If a mom passed away, there's a dad with kids and trying to figure out how am I going to afford childcare? How do I outsource some stuff that maybe she was doing?

43:24And it just takes the grief and the sadness of something like a sudden death to a whole new level. Like when you have to think through how am I going to pay my bills in the middle of all that grief. Like it's just, it is, it's terrible. And so life insurance is the one thing, especially as a mom with three little kids that I'm like so big on for people to get because it's inexpensive. Xander is the place that Winston and I actually get all of our life insurance. And we keep re-upping it because I'm like, I just want it there. Like there's something about that safety of knowing that you have money if something suddenly happens.

43:56And it doesn't cost much because Xander shops among a gazillion different companies. It doesn't cost much. You just have to admit that someday you're not going to be here.

44:02George Kamel:You got to say it out loud and you got to say, I'm going to say I love you to my family by taking care of them and taking the time to put this stuff in place. It costs a stinking pizza. It really is. So that is one thing to do to say I love you to your family. So we've used Xander for all of our family's needs for insurance for many years, including, of course, term life insurance. To get a free quote, go to 800-356-4282. That's 800-356-4282. Or go to Xander.com.

44:43George Kamel:Live from the Ramsey Network, this is The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create amazing relationships. I'm here with the host of Dr. John Deloney Show. Dr. John Deloney, my co-host, is with me. The number to call is 888-825-5225. And Lori joins us in Seattle, Washington, up next. What's going on, Lori? Oh, long story short, 72 years old. I was married and divorced now for several years. We had a million five in the account. Now I'm living on Social Security. Whoa. What happened? Let's make the story a little longer. Yeah, what happened? Yeah, long story short, he filed for divorce before me.

45:29There was domestic violence involved. Anyway, he filed. I went to get money from my attorney and I found out the bank accounts, all of them have like a thousand or two thousand dollars.

45:44George Kamel:What did he do with the money? I don't think the courts look kindly at people just sweeping the accounts in the middle of a divorce. Well, we'll never know because when he filed first, everything was frozen, and it looked like we had no money. I had to borrow money from friends and my church to get an attorney. Where is he? He's still living in the house. I assume with all the money. Probably. What did the judge say, or the attorneys? Uh, the attorneys, he hired a group of attorneys. I had one probably stinky attorney, basically. Uh, the judge asked where the money was. He said he must have gambled it away or lost it in the stock market.

46:38Lori, there's no, Lori, that doesn't make, I know I've been around the legal profession a long time. That doesn't, I mean, maybe that's a wild thing for him to say. And the judge would be like, all right, well, cool. yeah nothing was said nothing the only thing the judge found when she went through his things and the only saving grace for me was he had a life insurance policy that he had taken out during our marriage for two thousand two hundred thousand dollars so i got half of that what about your home did they have to buy you out of your house no it was his home before we were married so being we were married less than 10 years.

47:15It was his whole soul and separate property. Okay. So let's, let's do it. Let's do this. Let's stop talking about him. What's your situation right now? Cause he's gone. He, y 'all are divorced. He's over. Judge has hit the go. I am now living in a mobile home. I've got about$8 ,000 between eight and$10 ,000 in savings right now, my monthly cost for living and rent and everything is approximately, um, hold on here, is, um, let me see, about$13 ,500 that I have to pay every month.

48:02George Kamel:Wait, like$13 ,000? No,$1 ,345. Okay, that scared me. All right, that makes me feel a lot better. And how much debt do you have? I have about$8 ,500 in credit cards, which I've never had before. What else? That's it. Okay. Everything else is paid for. So you could pay off the credit cards today and have a little bit of money left over for a little starter emergency fund and begin to rebuild. How can I do that? I mean, if I pay everything that I have in cash, I'll have nothing. You told me you have$10 ,000 in savings. Well, approximately, that's before I pay my bills. After bills get paid, I go down to bed.

48:46Well, savings is different from checking.

48:47George Kamel:So have enough in checking to cover your next month. No, there's checking. No, I have that in checking. I have nothing in savings right now, actually. Okay. Nothing in savings. So what's your next paycheck, and how much will that be? I don't work. I just... You have Social Security? Yeah, it's$2 ,100 a month. Okay, so$2 ,100, your Social Security covers all of your bills, at least. Yes. With a little bit left over. $600 left, yeah,$600 left for... So here's what I'm advocating for you to do. Pay off your credit cards today. Your next Social Security check will cover your bills. And then with that extra$600, throw that into a savings account every single month and don't touch it.

49:29George Kamel:and cut up the credit cards and stick to using a debit card and cash. And that way you'll never be able to go into debt again, even if you wanted to. I know, but things like being in the mobile home, I had to, there was a major leak. The toilets broke. I had to get new toilets. Did you fix all that? The furnace went out. The furnace, as of now, yes. And there's more work to be done on this place. It's just, the whole underbelly needs to be fixed. Well, the goal is to get out of this mobile home situation. This is not a good situation. You're not living with dignity. You're not living a quality life.

50:03George Kamel:Do you have any kids or family or anything? I have no family. I have family, but they don't have anything to do with me, no. Why not? I'm guessing it's because I gave my life to the Lord, and I'm not on their political spectrum. And that's been for the last 15 years, so it's nothing new. So you have no friends. So 15 years ago, you became a Christian and don't vote the same way they did, and they won't speak to you and they're going to let their mom die in school? Absolutely not. I haven't heard. Nope. I haven't heard a word from them. I don't even know if they're still alive. Have they heard a word from you?

50:38Yes. I've left messages.

50:40George Kamel:Okay. What happened to this life insurance policy? It got split. He got$100 ,000. I got$100 ,000. And then I had to pay him because I bought a car during our marriage. I paid cash for it and I had to pay him$30 ,000 for that car. What's the car worth now?

51:01Oh, maybe$20 ,000, maybe. I would sell that car tomorrow. Yeah, but it's paid for.

51:09George Kamel:I know you're broke, honey. If you sold it for$20 ,000 and got a$10 ,000 car, a$12 ,000 car, you could clear your credit card debt without even touching your money right now. Lori, this is me and George. And you make$24 ,000 a year. You don't need to be driving a$20 ,000 car. We're just trying to love you. You are scary, scary on the edge broke. Oh, I know, but I'm saying I don't owe anything on the car. It's been well-maintained. I know. If you buy a car. But here's what that means. That means if you sold it and bought a used Camry that's not nice, but will get you to where you need to go for the next 20 years of your life, then you can do all the repairs, you can pay off all of your debts, and you could have$5 ,000 or$6 ,000 in a savings account.

51:53and if you value the car that's being well maintained in your gravel driveway in front of your falling apart trailer more than that sort of piece we can't help you but this is i realize that too but where am i going to move to because rents as you know or like where i am like two twenty one hundred dollars for one bedroom apartment yeah studio you might need to get a roommate or two yeah i mean you're in a none of the options you have are good

52:19George Kamel:but you're you're like in a house that's on fire and we're telling you to get out and you're like yeah but i don't have to pay the heating bill it's great and we're like no no no you're we have bigger problems to fry and so i know all of this is uncomfortable i know that solving one creates another problem over here but there's better things to solve on the other side and right now you're we're hitting you with a lot of solutions that aren't amazing i understand that but they're better than what you got. And so this is an unfortunate reality. Can I ask you a question? Can I get out of Bank of America?

52:50I'm finding their fees are just eating everything up. They ate everything in my savings account that I had in there.

52:57George Kamel:I don't even know how that works. I would have left them for a thousand other reasons. I would switch to a local regional bank or credit union today. You can check out Fairwinds. They're a trusted partner of ours here on The Ramsey Show, and they will treat you right without all the junk fees. Wish you the best, Lori. Thank you.

53:43besides COBRA to take care of your family during that time. Because if you didn't know, the cost of COBRA has gone up a lot in the past few years. And CHM is an affordable, biblically-based alternative to health insurance. So do your own research. The CHM is a great option that's potentially a third of the price of COBRA. It's a health cost-sharing ministry that's helped hundreds of thousands of families like yours take care of over$11 billion in medical bills since 1981. and the support you get from CHM goes beyond helping you pay for medical bills. Members become part of a family that prays for them when they have a medical event.

