You Don’t Have to Retire Broke—Time Changes Everything

22:42so i am eight years younger than my husband so he has quite a bit of working years old for me and when we met i was fairly young um i was only 18 when we first met you were 18

22:56Dave Ramsey:Yes. And you're how old now? 26. Okay. Yes. So our financial situations have always been a lot different, obviously, with our age gap. I mean, I've been working a full-time job since I was 14 years old. So being in the working field is nothing new to me. although because of I guess my age and I don't want to use my age as an excuse because there's a lot of people who make a lot of money that are my age or younger so I guess just with my experience and what I do have to offer on the table as far as job wise I don't always get like high salary paying jobs I start usually low. All of that has to do with it sounds like you think you have to earn your right to be a wife.

23:48Dave Ramsey:Like you're not equal if you don't make equal money. Yeah. When you got married, the vows said richer for poorer, sickness and in health. Yeah. Your vote doesn't scale with income. Yeah, I agree. You should have had a vote day one, regardless of your income level, if he decided to do life with you. So what was the real reason you guys never combined?

24:15he thinks that I'm financially irresponsible with my money. There it is. I don't 100 % disagree with him. Yeah. It's like I was always someone, and obviously this is something I'm trying to work on.

24:32Dave Ramsey:Okay, let's stop a second. So the marriages that are successful relationally and that are successful financially do not operate like yours. yeah that's why you're calling okay yeah and um so you're not his daughter even though he thinks because he makes more and he's older that he's going to treat you like that and so you're in time out because you didn't behave that is not a that's not a healthy marriage relationship That's bull crap. Okay. That's from a guy that's been married 43 years. That's bull crap. All right. So you don't earn your vote in the house, as George said, based on the income that you produce or based on your age.

25:25Dave Ramsey:Neither one. You both get a vote the day you say I do. And both votes are equal the day you say I do. Period. Period. And this is the way marriages function, that we have studied thousands and thousands of them that become millionaires and that have high quality, high satisfaction marriages. It's not a father-daughter relationship. No one is punitive. We might argue, but we argue from a level playing field about what our goals are going to be, not what I want to do versus what you want to do. but we argue about where we want to go. And you guys are a long, long way from that. And it brings me great fear because now that you're having another child at his request, um, now you're not going to be working at all, which means you don't even not only not have a vote.

26:22Dave Ramsey:Um, now you have to apply for welfare with him. Yeah. This is the way this character acts. And, um, He has had bad training somewhere. Someone has told him this is the way to do it, and he's wrong. I'm not being unclear, am I? No, you're being perfectly clear. Good. Okay. And I do agree with you. We've taken this call, so let me show you the future. He's going to give you an allowance, quote-unquote, because he's going to treat you like his daughter. And then bitch about how you spend it. Yeah, and then he'll shrink it based on your behavior and how he feels about it. Yeah. While you're trying to take care of the family and the kids.

27:00Dave Ramsey:So, no, today this ends. The worm turns today. As Shakespeare said, the worm turned. So that's it. It's over. And we're going to sit down, and honey, we're going to be on an equal playing field. We're both going to have all of our names on all the accounts. It is now our house, our income, our bed, our kids, our future, or our is going to see a marriage counselor. Yeah. And we're going to get some marriage help. And we probably need to do that anyway, because at a minimum, you guys need some new tools on how to do marriage. Your tool belt is really empty. It is. Yeah. And so I'm not being mean, but the things that are going through your mind, I don't want you ever coming at this discussion again from a subpar, substandard, I'm not as good as position.

27:56Dave Ramsey:Don't you ever use that language again in your house. Because you're not subpar. You're not substandard. You're younger. You had a different career path. Whoop-dee-duop-dee. You're his wife. The old marriage vows in the old days out of the Book of Common Prayer, where we get richer for poorer sickness and health, unto thee, the rest of it used to say, unto thee all my worldly goods I pledge. Boy, we ought to add that one back into the marriage vow, shouldn't we? All of us. My job is now to love you so well that you are cared for and you have a vote. Hello. That's service. Real leadership is service.

28:49Dave Ramsey:That's real leadership. so i we're we're on your side i'm not gonna i'm not angry with him but the way he's acting is not going to prosper you it's not going to prosper your children it's not going to prosper him and it's going to create a life of resentment bitterness and anger and you guys are not going to enjoy the next 10 years and your children are not going to grow up in a good house because this is not the way people are supposed to interact kiddo we always say more is caught than taught and those kids are going to see the way dad treats mom and mom gets an allowance if she's a good girl and that's a sad way to live and i think for too long laura has believed the lies that he has told her that would be stephanie but yeah oh yes our stephanie i'm sorry and so the part of this is laura might too but this may as well but you know i think if she went to a counselor on her own the counselor would say i'm seeing a pattern of gaslighting and narcissism and all these sort of trendy words, but I think there's a control mechanism here.

29:48Dave Ramsey:It's just an older guy that's used to being in control, and he's just still in control. That's all it is. I don't know if it's narcissism. That might be overstating it. And it's not gaslighting. He didn't tell her she's crazy. He just said she was insufficient, that she was deficient. And so she needs to follow and do what he says. It's a control mechanism for sure. No question about that. But I don't know if we go so far as to throw trendy, overused, poorly defined words at it. You know, TikTok psychology. But yeah, that's the thing right there. Wow. It's one of our most controversial takes is that we believe couples should combine their life, including their finances.

30:28I don't know how it became so controversial. You should have a joint checking account.

30:32Dave Ramsey:It's kind of like we teach people to live on less than they make. Controversial, Dave. Controversial. Who are you to tell me? Get out of debt. Controversial. Save money and become a millionaire. Controversial. Buy a house you can afford and don't buy one until you can? Oh, that's controversial. You're out of touch, Dave. You're out of touch, Dave. You're a boomer. You bought your house with a box of strawberries. It was bartered for.

31:37Dave, we got a lot of calls on this show where life happens. One day someone's healthy, they're working, providing for their family, and then a curveball hits.

31:45Dave Ramsey:You know, we hear it all the time. A car accident, a cancer diagnosis, a heart attack, and suddenly everything changes. Yeah, and that's why you've always said that having term life insurance from Xander is essential because it protects your family if the worst happens. Yeah, that's right. You need 10 to 12 times your income in coverage. No gimmicks, no whole life junk, just straightforward term life protection. But there's another piece that people often overlook, and that's long-term disability insurance. Yeah, it's important to understand the difference between them. Life insurance steps in when you die.

32:21Disability insurance steps in while you're alive but can't work. So it replaces a large part of your income so the bills still get paid while you get back on your feet.

32:30Dave Ramsey:Now, if your employer gives you free disability insurance, great, take it. If it's discounted there at a better price, take it. But if not, Xander can help you find the right plan. whether you're single or married it's not optional if you're going to be out of work for a while then you need to make sure the money's still showing up and that's why zander is our go-to they make it super simple to get the right coverage at the best price no pressure no upselling i've trusted jeff zander and zander insurance for over 25 years and so has my family so don't wait it's fast it's easy and it could make all the difference go to zander.com or call 800-356-4282 Protect yourself, protect your income, protect your family.

33:24Dave Ramsey:Folks, if you want to work the Ramsey Plan and systematically walk the baby steps, get out of debt, work the debt snowball, start putting money away for retirement, kids, college, get the house paid off, become very wealthy and a baby steps millionaire, the most efficient way to do that is using the EveryDollar app. The EveryDollar budgeting app walks you step-by-step, gives you Ramsey advice and coaching as if you were listening to the show, but it's carried around on your phone. Oh, and you and your spouse are working on it together. Hello, together. Pushing that through, pushing it through, pushing it through.

33:59Dave Ramsey:There we go. Check it out. You can get it for free on Apple or on Google Play. the EveryDollar app. It's the world's best budgeting and financial planning app, period. Laura's in Sacramento. Hey, Laura, what's up? Hi, I'm so happy to speak to two of my favorite people. I've been following you since 2013, and I am debt-free, and I have a house in the Sacramento area. But I have since moved in the last year to a very rural and remote property. And I cash flowed it. And I lived for a year in a travel trailer because I bought it, you know, for cash. And also I wanted to make sure if a fire came through, I could evacuate if I had enough time with my house.

34:54Since living here for a year, I've found that, you know, I would like something a little more permanent. However, However, I also don't want to have to pay fire insurance because according to my neighbors, it's between$10 ,000 and$12 ,000 a year. Also, I get – so, okay, I'll stop there and say – so I'm thinking about building a mobile home, which I know mobile homes are not a good investment. However, I still own my home in Sacramento as far as an investment. I rent it out to traveling nurses. So every 90 days is a turnover and I make sure that it's in great condition. So I wanted to get your opinion.

35:32Is it still a bad idea to cash flow a mobile home to have something a little more permanent, but to save on insurance, basically, to not have to pay the fire insurance, knowing I'm taking the risk if a fire comes through?

35:49Dave Ramsey:Okay, so what would the mobile home cost? The mobile home is about$100 ,000. Okay, so when it's worth$10 ,000 later, when it goes down in value, how do we put this in the smart column when it goes from$100 ,000 to$10 ,000? I'm wanting to say that instead of being an investment, it is a consumable good. It is something that I live in. Yeah, but if you put the same$100 ,000 in a house, it would have gone up in value. Yes, but I would feel much worse if a fire came through and burnt it down. And I would feel compelled to get that fire insurance. Yeah, I would too. I would too. But the thing is, you're losing$90 ,000.

36:30Dave Ramsey:That's a lot of feel good. Yeah, it's true. You're saving$10 ,000 to lose$10 ,000 every year in that mobile home. Ooh. Yeah. So I don't think it's as good a deal. You're going to lose more than$10 ,000 the first year on the mobile home. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So beyond a cost or I guess the financial component, is there anything else about mobile homes? I guess I shouldn't say that. No, that's it. That's the only thing. It goes down in value. If they went up in value, I'd shut up. Then you'd be okay with it. All right. But I mean, it's a car you sleep in. Yeah, exactly. It goes down in value. It's a modified, it's an increased cost, depreciating consumable item.

37:16Dave Ramsey:It's a bigger version of their travel trailer that you don't want to live in anymore. Yeah. In terms of math, that's the math on it. That's my only problem. I mean, one of my good friends owns one of the largest companies in the world that does those things. And he's like, Dave, would you quit trashing it? Well, as soon as they start going up in value, I'll quit trashing it. But they're not going to go up in value. So would I do that? No, I would not do that. I would pay the fire insurance and I'd build a house. Okay. Yeah, that was my second question. And if I need to sell the house down in the Valley to do that, I would do that.

37:45Dave Ramsey:It sounds like you do need to because you don't have the money. Oh, I have money. How much money? So I currently have$130 ,000 in cash to build a mobile home, but before I build it, I want to make sure. Well, you're not building a mobile home. You're buying a mobile home. Other people build them at a factory and they send it to you. It's on wheels, remember? Exactly. No, exactly. But it's also putting it on the foundation here, getting the water, sewer, all that. So that's why. Yeah, which you're going to do with the house anyway, yeah. Exactly, exactly. It's just the gut of, you know, it's a firm.

38:18Yeah, what is the house in the valley worth? It's worth$500 ,000, and I own it outright.

38:25Dave Ramsey:I would sell that and build a house for cash. Oh, yeah. I just. Let me ask you this. If you owned a house on this wonderful piece of property that you love, and it was 100 % paid for, and it was worth$600 ,000, and you did not own a rental property with nurses in it, would you borrow on your paid-for home to go buy a rental property? Oh, no. It's the same thing. Wouldn't borrow either way. It's the same thing. When you don't sell the rental property and end up borrowing to build the house, it's the same thing. Yeah. If I build a house, I would need to save longer before building the house. I wouldn't sell.

39:04I would stay in a travel trailer longer until I have the money to build the house outright, or I would do it. I wouldn't. I would cash flow it.

39:12Dave Ramsey:I wouldn't, but I wouldn't have been in the travel trailer in the first place because I'm a snob. I mean, for the weekend maybe, but after that, I'm done. If you're camping, I might see Dave in there. And if you did see me in there, I would be without Sharon. That would be the other thing. Sharon's not stepping foot in that. She will not darken the door of that. She's like, good luck with that theory, bub. She's more of a glamper. Especially these days. Okay, so. But yeah, owning a home is a long-term decision. So you want to think long-term. Ten years from now, was this a good idea? Yeah. And that's the problem with mobile homes.