54:22Try getting that with COBRA. So if you're going through a job loss, life change, or just wanna explore other options to save on healthcare, CHM might be perfect for you. CHM programs start as low as$98 a month. So find out more at chministries.org slash budget. at chministries.org slash budget.

55:00George Kamel:Amanda's up next in Cincinnati, Ohio. What's going on, Amanda? How can we help today? Hi, I'm just calling to see, I got myself in a little predicament here with my boyfriend, who I love. He's amazing. I guess it's just I listen to you guys a lot. And as far as, like, you know, when you're not married, nothing is mine that he does. So my question is, he is buying a body shop where he wants me to be the receptionist, work 40 hours a week. He currently takes care of all the household bills, but I still myself have, you know, a little over$2 ,000, like groceries, insurance, phone. He wants me to be the receptionist, but I could also go get a different job somewhere and make probably double the amount of money and work less hours.

56:00George Kamel:Sounds like he can't afford to hire you. I kind of I just Sounds like his problem Not yours He's helped me out So much Like financially And I feel like I kind of owe it to him But then at the same time I'm I'm thinking like Looking at my future Like if I go do this For another year I can't start saving For my retirement It's just not enough You know How old are you Amanda? I'm 36 36 How long have you all Been living together? I just moved in in May Okay So let's play this out. You say no to this job offer because you're overqualified, whatever. He's going to say, well, then get out of my house and I'm not paying your bills anymore.

56:43George Kamel:Is that what happens next? Or is it just a guilt trip? After everything I've done for you, Amanda, are you serious? Yes. He's not going to kick me out of here. I just feel really bad. I just don't know if it's a good idea as far as our relationship goes to say, no, I don't want to do this. my wife won't read drafts of my books and vice versa you know why because we love each other and we want to stay married right like the the idea that you i'm gonna be honest with you it sounds like the dynamic of your relationship is very one-sided it sounds almost paternal like you're his kid and yeah yeah does he think he's doing you a favor by offering you a job are you working right now um see that's the issue too i haven't really worked a lot in the past year my mom passed away and i went through a lot and i'm finally bit in the put it in like in the position now where i can get back and start working again but what makes you think you're just going to go find a job tomorrow making double what he's offering he's not offering you anything is he i'm sorry would you say?

57:57He's not offering you anything, is he? He's telling you just, you're just going to be the receptionist. He, he's offering me, you know, we haven't went into depth, but he said reception, receptionists make about, you know, 15 to$20 an hour. Yeah. But he's going to take that off the quote unquote bills that y 'all have at your house. Yeah. Yeah. And you know that, and you're going to have no insurance, you're going to have no protection and you're going to end up paying for his business to take off with your squat equity, you're going to have nothing. And you're not married, so you're playing house to a guy that uses help as a way to control you.

58:35And you just go along for the ride. And you're complicit in this too, right? Yeah, I guess I feel really bad because like I said, he's helped me out so much financially, paid my rent for me a couple times when I wasn't working. and I don't know I feel obligated to do it but I guess I'm just calling to see what you guys thought I I here's the deal if I was hiring my wife as an employee of a business I was starting I would make sure we had written something down yeah so that she would know a when the job was done how much that job was paying her because I'm gonna have to write her a 1099 or w2 anyway as an employee and she would need to be able to say because I treat my wife with dignity and respect and she's an autonomous person and vice versa.

59:22She treats me the same way. If she ever wanted to not work there anymore, I would want us to have a clean separation. Correct. And so I would not go to work for anybody in any situation without some sort of clear job description and or a contract. It wouldn't be a right to have a contract in your situation, but to have a clear job description with a pay amount. And I can almost guarantee you, you're not going to get that. It's going to be like, no, just come. You answer the phones. We'll take care of it. And you're going to let him in three years, and he's going to find somebody else to date, and you're going to be out on your own with nothing.

1:00:00That's what I'm so worried about. Like, I'm not getting any younger. I really need to find something that pays more than$15 ,000 to$20 ,000 an hour. What were you doing before? I'm a bartender. Okay.

1:00:13George Kamel:What were you making? I was making about$4 ,000 a month. Okay. So about$50 ,000 a year versus 15 to 20 an hour is closer to$40 ,000 a year? $35 ,000? Yeah. Well, and then I was also working only about 28 hours a week, and this would be a 40-hour work week. How much do you have saved in your savings account right now? Well, I have – in my savings account, I have about$4 ,000, and then I also have about$50 ,000 in an inherited BDA. Okay. Do you have any money in retirement and a Roth IRA or something? No. I do have to take the money out within 10 years from the inherited BDA. Okay. I need you to hear me say this because I care about you, okay?

1:00:58You're 36 years old. Do you have any kids? I have three. Okay. Do they live with you right now and him? Yes. Okay. You have to hit the gas.

1:01:11George Kamel:Okay. Which means - He can't float your bills anymore. You got to work two jobs, three jobs for a season because there is a gap. You're behind, if you will. Very, yes. Okay. The only way you're going to get that is not trying to find a job that will make you more so you can work less. You're going to have to maybe take this job and after you drop your kids off to school in the morning, go drive Uber for a bit. And then after you get home, because it's only paying you 20 bucks an hour, go do another job in the evening for a couple of years. You're going to have to just hit the gas because you got some catch up to do.

1:01:43Right, yes. I mean, I do get$2 ,800 a month for my mom's pension, but unfortunately I've been having to use that and it's making me sick using that. You told us that that guy's paying all your bills. He is paying most of the bills. I still have about$2 ,000 worth of bills myself. What about the extra$800? I'm sorry, what?

1:02:10George Kamel:If the pension's$2 ,800 and your expenses are$2 ,000 and he's paying the rest of the bills, where's the extra$800 going every month? I've had a lot of things to pay for. I've spent about$7 ,000 on my teeth. I had to get a will. That was$1 ,800. I got my plot. That was$1 ,600. What else? Oh, I had a trip to Spain. But the Spain trip has been going on. That was paid off, but then we had expenses over in Spain. Amanda, America's losing empathy by the second right now. By the second. I know, I know, I know. People who are unemployed, broke three kids, don't go to Spain for fun. Even if it's paid off.

1:02:54Yes. Do you have any debt?

1:02:56George Kamel:They don't buy a hole in the ground. Okay, there's the saving grace. You don't have any debt, you have$4 ,000 in savings, and now we have to build a life of our own. I know you've hitched to his wagon in a way. I'm not here to get on a soapbox about living together before you're married. But you've put yourself in a precarious situation, and you need to build some independence on your own because right now you're so codependent that it's putting you at risk. Let me say it this way. This is going to be an uncomfortable way to say this. If you were moving back in with your dad, and your dad said, you have to do X, Y, and Z if you want to live in my house, you have a curfew.

1:03:31And you're like, I'm 37 years old. And he's like, you have a curfew. I'm going to live in my house. and on Tuesdays we just eat bowls of cold beans. You could call me and I could say, hey, that sounds nuts, but you chose to live in his house, and so you've got to play by his rules. That's how I feel since I kind of feel like I don't pay any bills here. I don't feel like it's my house. No, you do pay. Well, you're paying a lot of money flying up. I pay a lot as far as the groceries and just everything else to keep a household running. And I think you have to have that conversation with the person you've chosen to move into with.

1:04:06A, are you going to marry me? Are we doing this for the long haul? And B, I don't feel like a participant in this house. I feel like I'm another child of yours and I'm not going to live like that because I'm worth more than that. And that's where we're going to start with that conversation. If you can't have that conversation, then that's the relationship answer that you need. So here's the spark notes.

1:04:25George Kamel:Do not take this job because you feel bad. Take it because you need money and you don't have any other options right now.