39:46You know, because they're, you know what, almost always, and in her case it is too,

39:52Dave Ramsey:but almost always drives the mobile home decision is I don't have the money. And so I'm going to cheap out. and you can cheap out and for a hundred grand you can buy something you sleep in and um and they're fairly nice at a hundred grand i mean it's a pretty nice one yeah it's not a bad one they make them up to 300 or 400 or whatever but um i mean a hundred grand's no that's a pretty nice place but you're right i mean it's going to lose more than ten thousand dollars the first year and then people also get confused and rationalized with oh well the property went up in value yeah but it was going to go up in value whether it had a house on it or whether it had a mobile home on it and don't just because it don't confuse that with the mobile home went down in value it still went down in value like 100 of things with cars with wheels and or motors if it has a motor it has wheels it's going to go down in value period Period.

40:52Your little John Deere tractor that you paid$8 ,000 to mow your quarter acre lot with, and you financed with John Deere finance, is going to go down in value.

41:03Dave Ramsey:Your Sea Dew is going to go down in value. Your Mastercraft, I got two of them, they're going to go down in value. The world's best ski boat, thank you very much. It goes down in value. They're fabulous. They go down in value. that collectible corvette i have in my basement is going down in value and it's a collectible they any and george your battery with wheels your tesla is going down in value we i know that the hard way i'm trying to sell it right now nobody wants it dave you can't give that nobody wants a battery nobody's in the market for like an iphone 4 you know they want the latest and greatest you're buying technology here but it's true it's why we say pay cash well if you're gonna buy depreciating asset, always pay cash.

41:43Dave Ramsey:And honestly, you feel like right now you're trying to get rid of that car and you can't get rid of it. That's one bad feeling. It would be triple bad if you had financed that. If I was underwater on it. And you're sitting there paying payments and you can't give it away. Now you got lots of pissed off. Now you're just moderately aggravated. Yeah. Just a light, stupid tax on something I enjoyed. Yeah. And well, the other problem with it is, is you know I'm going to make fun of you. So that's another problem. I almost thought you might want to buy it just to troll me with it, but I figure you're not going to put money into that.

42:15Could we put it in the front yard and plant flowers in it? That's what I was thinking. I thought you were going to take it to the farm, take it out back. Oh, we could shoot it. And just destroy it. We could take the Barrett.50 cal and shoot it. It's cheaper than some of these fancy hunting trips that you go on, so I figure. That would be fun. We could make some content out of it. We could make a video out of it. Let's charge it to the company. You know what, Dave? I like the way you're thinking. You run the thing, so. We'll get the Instagram team out there. Hey, team, clip this out.

42:41Dave Ramsey:I want to be able to use this in a court of law when I make Dave Biles come on. It's not happening, but it was a good—you had a moment there. I was close. It was close. Oh, man. Whether it's a Tesla or mobile home, it's going down in value. Elon Musk would be so pissed if we took that thing out to the farm and just blew the hell out of it. I think he's got a sense of humor. He might enjoy it.

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44:37Dave Ramsey:Welcome back to the Ramsey Show in the Fairwinds Credit Union studio. Frank is with us in Asheville, North Carolina. Hi, Frank. How are you? I'm doing pretty well, Dave. How are you doing? Better than I deserve. What's up? Well, throughout the marriage with my wife in the last three and a half years, We have been using our one credit card for covering some of the four walls, like groceries and transportation. We've been covering mortgage and utilities with our checking account. And we also use the credit card for health insurance, premium and medical expenses, and even some of the life expenses.

45:20expenses. So we pay off every month and it feels like we give ourselves some room before we pay off the credit card each month, but then using our savings as quickly. So I guess one of my thoughts or one of my questions is what are your thoughts on using the credit card for some of the four walls, even if it's not the long-term solution?

45:45Dave Ramsey:Yeah, well, you've obviously not listen to the show much right uh we've listened a lot but i guess one of the reasons that we're holding under the credit card is you know some of the i mean you understand that your question is completely perpendicular to everything we teach for the last 30 years right yeah okay so i just want i mean i'm trying to understand if you understand what you're walking into it's a warning i'm asking i mean i'm being i'm not trying i'm not trying to beat you up i'm just saying so the answer to your question is that's dumber than crud okay now why is it dumb all right several reasons number one is there's not a singular piece of wealth building research that indicates that what you're doing causes you to build wealth not a single instance we studied 10 167 millionaires the number of them that do that what you're doing is precisely zero rich people don't do what you're doing broke people do okay so that that's a bad sign now is it going to cause you to go bankrupt probably not but the problem is is that you actually have somehow used your decision making framework around money to convince yourself that this is a good idea and that this is somehow going to get you ahead more than simply investing Investing is where money comes from Living on less than you make Is where money comes from Not from trying to trick Citibank And so the number of millionaires That became millionaires By adding up all their airline miles Is precisely zero None of them Not one Broke people chase airline miles 78 % of the airline miles Are never redeemed and yet people spend a lot of brain calories chasing this bull crap that these rip off huge banks are screwing america with and then convinced you that it's a good idea to dance to their tune i mean that now are you losing money when you pay a health insurance bill that is a health insurance bill whether you pay it with cash it's the exact same amount Can't possibly change?

48:06Dave Ramsey:No, you're not losing money doing that. Are you losing money when you pay an electric bill that is going to be the same amount whether you pay it with a card or whether you pay it with cash? You're not losing a dime. When you go and you're buying your groceries, you're spending more. The best merchandisers on the planet are grocery stores. When you walk through a grocery store, you are walking through a scientific lab that is very carefully designed, what is on what shelf, at what level, and what color more than any other type of physical product on the planet. Grocery stores are brilliant merchandisers.

48:48Dave Ramsey:The chances that you walk out of there spending more than you meant to, regardless of what methodology you use, are very high because they're very, very good at it. And it started back in the 1950s with a simple thing of they put the necessities at the back of the store, the bread, the milk, and the eggs. So you had to walk through the rest of the store and impulse on the candy. And Wrigley's became multi-bazillionaires. The Wrigley family have a fabulous mansion in Phoenix. fabulous by putting sticks of gum where at the checkout the impulse proper so this is these are just the beginnings of the sophistication that i'm talking about so a hundred percent chance you spend more in a grocery store than you meant to and when you put it on a credit card all the data all the research says that you are spending somewhere between 12 and 18 percent more than you would have spent if you spent cash because cash activates the pain centers of the brain and credit cards don't.