1:04:49Switching banks can be a hassle, and I totally get that. But when Winston and I opened up our Fairwinds account, we were shocked by how quick and easy it was. It just took a few minutes online. We didn't have to block off an entire afternoon or track down paperwork. And the next day, we got a personal call from a Fairwinds specialist just checking in. I couldn't believe it when I answered my phone. And I was talking to them. I was like, y 'all are the nicest people. Now, if you're working hard to save money, get out of debt, and build a future, you should have a bank that supports that, not fights it.

1:05:21That's why I recommend Fairwinds. They created the Smart Checking and Savings Bundle specifically for Ramsey fans. Plus, they have a great app, and you have access to over 33 ,000 fee-free ATMs and more than 5 ,000 shared credit union branches across the country. So you can have access and withdraw your money just like you're used to, no matter where you live. Don't settle for a bank that slows down your progress. Make sure you choose one that helps build you up and helps you win with money. Visit fairwinds.org slash Ramsey and open your smart bundle today. fairwinds.org slash Ramsey. fairwinds.org slash Ramsey.

1:06:00Fairwinds is federally insured by the NCUA.

1:06:19George Kamel:When you're tackling debt or building wealth, you can often forget about one important step to reaching those goals. Insurance. Having the right coverage as opposed to too little or too much can impact how long it takes to get there. And skipping or skimping on insurance, it might seem like you're saving, but when life happens, it's easy to fall back into debt without a safety net. It puts you at risk in a big way. So the right insurance acts as a shield around you, your loved ones, your wallet, if and when disaster strikes. In some cases, it can even save you money if you're paying too much for insurance or for bogus ones.

1:06:50George Kamel:So how do you know if you have the right one? We make it simple with our coverage checkup. It's a free online resource that creates a personalized insurance action plan that is unique to you and your situation. It makes an overly confusing topic easy to understand and gives you clear next steps. So go check out the coverage checkup at RamseySolutions.com slash checkup or click the link in the description if you're listening on YouTube or podcast. Phoebe is in Jacksonville, Florida up next. Phoebe, welcome to the show. Hi. So, well, long story short, my husband is in the military, so he is on a fixed income, and I work two jobs.

1:07:28We do live on base housing, and so we live rent-free, no utilities or anything. But he took a major pay cut because of that, because that's kind of a catch to it. And so we're struggling with this debt that's been ongoing, and it feels like it's just getting heavier and heavier. My family believes I should stop working two jobs and bring myself out and just take the free college he offered me because my husband is sweet and gave me his GI bill so I can pursue my college and just work one job and deal with the debt later. I believe I should continue to grind out with the two jobs and get our debt gone because I know I can do it.

1:08:07I just kind of don't know what to do. I'm not sure. I just wanted your guys' opinion.

1:08:12George Kamel:Wow. How much debt do you guys have? So I have roughly about$30 ,000, including my car, and his is just two big ones. So$20 ,000 on a credit card and$20 ,000 on a car. Okay. Does he need the car if he's on base? Could that be sold? It could be sold. I think he would be a little bit sad to sell it, and also it was for a long-term kind of thing, for future reference and trips that we hope to do later down the road. Y 'all are awesome. He's committed to this car emotionally. He put a ring on it and said, I'm going to marry this car. We wanted the truck for a reason, you know, because we want to do vacations and Moab and, you know, all these things.

1:08:57But it's more of a sound of love.

1:09:00George Kamel:If I told my wife, hey, you can work three jobs if you want. I'm keeping this car. Versus, hey, if we sell this car, we could knock out like a third of our debt today. hey, that would excite me and give you the freedom and runway to go to college if you wanted to. And if you sold yours and just bought like a Corolla, that everyone would be like, why are you driving that? And you'd be like, because I'm free. Yeah, how about scale in the game? That would knock out halfway. We spit shake and say we're both selling it. Do what? My car is almost paid off. I got 10 grand. Awesome. What's it worth? Probably like four.

1:09:34Last time I had a Ford Fusion, it didn't value out that well, actually. So it didn't value out, and so you were like, you know what, I'm going to buy another one? Because I really liked the car. You're incredible. America, I'd like you to meet itself. It's called America. I like these things, and they're fun, but we can't afford them. You're like, I know, but we want to go to the desert and stuff and whatever. That's why I don't believe in quitting my two jobs.

1:10:03George Kamel:What are you making total from these two jobs? No, stop falling in love with depreciating assets. 50 ,000 in total. Okay, you make 50 grand. What does he make? He makes, so he makes about 4 ,500 net income a month. And you make 50K net income per year? Yeah. So y 'all make 100 grand together, you have no bills, and y 'all can't make it? The debt has kind of put weight on us, plus with the economy and everything. No, you make 100 grand, y 'all have no bills. You guys are bringing in, this is my estimation, over$8 ,600 a month net take-home pay. But that is with me working two jobs. Doesn't matter.

1:10:45If I take away one job, then I only make about$40 ,000.

1:10:49George Kamel:Well, let's say you keep, are you working 40 hours total? I work with both jobs about 60 to 70 hours a week. Okay. Or sorry. Oh, no, yeah, that tracks. Okay. And you have a total of, based on my math,$70 ,000 in consumer debt? Yes. And how much are your actual expenses that you guys have to pay every month, including the minimum debt payments? My expenses roughly come out to, I want to say about$3 ,000 or so. And then his, I think his comes out to, he has about$1 ,200 left over. What do you mean left over? So I know that after all his bills are done, he has 12 times. Oh, you guys aren't married.

1:11:39You guys like Venmo each other.

1:11:42George Kamel:You just said he's got his bills, he pays, I got my bills, I pay. He has this much left over, I have this much left over. Right? I like to pay my bills. I'm very OCD about how I pay my bills and everything. You're just not OCD about being married? No, we're on our first year. We've been together for six years, but we're on our first year of marriage. So we're working on the colliding of income and everything, but I kind of like my stuff. Okay. Here's the thing. In a way. Here's the truth, okay? This is just bottom line. Nothing in your life is going to change, and that's okay if that's what you want.

1:12:21the only way you get away from this debt you go to school you have peace in your life you build an amazing marriage together is you have to begin doing things that make you uncomfortable that you don't want to do period and the irony is for me and george is we can see every day of your life you're doing things you don't want to be doing right but you can't see it because i think it I think the end goal is going to be worth it. And I'm scared to take that leap and go to college because what if in a couple of years I do all the college and go to find a job and ends up not paying me much? I guess I'm overthinking and I just want certainty.

1:13:06And with paying off my debts, I know that's something I can do. I can put a track on that. I know. I know. But listen, listen, I'm falling into it. You're like you're sitting on a solution and you won't use it. because there's a thing i'm just like my father you could see it's cool man i accept that he must have been a really handsome quasi handsome smart guy but like if y 'all sold your cars and you worked really hard for six months and y 'all did not go out to eat a single time you would be debt free i know you see what i'm saying this it's so i can't tell you and i'm getting kind of worked up and i apologize it's not at you it's just that the whole culture we live in because is right there it's literally right here and the number we just george and i in a previous hour talked to a woman on a fixed income who's 72 whose family has abandoned her and you're sitting on six figures but y 'all don't want to like not buy another crappy car that just gets older and dies in your driveway and take advantage of this glitch in the matrix where you have no bills none and you're talking about you're talking about not even suffering just having kind of a bummer of a six months where y 'all just gonna have to make out more and go fishing more and go walking around more like that's the that's the penalty you will pay to not owe anybody anything come Christmas in January you can quit everything and go to college for free and as a taxpayer think I am all about paying for veterans and their dependents to go to college I think that's an amazing use of my tax dollars.

1:14:43I love that. And I want you to do that. But good God almighty, dude, go for, go for, go debt free. Go with, no. Basically stop dobbling around. Yes.

1:14:52George Kamel:I think this college dream is a distraction from having to deal with the reality. It's a Xanax. It kind of, I basically mush myself. Yes. I got caught up in the whole, whoa, we have to go enjoy life. So let's not worry too much about the debt. And it just kept going in that cycle. And I was like, Like, enjoy it like crazy. Enjoy it like crazy. Just start enjoying it in six months when you don't owe anybody anything. And that, my sister, is the true definition of freedom. Y 'all aren't free. Y 'all are owned by car companies, by the base housing, by all these other entities. Just say, as for me and my house, we choose freedom.

1:15:31It's the 4th of July, for God's sakes.

1:15:33George Kamel:Choose freedom. It breaks my heart because we love military folks. They're fighting for freedom, and yet they're living in a financial bondage. that's not okay we got to do better this is the ramsey show

1:15:48you

1:16:21George Kamel:Today's question of the day is brought to you by Why Refi. You didn't plan to default on your private student loan, but now you could have a way out. Why Refi helps you explore refinancing options with a low fixed rate and a payment plan based on your ability to pay. So take the next step at whyrefi.com slash Ramsey. That's the letter Y, R-E-F-Y dot com slash Ramsey. May not be available in all states. Today's question comes from Amanda in Colorado. Amanda writes, I earn$100 ,000 a year. I have$15 ,000 in debt and I owe$225 ,000 on a$550 ,000 home. My boyfriend lives with me. He earns$70 ,000 a year and pays me$1 ,000 a month for which he claims is more than fair.

1:17:11He pays no other bills other than food and some shared grocery items. He refuses to help me pay for home upgrades like a new roof and new appliances. How do I resent him for not asking me to marry him after supporting him for almost four years?

1:17:28George Kamel:Wow. We could have deleted the entire question and just left the last sentence. How do I not resent him for not asking for me to marry him after supporting him for almost four years? Here's the deal, Amanda. I believe that you resent you. He has no reason other than integrity, which he clearly doesn't have. Why would he marry you? You pay all of his bills. He already lives in your house. You do everything for him. You fold his laundry. You do everything. He isn't. And so you resent him because you signed up to be his mom kind of accidentally, but also intentionally. Fully intentionally. And when he said, I'm just going to pay you a thousand bucks.

1:18:10And that's more than fair.

1:18:12George Kamel:I love that for which he claims. This feels like an episode of Judge Judy. He claims. Why did you not decide ahead of time versus going like, hey, let's take the highest bidder. All right. A thousand bucks. That'll do. You tell him. Now, first of all, this is just one of a thousand reasons I would never suggest for people dating to move in together because of issues like this. But you didn't make the guardrails clear. You didn't say, hey, it's going to be$1 ,500 rent if you're going to live with me. And you're going to pay utilities 50-50. We're going to pay whatever 50-50. You didn't make that clear.

1:18:44George Kamel:Now you're resentful. Because you thought, hey, if I just let him move in and if I just take care of stuff, he's going to fall further in love with me and then he'll ask me to marry him. and that's not how he chose to live his life he was like man i got a sweet setup i can kind of do whatever i want and get away with whatever i want whenever i want and so uh cool dude and so yeah you've i mean what incentive does he have at this point it's like besides character and he doesn't have that but you knew that when he said i'm not i'm not helping here i'm just gonna give you a thousand bucks a month and you just shut up and you're like okay cool cool cool i'll take that and maybe I'll prove to you.

1:19:20I don't know, dude. It's a mess. But Amanda, I think the person you're most upset with is the person you see in the mirror. You're smarter than this. You're worth way more than this.

1:19:32George Kamel:And truthfully, you think you're better than him. You mentioned that you make more than him, that he's not paying his fair share. He's not going to pay for upgrades, which why would he pay for upgrades for a home he doesn't own? Right. In your house. You're the landlord. You have to pay for that stuff. That's what you signed up for. by asking for rent money. So both parties are at fault here. If I was Judge Judy, I'd kick you both out of my courtroom. I'd have the bailiff escort you out at this point in the show. So Amanda, here's the scary question that I'll just pose this to you and to anybody else in the situation.

1:20:06You can change no things about what have happened up until now. The only question you can solve is what are you going to do now? Are you going to realize this is a person that I don't want to hitch the rest of my life to and you're going to have a sunk cost fallacy and say, but I've invested four years. I'm worth more than this. I'm going to ask you to go. Or you're going to sit down and say, not only is this a financial issue, this is just a, hey, I've asked you to pitch in. And he's like, yeah, I don't really care what you say. Behavior is a language. He's telling you, I don't care what you say.

1:20:36I don't care what your values are. I care what I want. And I'm going to kind of do what I want to do. And you get to ask yourself, do I want to be married to that guy? Or do I want to have a live-in son slash boyfriend like that guy? You get to pick that, but the only question you can solve is what am I going to do next? And there is no path forward for you that does not come with heartache. Him staying in this arrangement stays the same, your heart's going to ache. You break up with him, your heart's going to ache. You draw a line and he walks away, your heart's going to ache. So I want you to take the path that is going to leave you with the most dignity and the most respect for yourself and for others and is going to get you to eventually where you want, which sounds like a relationship of two people who love and respect each other.

1:21:18And you don't have that right now.

1:21:20George Kamel:It might be a huge blessing that he hasn't proposed because divorce is expensive. And you guys made it clear you're not compatible. Yeah, I've been doing a ton and ton of research digging into marriage. Just the question, is it still even worth it and whatever. So if part of your equation out there is, I bet if I take in a young man and I quote unquote support him for four years financially, romantically, housing and clothing him and feeding him, then maybe he'll like me. That's not – that algorithm won't work. Just FYI. That's not the way – that's not the path to marriage. So it is what that is.

1:22:02Do with that what you will, Amanda.

1:22:05George Kamel:All right, let's go to the phones. Joshua Waits in Phoenix, Arizona. What's going on, Joshua? Good afternoon, George and John. It's a beautiful day in Arizona. How are you guys doing? Love to hear that. Perfect. Hey, I'll be brief. I'll get to my question first, and then I can provide some context. So I'm looking for some tools and some expertise. My wife and I are behind on some tax debts and are owing about$9 ,000 towards that. Recently, we've gone through the hard thing of downsizing our rental property, moving in with grandparents in order to take care of some debts that we have. So as far as that breaks down, we have about$20 ,000 in credit cards, Canadian loans, American student loans, as well as this remaining tax debt.

1:22:55And the federal portion of that is about$8 ,500. And then the state is about$500, which isn't an issue. And this paycheck coming up, I work in sales, and I'm expecting a significant amount of money, around$12 ,000 on my paycheck. So trying to figure out how to go about that. My wife and I just recently downloaded the EveryDollar app and created our EveryDollar budget. But just like we've got some expertise and tools around how to settle this tax debt in particular.

1:23:23George Kamel:Well, the easiest way to sell it is to pay it off. So with that next check, I'd pay off the tax debt. That's going to come first. So all the tax debt is going to - Even though it's not the lowest? Yes. The IRS debt is going to go to the top of any debt snowball list because they can really screw up your life more than any other debt collector. So that's going to go to the top regardless of balance. and that's going to be knocked out with this next paycheck. You're going to have three grand left over. I would apply that to your next smallest balance. Okay. Is there any way to settle that$8 ,500, like any expertise or any approach to try to settle that for lower or just write the check, stroke it, and be done?

1:23:59George Kamel:You owe the money. It's the government. They don't play. This is not like a medical bill. We're like, well, you take$500. This is what you owe in taxes. This is what you have to pay. I would not even go about trying to settle it. I would verify the total, make sure that you're only paying what you're actually, you know, that you owe. But if you owe$9 ,000, I would write the check for the$9 ,000 and be done with it. Okay. No, probably not the answer I wanted to hear, but that's the harsh truth, right? Yeah, well, you're going to find now, like, you're going to get Facebook ads for, like, we'll help you settle your tax debt and just contact us and give us the payments.