49:47Dave Ramsey:When you lay down a$100 bill in the grocery store and Uncle Ben looks at you and says, what are you doing? What are you doing? When you lay down a credit card, Citibank says, thank you, what's in your wallet? Samuel L. Jackson, my money is in your wallet. Not my money, but his money is in your wallet to pay for them stinking commercials that you did. That's what's in your wallet. We know what's in your wallet. a lot of Citibank's money. Here's the fun math on this. Let's say you put$60 ,000 of your take-home pay on that credit card to cover these bills and you got 2 % cash back. $1 ,200 is what you got, right?

50:25For the year. I'm exhausted for$1 ,200. For the year. So here's what I want to challenge Frank with. Frank, if no one has taken me up on this challenge, for one year, switch to on a budget using debit card and cash and see if you don't spend less than that$1 ,200 a year, which then negates all the rewards you got. And my guess is you're going to find that you spent thousands less by using your own money, leaving your bank account now versus using someone else's money that you can pay back later.

50:53Dave Ramsey:100 % chance. Take me up on it. Yeah. You're stepping over, stepping over dollars to pick up nickels, stepping over dollars to pick up pennies. Yeah. And so no, Frank, I would not do what you're doing. That's the reason. The biggest reason, though, is not the$1 ,200. The biggest reason is while you were focusing on the$1 ,200, you were missing the real way to build wealth because you had your eye on the wrong thing and you were thinking this method works. It's a distraction. I'll tell you, it's the exact same. It's the same problem I got with Acorn. With Acorns, that app? Yeah, where you put pennies, you round everything up.

51:32Dave Ramsey:Your spare change can go into an investment. You put your spare change in there. and people are screwing around with that with 14 cents while they should have been putting 350 bucks in their 401k and they use the same brain calories to chase down the 14 cents that they would have done to set their 401k up and retire a multimillionaire. In their mind, they've checked the box that I am investing. If I ask them, are you investing? You've scratched the itch. I have the Acorns app. You're not investing. You're a child with a piggy bank. That's not investing. Children with piggy banks have$14 when they're four years old.

52:07Dave Ramsey:And that's what you're going to have in your freaking Acorns app. It's the same thing. There's nothing evil about it. They're not ripping people off, but they took your eye off the ball. And you're focusing your decision-making paradigm and framework around the wrong things. And so that's the problem. And 100 % of the time, the Citibank tells you to do something. It's something you should not do. It is in their best interest. It's not for you. It's for Samuel L. Jackson. They got to pay him. He's expensive. Jennifer Garner is not cheap either. A hundred percent chance that Patrick Mahomes cost State Farm a bunch of money.

52:46Dave Ramsey:Who do you think paid for that? Oh, you people that buy from State Farm. Sheesh. Have you not priced your dadgum homeowner's insurance? You can beat it with almost anybody if you got State Farm. because you don't have to pay Patrick Mahomes.

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54:48Dave Ramsey:Thanks for hanging out with us, America. We're glad you're here. Ashley is in Bend, Oregon. Hi, Ashley. How are you? Hi, I'm good. Thanks for taking my call. Sure. What's up? So my husband and I have been given kind of a once in a lifetime opportunity. We have a family friend that is fairly well-to-do. Her and her husband own about five homes throughout the state, one of which is far over in eastern Oregon, and they are getting older and have offered for us to basically at a$0 a month lease this property from them to allow us to essentially build my horse training business and kind of start a ranching dream that we've had.

55:37Our hiccup is we both have extremely good jobs where we're at. All of our family is here, so on and so forth, and it's just a big leap, so we're not sure if we should do it or not.

55:49Dave Ramsey:What do you guys make at your extremely good jobs? So we both are in the construction industry. He makes about$110 ,000 a year. I make$75 ,000, and then I train horses on the side and make about$50 ,000 from that. Of course, you would lose all of that clientele because you're moving far away. Not necessarily. So my business is based on developing young horses and then selling them, So I don't necessarily have like a monthly clientele per se. It's more of... So where you train the horses that you sell doesn't matter. So you wouldn't lose the 50. Correct. And I mean, the idea would be to substantially grow that.

56:29Dave Ramsey:I understand. But I mean, you would not lose the 50. You know, we know at least you can do that. Yes, sir. If everything, well, unless something really bad goes wrong. Okay. Correct. And so how rural is this area? Why can your husband not work? So he can, and that would be the idea over there. The town is about 140 people, so it's very rural. I guess it just wouldn't be what he sits at now. From what we've researched, probably about$70 ,000 or$80 ,000 is what he would make a year. How out of 140 people? um the county as has some like management positions that are opening that i think he would be a very big benefit to them he's a foreman for a construction company now so um i think he probably he has some skills that would definitely be of interest i would say um i am 30 and he is 31 how far away is this place from where you are now?

57:33About five hours.

57:36Dave Ramsey:How many kids do you have? None. Okay. All right. And so we would be moving from 110 on him down to 70 and we'd be moving your income that you're losing is you're keeping the 50 on the horse. What's the income you're losing? About 70. So it's 110,$120 ,000 shift initially, assuming you don't. That's if he gets a$70 ,000 job and you can retain your 50 on the horses without any increase. Yeah, I got you. And I have thought about grabbing something remote while I build the horse thing up more and more, maybe getting something part-time to remote to kind of help that gap be smaller. Yeah, or like full-time.

58:22Yeah, or full-time. And these people will let you use this land and house for free is what you're saying? Yeah, so they don't get over there very much, and it's obviously hard to maintain a property that's also five hours away from them. They've just held on to it because they like visiting there twice a year, essentially.

58:41Dave Ramsey:Do you own a home? Yes, sir, we do.

58:49We have right at about$100 ,000 in equity in that, and I do currently run the horse business out of that. It's not something that I have to move to do that. I run it out of my house now. This is just, I mean, it's 1 ,500 acres.

59:07Dave Ramsey:But it's not yours. It's not going to be yours. Correct. That's my fear is long term. You don't own this, and it could shift hands. So 10 years from now, what does winning look like? You don't own any real estate. He's still working a county job, and you've grown a horse business. Yes. That's what winning looks like 10 years from now. I think the idea would be potentially to grow the business and, I guess, buy a place of our own. The expenses there would be essentially next to nothing. You know, I guess it would just be utilities.

59:44So what's the mortgage on your house today, the map balance? $410 ,000. Okay.

59:51Dave Ramsey:And so if you took$100 ,000 and went and bought a$500 ,000 ranch in some area that sounded like this, you could keep about the same mortgage amount and be on a ranch and do this deal and do this deal but own it yeah and that's i mean like that's kind of been our plan was to just stay where we are and you know obviously work to make that dream come true they have just offered this to us and um yeah i'm not i'm just not sure it's a blessing i was trying to figure out if it is It lowers your expenses, but it moves you away from ownership long term. Yeah, and you're – And it also lowers your income.