1:24:33George Kamel:Don't trust any company to handle this. You contact the IRS yourself and pay the bill and be done with it. no hacks needed. This is money that you owed legally. There's no way around it. And so I would do that and then continue the debt snowball as you would. Smallest to largest balance from there. I wish you the best. We're all looking for the hacks, John. I wish there was magic shortcuts and buttons. And if I could just contact that company for that debt settlement relief, they said they'd give me freedom. It'll solve my problems. And here's the thing. if it sounds too good to be true it is and if it looks like a shortcut i would run far away most of these shortcuts yeah i don't know dude they're just so predatory and they break my heart because we take so many calls um people who just get ripped off and i hate it for them well they're in a they're in a tough spot their backs against the wall they're desperate and they see an ad that says the word freedom in it or debt settlement or debt relief yeah these words are intentional All of these are just math problems and they just don't go away.

1:25:34And it's just, it's disillusioning right now. I can find myself getting kind of down just across the country. It's like, no, this will just all go away. It's cool. And it just won't. And it's going to take hard work and heading right into the middle of that problem. Everybody getting together and doing it together. But it's a mess, man. There is not, there just is not a hack. There's just a path. This is the Ramsey Show.

1:26:29George Kamel:Transcription by CastingWords financially, I can help you finally get ahead. You can get breaking free from broke today at RamseySolutions.com slash store. That's RamseySolutions.com slash store.

1:26:54George Kamel:From the Ramsey Network, this is The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create amazing relationships. I'm George Camel, joined by a Ramsey personality, Dr. John Beloney, and we're taking your calls at 888-825-5225. We're headed to Santa Fe, New Mexico, to talk to Claudia up next. What's going on, Claudia? Hi, thank you guys for taking my call. Sure. I've been hearing on social media, and I want to know what Dave and you all know about cryptocurrency replacing the U.S. dollar. I know it seems far-fetched, but it just seems like it's huge. Well, I mean, you heard it from a credible source, social media.

1:27:37George Kamel:Who are we to refute that? I saw a guy on social media the other day. He was swimming in the ocean, and he kissed a shark. It was amazing. Right on the face. Definitely not AI. No, not AI at all. We're having fun. But where exactly did you hear this? Like, what caused the algorithm to bless you with this fear-mongering content? well it's i think it's because you started doing investments um and i you know how the algorithm says oh okay so then it starts to say whatever lead you to this direction of where you can invest here and you know it's an investment i don't know anything about how economics works or i do know through prager you that the money that our u.s dollar really isn't backed by anything it used to be backed by gold and now it's a note okay but listen to this along that same line that is correct the the what backs the the dollar is that the whole world has said we trust that the united states will pay their bills right that's what makes like the debt ceiling thing so complicated the thing that makes the world spin is the u.s the u.s will pay their bills right but if you take that away before that the whole world said hey this yellow rock is worth everything right there's no that yellow rock does nothing you can't eat it you can't plant it you can't raise it you can't hug it it's just a yellow rock that we all said all right that's gonna be a thing and so could the whole world the whole world get together and be like you know what we're going to let a bunch of zeros and ones from some kids in San Francisco or Dubai or wherever across the world somewhere we're just going to trust them we'll trust them does that sound right?

1:29:28well it's all on trust that's it and as screwy a system as we have and as messy as things are most of the world's like I'll put my money on them which why it's why I think you're hearing such passionate debate right now about the U S signing bills that are going to add trillions of more dollars to the debt. Like there's American citizens. They're like, Hey, we got a good thing going. It's not perfect. And it's a mess, but we got a good thing going and we're, we're going to shoot holes in our own boat because we didn't have the courage to make hard choices. And so it's, it's, let me split, let me put it this way in, in George, This is how my buddy who's a banker told me this.

1:30:09The day the U.S. dollar seeks to be the world's currency, it will be such a disruptive force that we can't imagine our lives the day after that. And so he called it a meteorite plan. Like, I have a lot of plans. I have a deep freezer with some eating. Like, I'm that guy, right? I got big gardens, whatever. But I don't have a meteorite plan. If we get hit by a meteorite, I'll deal with that then. But me buying a bunch of crypto is not going to be my hedge against the U.S. dollar and potings. It's just not. And take that for what you will. It's free advice, so it might be worth what you paid for it.

1:30:46In five years, if the U.S. dollar goes away and the crypto bros are worth trillions, you can call and be like, you idiot. And I'll be like, yeah, you're right. I screwed up on that one. But it all comes down to trust, right? And I think that's what Bitcoin is, too. It's all based on trust. Right. Because I've just been researching it. And basically, it's the same thing. It's just untrust. But let me push back on you. From my nerd world, research is sitting down and doing science experiments and having it peer reviewed. So other people have done experiments, push back on my findings, etc. If you're just Googling stuff or YouTubing stuff or chat GPTing stuff or looking on Instagram, that's not research.

1:31:28it's learning what you want and it's giving you an increasingly more sensational version of what you're looking for for one reason not to give you facts but to keep you hooked on that device and guess what gets clicks and views it's the dollar's gonna crash everyone buy crypto not the dollar's fine america's annoying right now and we're fighting ourselves and we are causing ourselves in measurable damage for no reason but it's not going away we're here right now. So I have a follow-up question to that research. So that's what we do. That's what we've been trained to do. Okay. Just go online and search it.

1:32:04So how do you research it?

1:32:07George Kamel:I mean, there's books, there's people who have done more scholarly work on this, but again, they're going to have a very biased take that says, I'm going to put all my money into crypto and you should too. Can I tell you, can I tell you what I do? This is my personal thing. I've, and this is me working with academics for 20 years, like really some world-class scientist, okay? And even some of my close buddies in the nutrition space, the weightlifting space, the mental health space. I do not ask the question, what do you think? I don't ask that to George. I don't ask that to my friend Dave Ramsey.

1:32:39I don't ask the question, hey, what do you think about? I simply ask this question, what do you do with? I don't say like, hey, what do you think about this thing? I ask, what do you do with your kid? what do you do with your money and what i can tell you is dave ramsey the wealthiest guy i personally know owns zero cents in crypto my friend george camel who i call on the weekends and say hey man i'm i need to ask a question about this mutual fund whatever and george owns zero crypto and he's got two young kids like me and so you're calling two guys who own zero dollars in crypto.

1:33:16George Kamel:I also don't have any gold. I don't buy things that are a store of value, quote unquote, or a currency. All I do is invest into the U.S. stock market and a little bit of international like we've been teaching for years. And that's all you need. Anything more complicated than that is just a trap to try to get you into someone else's maze. My friend, Lane Norton, Dr. Norton says most people step over$100 bills to pick up nickels when it comes to health and weight loss and nutrition. People want to know what the best hack is instead of just exercising and eating. Right. And so I wouldn't even be researching what you're researching until I don't owe anybody any money.

1:33:57I've got my, my house paid off so nobody can take my house from me. Right. And then I'll start getting like, okay, what's the, but until you've solved those problems, it's, it's, it's, It's just stepping over the next annoying, boring, next right step for some sensational thing. And so I would go sit with a smart investor and pro. And I'll tell you what I asked mine. He started talking about, hey, I'm just going to stop right there. Whatever you did for your family, through these four, I want that for mine. And he smiled at me and he goes, all right, cool. Because that's what's going to tell me what you believe is your actions, right?

1:34:37Same questions I asked George.

1:34:41George Kamel:How much are you investing every month right now, Claudia? Well, it's interesting because I don't think we're... None. Ah, there it is. Get off the apps. You're making yourself nuts for no reason. Just get off. Find some puppy videos. Get two dogs and wipe their butts just like George does. Thank you. Look how happy he is. That's a good life. It's a life well spent. So here's the key. Replacing the U.S. dollar with crypto would require a complete overhaul of the global financial system. we can't agree on anything across the world right now, let alone that. Nothing, no things. Too much volatility with crypto.

1:35:14George Kamel:It's unregulated. It's a private digital currency. It's decentralized. There's too many problems with it still. While it has cool technology and features, I'm not going to hang my hat that the dollar is going to crash anytime soon unless I wanted some YouTube clicks.