1:00:29Dave Ramsey:You know, everything's dependent upon – how long a lease will they give you for a dollar a year? She basically has told us infinite. No bull crap. She went as far as telling me that she will put it in her will that the kids cannot sell the home until we decide we're done with the property. you understand that's weird it is very weird um and like so strange i'm now spooked yeah this is weird that they wouldn't give it to their kids yeah as long as you guys are alive essentially our friend that raises horses gets priority over our entire family with our 1500 acres nah i think where she comes from is that is her kids are very well-to-do and they're i know No, but my kids are well today, but I'm not doing that for you.

1:01:21Okay.

1:01:22Dave Ramsey:Dave's not giving me his farm just because I love horses. George, you can't live there for free. I don't care, George. Shut up. But I love horses, Dave. I know. Well, you're known for your horse love. I'm just glad I met someone who's in the business of selling horses. Makes me feel better. Oh, wow. Yeah, her job is to do what you tell people to do. Who knew? She made a career out of it. Okay.

1:01:44Dave Ramsey:I don't know. I got to admit, the romance of it, I've kind of caught on to, okay? Because 1 ,500 acres, you know, are we all Yellowstone junkies? Is that our problem? But, yeah, anyway, the— And it's like it's not— I don't like the business aspect of it. Okay. The only way I would tell you to do this is if you pledge to yourself at the end of five years that you have your own place or you leave, period. Okay. We're not going to stay here longer than five years. Okay. Would they sell it to you? Yeah, but the— Yeah, but they can't afford it. I mean, she put it at$2.8 million. Perfect. Perfect. Okay.

1:02:34Dave Ramsey:So, number one, I would put a time limit on it. And you can return to construction, and you can return to the life you have now fairly easily. plus or minus your current job, okay? Yeah, and I would say— If this thing all blows up and isn't fun, and you hate living out in the middle of nowhere after all. I took a call from a lady yesterday who said, we bought our dream home with a bunch of acreage, and we hate it. What do we do now? And I'm like, well, you sell it, and you move back to the city. Dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun. And so, you know, the green acres—but the—yeah, wow. Anyway, the other thing that's bothering me, I'm just going to get it all out, okay?

1:03:17Dave Ramsey:Because you called and asked, and I really like talking to you. Thank you. Because you really have a level head for somebody doing a whole thing based on romance. And this is a very romantic story. It's a very cool story. I mean, the people that are infinitely generous, that are infinitely wealthy, and their children don't even care. I mean, this is strange. And so that's sweet, but it's weird. And so, yeah, I'd put a five-year limit on it, number one. Number two, I want you and your husband to do some prayerful soul-searching. Because this entire adventure is based on your desire to run a horse business.

1:03:57Dave Ramsey:Nothing else. That's 100 % the driver of this. And is that really what you want to be the driver of your whole life? because nothing else, we're doing everything else in this story to serve that one thing. And that's bothersome.

1:04:32You know, when I became a dad, something flipped. Suddenly, it wasn't just about me and my wife anymore. It was, what happens to my family if I'm not here tomorrow? And things like that just hit different when you become a parent. But I'll be honest, making a will feels heavy and complicated, and it's not exactly what I want to be doing with my time off. But here's the deal. Being a parent means doing the hard stuff, especially stuff that protects your family. And that's why I used Mama Bear legal forms. No hassle, no lawyers, just a simple online tool that helped me create a legit will in about 20 minutes.

1:05:05So it was pretty much painless. Plus, I added a notch to my dad belt right there between installing car seats and bedtime stories. Listen, being a dad never stops. And making a will is how you make sure your family's covered even when you're not there. So get your will done today at MamaBearLegalForms.com and use the promo code RAMSEY to save 20 % off when you check out. Again, that's MamaBearLegalForms.com, promo code RAMSEY.

1:05:41Dave Ramsey:Buying or selling a home is a big deal. If you want to learn more about housing trends and see what the weekly mortgage rates are doing, what prices are doing across the U.S., well, we're on top of all the market trends, and we can help you buy or sell with confidence and even hook you up with a Ramsey-trusted agent. Go to RamseySolutions.com slash market. We'll give you some help. Emily's in Chicago. Hi, Emily. What's up? Hi. Thank you so much for taking my call. Sure. How can we help? um well um i'm 55 years old and i've got four grown children um when my husband my first husband passed away nine years ago and left me with some life insurance money i had a revocable living trust created with my four children as a beneficiary my house is fully paid for and it's titled to the trust.

1:06:34So I got remarried four years ago to a wonderful man, and he moved into this house with me. And he, of course, helps with some living expenses and upkeep here and everything, and the house is rising in value. So my question is, how much equity should I give my second husband in this house that was fully paid for before we got married, but I am fair to both him and the kids.

1:07:07Dave Ramsey:Well, the only way you could is if you restructured the trust, right? Right, which I am about to do. Actually, I have an appointment here in about three weeks. So restructure your—have that appointment. Why? Well, I was already going to make some amendments now that my kids are no longer minors. So while I'm doing that, I thought I would amend the trust in some way so that if something happens to me... What is the size of your estate?

1:07:37My house now is worth about$500 ,000. I don't have any debt. I do have some retirement investments and some savings in an accessible. investment account. I've always looked on a zero-based budget, and I think grand total, mine would be about$1.2 million, actually.

1:08:02Dave Ramsey:And what have you done with all of that in regards to your current husband? Nothing yet. All of that has all been in the trust that I had before. So everything you have was put into this trust? Yeah. Why? It's still like it worked before I met him. Why? Why was it put in the trust?

1:08:27When my first husband died, my financial advisor just said, this is what you need to do, and he just did all those things for me. So you don't even know why? Not exactly. Well, except for two, I guess if something were to happen to me. A will would take care of it.

1:08:46Dave Ramsey:A will would take care of it. You don't have to operate everything out of the house. You designate a beneficiary on these accounts, and you don't need to put it in the trust. Yeah. Okay. Well, I already do have the trust. Yeah. And I'm not sure you need it. Oh, okay. You might, but I'm not sure you need it. And I don't like that you don't even know why it's there. And yet this trust is running around. We're doing all this stuff. We're serving a trust that we don't know why it exists because I don't know why it exists. I'm not sure why you need one. You don't need one for estate tax planning. You don't have an estate tax problem.