1:35:42George Kamel:You spend hours researching before making a major purchase like a home or car, but it's also a good idea to put in the work searching for the right insurance coverage. To protect your biggest assets, I recommend using Ramsey Trusted Pros. Whether you're looking for car, home, or any other type of insurance, Ramsey Trusted Providers have been coached and vetted to serve you like we would. Find what you need at RamseySolutions.com slash insurance.

1:36:32George Kamel:Amy's in Tampa, Florida up next. Amy, welcome to the show. Did I get that right, or is it Ami? Yeah, it's Amy. Yes, first try. Okay. How's it going? Good. How are you? Great. What's your question today? So I financed a used car, and I got an extended warranty with it, and now recently the engine blew up. And so basically I have no car, and I'm stuck with this. Like, it's a$30 ,000 loan still with this car that I can't use. You said you got the extended warranty. Does it not cover exploding engines? No, I guess not. No, they're kind of like trying to get out of it, I guess, basically. They want me to pay for the mechanic.

1:37:17It's not a mechanic shop right now, and they want me to pay for the tear down for it.

1:37:21George Kamel:Who does? To figure out exactly what's wrong. The warranty company. The warranty company wants you to pay for them to tear apart the car to figure out what went wrong? Well, no, the mechanic wants me to pay first. And then maybe they'll reimburse you? Exactly, yeah, and then maybe the warranty will cover it. Maybe they won't, so. Yikes. Okay, what's the car, what was the car worth before this issue?

1:37:51Probably about$18 ,000, and then I bought the extended warranties, and then out the door it came the$30 ,000. What? Whoa, what? Yeah, so now it's only worth$13 ,000. Now, how is it worth$18 ,000? You bought it for$18 ,000. You bought$12 ,000 worth of extended warranties? Well, it was$6 ,000, and then I guess some fees got added. I don't know how it got up to$30 ,000. You bought a$6 ,000 extended warranty? Yeah.

1:38:16George Kamel:And they just added$6 ,000 more in fees? I'm confused. I'm not convinced that you're—I feel like you're smarter than this. Yeah, it was a really dumb thing. I don't know how that's— If I bought a$6 ,000 warranty, they're paying for everything. They're paying for my toothpaste that morning that I used to brush my teeth. They're paying for everything. What could possibly be the holdup? Because you must have bought the Cadillac, Lexus, Atomic, Diamond, Platinum warranty. Because think about that. You bought a warranty that's one-third the value of your car. Yeah. So how are they protesting any sort of service?

1:39:03I don't know. And then I've messaged the warranty company. So I was at a shop before this shop prior because I had issues with the overheating. So they replaced the water pump on it. And then two days later, I was driving down the road and it started overheating again. And then it just wouldn't turn on. So I towed it back to that shop and they said, oh, it's nothing that we did.

1:39:27George Kamel:How long ago did you buy this car? In February. Okay, and where did you buy it from? Like, was it a dealership? It was a place in Tampa. It was Discovery Autos, a dealership. Have you went back to them? Not like a big known dealer. Yeah, I did. What did they say? They sent me a form that I signed that basically says I bought it as is. Yeah, but if they sold you the warranty, there's got to be some... Here's the thing. Also, I'm not messing. They didn't disclose that there was anything wrong with the car at all. No, no, no. That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying if you bought that warranty through that dealer, then there may be some liability on their part, that they're pushing a bad product on you.

1:40:08Yeah. And here's the second thing. I'm not messaging anybody. I'm calling everyone. I'm going to find a buddy who's a lawyer that's going to write me a letter. I'm calling everybody I know. I'm not messaging anything. This is too big of a deal.

1:40:24George Kamel:Whenever I'm not working my full-time job, I'm working on this and fighting it. I'm going through the fine print. I'm working with an attorney. I'm showing up in person every day until they know me by name. Okay. Do you own a house? No. Okay. I'm making up a number here, but if you have a$500 ,000 house, depending on where you live, obviously, your homeowner's insurance is going to be$5 ,000 or$10 ,000 a year. you paid$6 ,000 for a warranty against an$18 ,000 car at that ratio that would be like buying a warranty for a half a million dollar house that costs$175 ,000 so what you paid is so out of whack proportionally and you should be able to get your money back for the warranty at least.

1:41:21Yeah, that's what my next step was going to be. I just wanted to figure out if I should still continue to try to get it covered by warranty. Yes, but you've got to - But I have to pay up front for the whole teardown of the engine and everything, and so -

1:41:38George Kamel:That is insane. I've never heard where you have to pay, and then maybe the warranty company will reimburse you later. And Amy, I'm confused by your lack of just going to war over this. I don't have the money. I don't know anything to do that. To get a ruler out and go line by line down this warranty that you have. Oh. And with the highlighter. I've been emailing the warranty company. I've been going through it and everything like that. And I've reached out to like the Better Business Bureau and all that. Okay. Do you have any money right now? No, not really. What do you make? I have a few hundred.

1:42:19I make hourly or salary?

1:42:22George Kamel:Salary. Salary, I make about$49 ,000 a year. Okay. And what other debts do you have outside of this$30 ,000 car loan? I have a$8 ,000 personal loan, a$700 loan, and then I have a couple of credit cards for $200 ,000, and then three for$500 ,000, and then one for$300 ,000. And then I have another car loan for$13 ,000. What? What happened to that car? That car I gave to my mom. Wait, you're still making the payments on it? Yeah. Why is she not paying the payments? She doesn't have a job right now. Okay, so this runs in the family. Okay. Can you sell that car immediately? The other car? What's it worth?

1:43:10George Kamel:The one your mom's It's not worth what I owe on it. Have you rolled a lot of negative equity into these? That car, no, but that car I bought for, I think, more than it was worth as well. And it's only 2 % interest on that car. Well, at least there's the good news. We have 2 % interest. Oh, Amy, we need to change everything. I'm cringing. You're getting hosed at every single dealership you go to. Yeah. What's the interest rate on the$30 ,000 loan? 7%. And did you roll negative equity into that one? That one, no, I didn't. That was just... Here's the deal. You're underwater on this car, obviously.

1:43:56George Kamel:And right now, it's to the tune of$30 ,000, because I don't know if this car is worth anything. And so your best bet is to try to get it fixed up so that you can sell it. Because your other option is trading it in or selling it for parts at this point, if it's kaput. and that's going to put you in a giant hole to where you're upside down by, you know,$28 ,000 if you get rid of for$2 ,000. And so getting the warranty refunded, if they're not going to come through and fix anything is one at least step, but you're going to need the difference in a personal loan in order just to get out of this payment.

1:44:28George Kamel:And then you still need a car to drive. Right. In which case I would rather take your other car back that you owe 13 on, because at least you're less in debt than that. And mom needs to figure it out. Yep. But you're going to have to make a lot of hard choices and fight really hard, probably for the next few months, to battle this thing out. And in the meantime, what transportation do you have? Right now we have a car that I use from work. Who's we? That we use for customers. I've been borrowing it from my... From your employer? So we have like a crew car, yeah, that customers will use. So I work at an airplane maintenance shop, and so they'll drop their plane off and then sometimes take the car to lunch and stuff.

1:45:10So I've been borrowing that car.

1:45:11George Kamel:Are there any folks over there who know cars pretty well who can help you navigate this mechanic situation? I'm sure they know mostly about planes, so. I mean. Cars, I'm not sure. I feel like they're cut from the same cloth. They've got to know what an engine looks like to be dealing with this. So I would be begging folks from work to say, hey, can you help me with this? I'm struggling. I want to make sure I don't get hosed once again. But the key is you've got to come up with a difference just to get rid of the car loan. And to do that, you're probably going to need to fix it up. And that's going to mean saving up when you can and covering the difference in cash or with a person alone.

1:45:48George Kamel:I don't know of another way out of this right now, unless you just sell mom's car and try to cover it. But you're way underwater on that, too. We're out of options here.

1:46:16George Kamel:I was sick and tired of being sick and tired. Bankrupt with a toddler and a brand new baby at home. Scared doesn't even begin to cover it. But I got mad enough to change. I started using God's and Grandma's ways of handling money. That journey became the total money makeover, a plan everyday people can use to take control of their money. Millions have changed their lives following the plan in this book and found hope. Start your makeover today at RamseySolutions.com slash store.