1:09:21Dave Ramsey:I'm sure of that. If you were trying to protect it from something, then you could use a trust for that. But I don't know who we're protecting it from. I want to make sure that... Well, if you leave the house, if you're a widowed lady and you have a house and you say in your will that a house goes to my four kids, 100 % of the time it goes to your four kids. You don't need a trust to do that. Should I, though, give some of that to my husband since he, my second husband... Well, that's a separate discussion. First thing I'm talking about is the structure of your finances. Okay? And the structure of your finances, I don't know why you're doing this.

1:10:05Dave Ramsey:So I want you to get some estate planning advice. And if you're going to keep the trust, I want you to have a real good reason why you have it and why you're keeping it. I don't know why your million three is in a trust. Mine's not. Okay. And I'm your age, and I've got more. And it's not in a trust, okay? I've got some things in a trust, but that's an estate planning mechanism because my net worth is in excess of the$25 million exemption. So I've got some of those issues. But you don't have those issues. I'm not picking on you. I'm just saying there's a reason for a trust. Sometimes the only reason people have a trust is what I'm getting at is because some attorney sold them one, not because they needed one.

1:10:48Dave Ramsey:So I want you to get into this and figure that out. Now, having said that, let's go back to your question. Let's say that you kept the trust and the trust stated that the first$500 ,000 value of the property upon you being deceased, the current value, the first$500 goes to your children as promised, and half of any increase goes to your children as promised. The other half of any increase would go to your husband. That is what I was thinking. It was worth$340 when we got married four years ago. I don't know that you have to backdate it, but if you want to, you could. Okay. And then 50 % of the increase after that would be...

1:11:31Yeah, split the increase between your kids and your husband.

1:11:33Dave Ramsey:That's an equitable way to do it. Okay. Yeah, the reason I wanted to ask is he feels like I should just give him 50 % total. No, well, he wasn't there for the first 50%. The first 50 % came for, he showed up. Why does he think he needs that? Right, okay. Why? Where did he get that logic?

1:11:56Dave Ramsey:He thinks he's that pretty? No. I think he's listened to a few of your segments where you were speaking to somebody in a different situation. Oh, me? He was doing property taxes on a house that he had a totally different situation, and he kind of, I feel like he's kind of misapplying it to ours. No, I wouldn't have said that in your situation. I mean, there's not a situation like yours that I would have answered this anyway other than this way. And I'm not even sure he needs half of that. But if you want to give him half of the increase from the time you got married on or from today on, that seems fair if he's putting money into the property.

1:12:37Dave Ramsey:And he's going to pay at least half of the – I mean you all have a combined account now and your combined account is paying the property taxes and the insurance and the maintenance. Then, yeah, he could participate that way. That's okay. That's fair. But I don't know why he would be due anything from before the marriage. That's not logical to me. But I really do want to go back to the other thing and say, investigate why you ended up with a trust. All right. Now, the reason I'm kind of going off on this, everybody, sidebar, there's a whole segment of people in the insurance world and in the legal world that sell people a$1 ,500 trust as if it's some kind of freaking magic wand for an estate planning tool that they don't need.

1:13:23Dave Ramsey:and they're a pain in the butt to operate. So every time you want to sell the house, every time you want to do an investment, anything you want to do, it's all in the name of the stupid trust. And so I've got a couple of things in a trust, but they're not used that way. And people sell it to avoid probate tax, which is local estate tax. And it's usually not that much. As a matter of fact, it usually doesn't even cost as much as the trust. Because the trust is a couple grand. Yeah, typically. Two to five grand, depending on who draws it up and what it's for. Now, if there's a combative adversarial family situation of some kind and you're trying to lock down your intentions for the ownership for a particular thing in perpetuity, a trust is a way to pull that off, okay?

1:14:08Dave Ramsey:And then in that case. But normally a will will suffice for 98 % of situations, and you don't just run over and get a trust. And what I've got here is a lady whose husband had passed away. She had a big insurance check, and she went to a lawyer. and what'd she end up with, a trust. So I'm suspicious that she didn't need one. Well, I get a lot of these videos sent to me from our fans, and it's always someone who has a vested interest in you getting a trust, which is why they're like, oh, you've got to get a trust as soon as possible. And it's as if it's some magic trick. Scroll down to getmytrust.com.

1:14:41Exactly. And it's usually an estate attorney trying to get some clicks and views for their business.

1:14:46Dave Ramsey:Hello. Hello. Here's the advantages of a trust. No one talks about the disadvantages. I just, here's an interesting thing. Unless you retitle everything, including your mutual fund state, your mutual fund account, your real estate, everything, you have to go retitle it, your car or whatever. It's not in the trust until you retitle it. That's a whole ass. And people buy these trusts and then don't retitle the stuff. So the trust is sitting there with nothing in it.

1:15:48Dave Ramsey:James is in Baltimore. Hey, James, what's up? Hey, how's it going? Thanks for taking my call. Sure. How can we help? So my wife and I just recently quit our high-paying jobs to have her stay home with the kids and for me to live out an early semi-retirement, I guess, just working part-time. How dumb are we? I don't know. I mean, what's wrong with it? What did you do that was dumb? It sounds like you think you was dumb if you're asking us. What's the regret here? I mean, I'm having some second thoughts, but I don't know how much of that is outside influence from my parents and my in-laws who are pretty risk-averse.

1:16:34Dave Ramsey:Oh, okay. And how much of it is? Well, what were you making? In total, we were - What were you making? I was making about$300, just shy. Doing what? IT, cybersecurity. Okay. And why were you$300 ,000 pissed off about it to where you didn't want to do it anymore? I've just been working for 20 years in the industry. I'm 40 now. And just thought that it would be a good time to refocus my energy on the family rather than work. Okay. And so how much have you got in your nest egg? What are you living off of? Um, so we sold our house and, um, so we've got about a million, just, just over a million cash, 785 in 401k, 550 in a brokerage, 176 in a paid for rental and maybe 40 grand in miscellaneous.

1:17:44So about 2.5 and change. And you guys are renting now? Yeah, we actually moved to Greece. Oh, wow. So we're back home visiting right now, but we moved to Greece.