1:47:00George Kamel:Buying or selling your home is a big deal, and you need an expert in your corner fighting for you to find the best deal for the right price. The Ramsey Trusted Program is the only way to find a top agent you can trust who will help make your home a blessing, not a burden. It's super easy. You compare agent profiles, interview them, and then choose the one that you want to work with. You can find a local Ramsey Trusted Real Estate Pro for free at RamseySolutions.com slash agent or click the link in the description if you're listening on YouTube or podcast. Carolina is up next in Burlington, Vermont.

1:47:31George Kamel:What's going on, Carolina? Hi, thank you for taking my call. I just wanted to say first that I love you, Dr. Delaney. You're just such a blessing for so many people. And yeah, I retweet that statement. Thank you. I wish you would tell my friend George Campbell that because he's mean to me off air. But Thank you. I accept. And then my question was, how do I budget for irregular expenses, including things like kids growing up? I'm, you know, we're debt free, but we seem to be spending every single bit of our money every month. What do you mean budget for kids growing up? That's like a thing they all do.

1:48:18yeah i mean like my you know i have my my baby just turned one and you know she's eating more food my my seven-year-old is like just eating like a teenager now my 15 year old he ate an entire horse the other day it's the horse that george told that poor woman to sell one time my son just ate the whole thing like they'll eat everything i just don't know how to budget for things like that or um like heating in vermont is a big you know big part of living here and it seems like it how long have you lived there uh my husband's been lived here all his life but i've i've lived here eight years okay we've been married eight years so you guys know and you can go look

1:48:59George Kamel:at your your bill for the last year and go oh look at that it spikes in the winter time we pay more for heat in december than we do in july no way and so you'll be able to kind of find those trends and then you'll adjust the budget as the month goes on. And so the key, have you done a budget formally yet? Or is this just sort of like, how do I prepare for these expenses? No, we have done budgets before. But like, okay, another one would be the car, the VM is just hitting 100 ,000 miles. And so last time I went to get a service for oil change, they said, oh, you know, you need to do this maintenance and this other thing.

1:49:39And those are things I didn't budget for.

1:49:42George Kamel:Okay. So you're going to, this is going to change your life when it comes to budgeting and it's called sinking funds. And so for things that are necessary in your life ongoing that you know you're going to need to cover at some point, you just set up a sinking fund. So there's going to be a line item in your every dollar budget that says car maintenance and repair. And every single month you're going to put a hundred dollars into that account so that over the course of the year, you will have saved up$1 ,200. So when there's the oil change or the little repair, you're going to have the money sitting there ready to cover it.

1:50:13George Kamel:So that's going to help you cover those longer term expenses that are coming up over the year. Maybe it's an insurance bill that you pay yearly. Just divide it by 12 and then put that amount in a line item in the budget. I think the key is you're not actually adding any of these line items to the budget, but then you're surprised when they pop up. So for the kids, maybe we need to have a new line item for kids clothing if they're moving through clothes really fast as they grow let's have kids clothing in the line item in the budget for 50 bucks a month whatever you guys decide what about like what it would be for a family of six what's a good food budget i wish i could tell you that it's so dependent on are there dietary needs in the family um where where are you guys shopping currently i know like we i love aldi that's where i go for the grocery shopping because it keeps the bills low.

1:51:02George Kamel:I have no clue what a family of six should be spending. You can check. They have the government lists of here's how much people have spent that are in your shoes, but that's really dependent on you. The key is how do we get it lower than it was last month and keeping it in check. So don't make it outrageous. Don't decide, well, I'm going to spend 300 bucks for six people for the month. That's not reasonable. So make it realistic and put a number out there. You can see what you've been spending and then go, hey, we've been out of control here. We've been spending$1 ,500 a month. Let's tighten this down to$1 ,000 a month or$1 ,100 a month to cover us.

1:51:35But I also, and maybe you didn't say this, and maybe I'm just tired today, but I don't want you blaming a one-year-old for their appetite increasing, right? Or their seven-year-old for beginning to eat more and more. That's just what kids do, and it's amazing and awesome. No, no, no. No, no, no, not at all. I just, I'm just overwhelmed with just the food cost and all of these things that seem to have to have a line in the budget. And then sometimes it just feels like we don't even have enough money for what is budgeted. Sure. Yeah, some of that is a frustrating, annoying, like really heartbreaking amount of discipline at a grocery store.

1:52:26like i can only buy these things with these coupons especially nowadays groceries are still so expensive like i can only buy this much stuff mom can we we just can't come on mom and every parent wants to be able to get their kid that two dollar thing and we literally don't have that margin right this second um and it's being intentional as george said it's planning out expenses before we get there right but it's it's a pain and it's not fun but it shouldn't be that much of a surprise.

1:52:56George Kamel:And what helps is we do a monthly budget meeting and then we have a little weekly check-in. Hey, what's coming up in the week ahead? Are line items still accurate? Do we need to tweak anything, delete something, add something? And that can make it much more palatable to realize that you're in control and that life isn't just happening to you. Even if it's something annoying to pay for, we have a miscellaneous line item that just is a little catch-all for the little surprises. You know, 50 bucks a month, that's the catch-all. I wasn't expecting that$6 charge here. Now we have a place for it. And that way you're sort of planning for the unplanned.

1:53:27George has a line item up for$175 for extra hair care. That's on top of his haircut. I do. Well, here's the thing. I spend more on my dogs than I do my own child at this point. It's out of control. But you know what? It's a blight mark on America that he does that. 100%.

1:53:42George Kamel:Have you guys used every dollar before, Carolina? Oh, yes. And we're eating at our savings. and that was, I guess, my next question was how do I know at which point we have an income problem? You have one right now. If you're living off your savings, you have an income problem. If you're debt-free and you have no margin and you're living off savings, it's for sure an income problem and an expense problem at the same time. Because you can always make more, but then you'll just spend more if you don't solve the other side of the equation. So I think you and your husband sit down tonight with EveryDollar and make it realistic and go back in the bank statement and go, hey, did we miss anything?

1:54:23George Kamel:What do we need line items for? And then actually meet up once a week, track the transactions, and see if you feel a little more in control and a little less chaotic as the month happens. Okay. Do you have used EveryDollar Premium before? That connects to your bank account? No, we've used the app, the App, the Premium. Okay. Well, I'm going to gift it to you today. to help you guys win on this journey. It's going to connect to your bank. There's a new experience in there that will help you with recommendations. And I think the more you use it, the more comfortable you're going to be with all these ups and downs and the kids are eating more.

1:54:59George Kamel:And if they're eating more, up it a little bit each month until you find your baseline, you figure out what works for you guys. What are you guys making a month? So my husband makes like$4 ,000 a month take home. Okay. And then we have a renter, but that pretty much pays off our mortgage, most of our mortgage. Okay. And I'm going to stay at home. We homeschool. Okay. So$4 ,000 a month is what you have coming in, and the renter helps cover some expenses. And what are your monthly expenses as you've been doing this budget? Well, our rent, well, not a rent. I guess the leftover mortgage is about$1 ,000.

1:55:45And then food kind of varies, but it can be$400 or better. And we don't have any car payments.

1:55:56George Kamel:Okay, it sounds like you don't know the total expenses, which tells me it's probably been a while since we've really dialed in this budget. So that's your homework. Figure out exactly what your expenses are going to be for the month of July. Today is July. It's the start of July. Let's figure this out and dial this in. It might take 90 days to get used to it, to get all the pieces dialed in, but you're going to feel so much better when it's done and not go into a frenzy every time the kid needs a little more milk. I hope that helps. This is The Ramsey Show.

1:56:42you

1:57:07George Kamel:Our scripture of the day, Proverbs 9.9. Instruct the wise and they will be wiser still. Teach the righteous and they will add to their learning. jimmy hendrix said knowledge speaks but wisdom listens dan joins us up next in minneapolis what's going on dan hey gentlemen how you doing today great how are you great say i have a 19 year old son who's going to be entering his second year in college here uh we've always pushed for living the debt-free lifestyle. He has about$50 ,000 saved up in his savings account for college expenses. Year one, he's already paid his way through. He's going to a South Dakota State University, which is a fairly reasonable school.

1:57:56And with his scholarships that he's been awarded, we're kind of anticipating maybe$10 ,000 a year out-of-pocket expenses for him. Amazing. Um, what we're getting at is, uh, he actually threw a question at me the other night that I wasn't really anticipating. And he says, dad, what about, what about this thought? He goes, what if, uh, I take out a student loan, which I'm not familiar with how all the student loans work and, uh, whatnot, but he says, you know, I'm not going to get any interest tacked on until the end. He says, what if I invest my money in some sort of a Roth account, gain some interest in the next four years.

1:58:36He's on a five-year plan to get his master's degree as a structural engineer. And he says, what if we try to gain some interest on that money and then pay it off as a lump sum when I get out of school? What do you think about that?

1:58:52George Kamel:Oh, boy. Well, I think your debt-free plan is out the window, number one. And I think we've then trained him to use a word that I think is a cancer amongst young men in society, which is arbitrage. That's what he's doing here. Bro, it's all about arbitrage. If I can make more in the market, why would I pay down my low interest debt? That's the path he's going down, and it will then spiral. This will be a gateway drug into more risk in his life that he thinks he can manage. And he's assuming that this money is going to grow if he invests it in this period of time in four years. Right? And we've had that conversation, you know, and I've shown him some losses with, you know, just the latest stock market decline that we had here.

1:59:37George Kamel:Yeah, while he's in school, he's going to be checking that investment account going, oh, gosh, it was 50, now it's 43. I'm going to pull all my money out of the market. That's what's going to happen. And he can't invest in a Roth account. That would be a retirement account at that point. Yeah. In which case there would be penalties if he withdrew money beyond his contributions. Now, if you left it in a taxable brokerage account, he would be taxed on the gains of that money. And maybe he makes a little bit. Maybe he doesn't. But I like to avoid all the variables when I can. And one way to avoid all these variables and to go, hey, man, it's not worth – the juice ain't worth the squeeze to potentially make$1 ,000 or$4 ,000.

2:00:19George Kamel:I would just pay my way through, graduate debt-free, and not have to worry about what life looks like four years from now. What happens if he doesn't graduate? and he's still on the hook but doesn't have the degree with the job on the other side yeah there's a lot of things that could twist into that and uh make it bad for him and right now he's doing very good it's keeping him on track he knows you know annually what about what it's going to cost him he knows how much he needs to work in the summertime along with taking some summer courses he's really going down an excellent path right now but i didn't want to deter it but I wanted to call in and get another opinion and just tell him that he does think a lot of the Ramsey program, they taught it to him in high school as an elective, and so he's been a believer.

2:01:05So he's a buy-in. I just needed that other voice to maybe deal the deal. Well, I think more than me and George, can I tell you a voice that he really needs right now is yours. and there's something powerful about saying hey like that's a you asked me a phenomenal question and i actually had to go get some other wisdom on it because i hadn't thought it all the way through well done dude and your rising sophomore son's chest will puff out about six inches because he got a great i'm proud of you compliment from his old man and a hey you stumped your dad man man, that's an excellent, I can tell you're really thinking this stuff through.

2:01:46And I want to tell you a story or two from my personal life where I thought I had it all figured out. And then I didn't understand what I didn't understand. And that's called wisdom. And life came at me. And man, I want to let you know you're an engineer mind. You're a brilliant young man. And life doesn't play out on a spreadsheet. And if you can give him one or two stories from your life that you had it all mapped out and then it went sideways, in my life, I would have about 10 ,000 of those stories because I always have a plan and a scheme and it never works out right. Then you'll find a closer relationship with your son.

2:02:25You'll model for your son how to go, wow, I learned something new. I was challenged. And you'll give him a great gift, which is any dad looking at their son saying, I'm proud of you. That's a great question. So you see what I'm saying? Like your voice right now matters a lot. And I appreciate that. But at the same time, that second opinion also matters. It does. It does. You appreciate that. What do you have for advice on anything other than like a high yield savings account, which we're in now, which is I think just below 4 % where his money is sitting.

2:02:59George Kamel:That's exactly where mine is. Yeah, that's where I keep my money that's not in checking. During the last break, I just moved some to my high-yield savings account. So, I mean, I just did that. These rates are still historically high. I'm still shooketh that we are sitting at 3.5%, 4%. He's speaking King James. That's how shaken up he is. When I was saving up for a house, I remember it was 2 % in a high-yield savings account, and I was losing my mind. I was like, the banks are losing money on me. How are they giving us 2 %? And so perspective helps. And the other thing that helps them realize is that when you pay in full for that next semester, you're going to show up to class.

2:03:35George Kamel:You're going to pay attention. You're not going to flunk out. And when it's someone else's monopoly money that maybe I pay back later, maybe there's a forgiveness program someone dangles when the next election comes up. Or it's this. Here's what's going to happen. Dude, my dad's got a 2020 F-150. He's trying to sell for cheap. What? He's selling it for cheap, man. And he's going to have$50 ,000 on account. And he's going to call you and say, dad I can get a truck that's worth 40 grand for like 20 right now that's how that's going to happen and I only know this because I worked with college students even great ones for 20 years and all of them act like college students even the great ones right it's just yeah I mean this is just a pretty amazing moment and I want to I want to also credit you my son right now he's 15 he thinks I'm the dumbest person who's ever lived so you are right a second a second opinion does matter and I've always said Hank's a genius yeah he's pretty sharp and he's like dad I don't think you're that good at what you do.

2:04:33But anyway, but like, yeah, getting a second opinion is awesome. But man, telling a personal story and kind of mapping it out, that's awesome.

2:04:39George Kamel:There's a piece of this, Dan, and you've believed this principle for a while now, is that it's a better life to just believe in the principle that owing people money is a bad thing, regardless of the interest rate, regardless of the spread or the arbitrage. And so my fear is that he does this and then he gets out of college and goes, dude, the dealership gave me 0 % APR on a new car. Why would I not take that? Leave the money in savings. I'm a genius. I'm going to be a TikTok star talking about this stuff. And that is what I think is causing a lot of people to get trapped in the maze of the lending world, which is what they want.

2:05:14George Kamel:They want to lure you in with all the low interest rate. And now it's actually smarter. And every financial advisor would tell you, hey, no, leave your money invested. You shouldn't pay cash for things. Just leverage as much as you can. And so I think there's a principle to it where you just decide early on that you're never going to touch debt, you're going to be unbelievably wealthy and focused instead of losing sleep over the next arbitrage scheme. And so I hope this gets to him. I would encourage him to read my book, Breaking Free from Broke. I'll send it to you if you can get it over to him or if he'd prefer the audio book, we'll get that over to you.

2:05:45George Kamel:I have a whole chapter about student loans that I think will set him free of this and cause him to go, oh my gosh, why would I touch debt if I don't have to? And you guys have done such a great job. It makes no sense to go backwards now. So way to go. Dad of the year right here. And kid of the year, man. Son of the year. I love young - 19 year old with 50 grand in savings? Yeah. Young men and women that work really hard and ask hard questions. And I love students who are young, young people who are like, wait a minute. What if that's all good questions? It's all great. Yeah. And I love that. His critical thinking skills are working.

2:06:18George Kamel:It's just with the wrong motive underneath it all that I'm worried will add more risk and stress to his life. He's already got a lot going on. A 19-year-old is having an existential crisis every day. Especially an engineering major. Engineering majors don't have many existential. Not like the young poetry skater boy said to you later boy like you were. The artists, the troubled souls we are. That's right. That puts this hour of the Ramsey Show in the books. Thank you to Dr. John Deloney, the whole crew in the booth keeping the show afloat, and you, America, will be back before you know it.