1:17:57Dave Ramsey:What are you doing in Greece? Working remote, IT, cybersecurity, but for myself, part-time. Oh, okay. And how much do you make doing that? Just shy of$180,$190, it's looking like. Well, that doesn't sound like you quit. Well, I'm working 20 hours. I know, compared to what you were working, you quit. But, I mean, you know, this is not a guy who's sitting on your Duff 40 your entire week. You're working a little bit, make 180. You used to make 300. It's a 120 cut. What was your wife making before she quit? Right around 300. Okay. And what was she doing? Marketing, digital marketing. And she took hers all the way to zero?

1:18:44She has one client, but it is basically nothing at this point.

1:18:51Dave Ramsey:No money? Not much. What's not much? She has a contractor looking for her, and I don't remember off the top of my head, but it's... Okay, so let's just round up and say you guys are making over$200 ,000 a year. You live in Greece, and you sold everything. everything yeah that's different than i retired that's not your initial story is not true i retired i quit i do nothing i play with babies and change diapers and my wife plays with babies and change diapers we do nothing we quit everything we're off the grid that's how you started and that's just not the accurate facts you've got two and a half three million dollars and you make $200 ,000 a year.

1:19:39You took a pay cut to have an adventure in Greece and kind of scale back a little bit. Yeah, I guess that's why I'm thinking of it as semi-retirement because I'm working Eastern hours and I'm able to work from Greece. I'm effectively not working during the day. I work evenings.

1:19:55Dave Ramsey:Work whenever you want and however much you need to to get the job done at 180. And you're keeping your skills sharp in probably one of the hottest fields in the world right now, cybersecurity. And as long as you keep your skills sharp, you can jump in and out of that world at random and make money. Agreed? Yeah. I guess, like, plug in my income and my, more importantly, my, you know, savings and investments into various calculators. Okay, so let me put it this way. It sounds to me like you guys were driving. Have you ever driven a car at 150 miles an hour? In excess, yes. Yeah, me too. The white lines are coming at you pretty fast.

1:20:33Dave Ramsey:You remember what happened when you slowed down to 50? I feel like you could walk it out and walk. Yeah. You felt like you went from, you know, whatever, to riding a turtle. I mean, it was just like because your brain had adjusted to that speed, and when you dropped down to 50, it felt like you stopped. Right. That's what you did. 100%. You two were$600 ,000 a year, high potential, high capacity people. you were working 60, 80 hours a week. You were straining your brain. You were straining your emotions. You were straining your physical body with the hours. And you went from 180, or went from 600 miles an hour to 200 miles an hour.

1:21:16Dave Ramsey:And it feels like you stopped. Right. Exactly. But you really didn't. Yeah. You're now just driving like most people. No, I know. And it just feels like I worked 20 years to get where I'm at. And I was kind of on the threshold of getting to the next level. What's the next level?

1:21:39Dave Ramsey:SVP, the title. Yeah, do you want that? I mean, be careful about climbing that ladder of success. You want to be sure which building it's leaning on. Yeah. Yeah, you looked up and said the destination ain't worth it. The juice ain't worth the squeeze. I think I'm feeling pretty good, and I can have a really good life. I suspect you'll go through about four or five years of what you're doing now. you'll probably open up your own shop in some manner of some kind and get back to making a half million dollars just because it's fairly easy for you. But you'll want to control your own destiny instead of running around in the corporate world, which you really got sick of, and I really don't blame you because they piss on their people.

1:22:16Yeah, yeah, 100%. I think you're good. What's your burn rate right now? How much are you guys spending in a year? Right around$6 ,000. That's living really comfortably there. A month. So, um, six grand a month, like, um, 72 a year net. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You're making well in excess of that working 20 hours a week.

1:22:37Dave Ramsey:James, I want the narrative, see the narrative that you are shiftless, do nothing, retired early and have no work ethic that is being shamed and delivered to you somewhere is actually not accurate of who you are. If you were that, I would tell you. Okay. I would say, you know, get off your butt, you loser. I would tell you, okay? But you're really not. I mean, you're making substantial money because you've honed sharp tools. You have sharp tools in your belt, and you're a craftsman, and you're able to apply those because of your years of experience and your connections and make an inordinate amount of money for a small amount of hours.

1:23:18Dave Ramsey:And for right now, that's an adventure and a chance to slow down and get your breath. You guys have been running so stinking hard for so long. You just went from 180 to 55. That's all you did. But you're not shiftless or lazy. And I don't think you're going to do this exactly this way for the rest of your life. I don't think you're done. I think this is a sabbatical. Yeah, this adventure could go, yeah, it's getting old. We want to go back to the States four years from now. And you can do that. And you'll go pick up a job if you so choose or do your own thing. You may move to Switzerland. I don't know.

1:23:48The numbers are irrelevant. You guys are doing great financially. It's not dumb financially. But if you're the parents, you're going, I can't believe they went from 600 to 200 on paper. He quit their jobs. My son-in-law quit his job. So impulsive. But, you know, they don't have a vote. If you guys are enjoying your life, you're making your bills.

1:24:05Dave Ramsey:You know, it's funny. I've told this story a thousand times, but I'm going to tell it one more time. So my grandfather worked for Alcoil Aluminum for 38 years every single week. And when he retired, he was head cost accountant. He's a wonderful man. One of my favorite people on the planet. But steady. stable, secure. Risk averse. Yeah. So my grandmother's a second grade school teacher. So I printed the first book financial piece. I was selling out of the trunk of my car, sold it to a publisher. I got an email and it said, congratulations, you just sold your millionth copy. Wow. And the phone rang and it was my grandmother.

1:24:44Dave Ramsey:And she said, I wasn't worried about you. When are you going to get a real job?

1:24:51Dave Ramsey:Oh, man, that's funny. And she's sweet. I mean, she really was. It's so sweet. She was so worried about me. That's passive-aggressive grandma behavior. No, no. I mean, the point was it's just not her world. It's not her paradigm. She doesn't understand it. And she didn't have the viewpoint to go, a million copies, I think we're okay. I actually do have a job, hon, and we're okay. I'm still doing it today, by the way. All these 30 years later. Well, she'd probably think remote work is just unemployment with a different title. Well, it is.

1:25:43Dave Ramsey:welcome back to the ramsey show in the fairwinds credit union studio sammy is in chicago Hi, Sammy. How are you? Hey, good. How are you today? Better than I deserve. What's up? So me and my wife got on your program about seven months ago. We've shut down all of our credit cards. We have about$50 ,000 worth of debt left. How much have you paid off in seven months? Right under about$6 ,000. $1 ,000 a month. Okay. Yep. What's your household income? $150. So far, you suck at this. Yeah. You're making progress, but$1 ,000 a month is kind of weak. Our kids go to private school, which is a big expense.

1:26:40But my question was, is it a bad idea to take out a HELOC to consolidate it? I'm sitting at about$250 ,000 worth of equity in my house and kind of just get it all in one place and push it up to$1 ,200 a month and kind of clear that out in four or five years.

1:27:00Dave Ramsey:Yeah, that's a bad idea. Because you should turn up the heat on your budget, turn down the heat on your lifestyle. You guys have, you've begun the process and you've taken the first level of sacrificing, which is a great progress i picked on you pretty hard but i mean you really you cut up your credit cards and you paid off six thousand dollars and that's more than you've done in 10 years so you've come along well i mean you're going in the right direction finally congratulations on that and that's good but what i want you to do instead is pay three four thousand dollars a month and just get rid of this in a year but that means you're going to cut a whole bunch of stuff out of your life for a year and i don't know exactly what it is and it's not the kids private schools because that's not the real problem the problem is y 'all spend a lot of money eating out and you go on vacation whenever the flip you want.

1:27:50Dave Ramsey:Ding, ding, ding. I hear that. Yep. Yeah. Vacation, yes. But yeah, okay. And you, you know, I mean, you're paying. That makes a lot of sense. You add all of that up and you take the budget and you and your wife go, kids in private schools is a non-negotiable, but all this other crap, we can cut it out for one year and hold our breath and be done with this. Or we can keep this stupid thing around as a HELOC like it's a pet. No, I want to kill it. And here's what will happen. Here's what will happen. Here's the cool thing. In the process of doing that, Sammy, you and your wife will permanently change how you handle money.

1:28:24Dave Ramsey:You won't have to stay permanently sacrificed at that, but you will never be inattentive again. You will pay attention for the rest of your life because of this one time, because of the strain it does to your brain when you go on this much sacrifice. George? Yeah, using the house as a piggy bank and moving the unsecured debt to a secure debt, it's not changing any of the behavior that got you guys here. And that's why we're telling you, don't do this. It's just moving the debt around, and you guys are the solution. This great income you have, we just got to put it to work. I don't want you to be 10 years from now and only still finding$1 ,000 because you make too much money to be as broke as you are.

1:29:04Dave Ramsey:I want you to be rich. I want you to live like no one else so later you can live and give like no one else. And so that involves turning up the heat for a short period of time, cleansing the whole thing, cleaning the whole thing off, and then going from there. Pause all investing too if you guys are doing any investing. Temporarily stop your 401ks. Make sure you're not getting a tax return. You and your wife are together. We're not going to see the inside of a restaurant until we get this done. We're not going on vacation until we get this done. We're going to sell so much stuff that's junk around this house that the kids think they're next.

1:29:37Dave Ramsey:We're going to bust it. And we're going to have a tight budget and we're going to have a detailed budget. And the two of us are going to agree on that budget. And we're going to make a game out of this for the whole family. And we're going to clean up this mess and cut up these credit cards, which you already did. Way to go. And, you know, we're going to finish this change out because personal finance is 80 % behavior. And you have to modify behaviors to win. It's only 20 % head knowledge. The head knowledge, the intellect needed to, the intellectual knowledge base needed to become a millionaire you learn by the sixth grade.

1:30:15Dave Ramsey:It's just not that hard. The hard thing is the guy in my mirror. The guy in my mirror, if I can get that guy to behave, he could be skinny and rich. But he's got issues. And I like donuts. It's a problem. This is getting personal, Dave. Oh, I'm sorry. My name is Dave and I like donuts. This is my personal AA meeting. That's it, man. That's how it works, Sammy. We all face this stuff is the point. And the more I can get you to lean into it and burn with it a little bit, the more permanent the change becomes in your household. And then that is the biggest indicator of whether you're going to become wealthy, not whether we save a few interest rate points on a HELOC.

1:31:00Dave Ramsey:So good question. Thank you for calling in with it. Jonathan is in Miami. Jonathan, what's up in your world? Hey, Dave. Thanks for having me, man. How are you? Sure. Better than I deserve. How are you? I'm well. I've been following you, and I have a question. This is mortgage-related, and let me give you a little background. I'm 44 years old. I have four beautiful kids. I am the sole earner in my home. I'm the head of household. My wife is a stay-at-home wife. We have no debt. I bring in a box of little$200 ,000. year. Way to go. And I have extremely poor financial discipline when it comes to investing or any of that stuff.

1:31:39No one has ever taught me and I've always been fearful of losing my money. Therefore, I do the dumbest thing possible, which I keep it all in checking. How much is in checking? About 1.4 million.

1:31:53Dave Ramsey:Correct. Wow. Wait, wait, wait. Don't chew. Don't chew me out. I'm not. That's just fabulous. You've got a million dollars in checking. I love it. Oh, you're going to be so easy to help. Well, I'll tell you what my problem is. Okay. Because I don't have that financial discipline and fear of losing money, and I like having it under my pillow, per se. Yeah, you think? Having it in your checking account. You know where it is. You can get it whenever you want. Yeah, I guess so. I've been stacking. Now, the only debt I have is this house mortgage. So I purchased a home in 2020. I have about$400 ,000 outstanding on it.

1:32:35And I am fighting myself whether I should pay it off in full or whether I should, I don't know, do something else perhaps.

1:32:43Dave Ramsey:Everyone is telling me that I've spoken to, invest it, invest it, invest it. I have no idea what I'm doing. That's fair. Every person I talk to. And you're wise not to invest it until you get comfortable. You should not do it because someone else said do it or because Dave said do it. But let's just start with the basics here, okay? 1.4 in checking, right? How long has that been there? I've been saving for nine years now. Okay. So it's been occurring over the course of nine years. Let me just play a game. Let's pretend a million dollars has been there for the last four years, okay? Okay. Just for the fun of it.

1:33:18Dave Ramsey:Now, I want you to go learn about investing and get comfortable with it, And I'm going to help you do that because you've done the right thing. Don't put money in something you don't understand. So far, you've done the right thing. But by not understanding investing, had you invested in a basic mutual fund that only returned exactly what the market has returned, you missed out on three of the best years ever. Your money would have doubled in the last three years. Wow. That's cost you a million dollars, that lack of knowledge. So I want you to go get the knowledge, okay? And I want you to go to a SmartVestor Pro at Ramsey Solutions and go sit down with them and begin the process of learning and tell them you have a million dollars to invest because yesterday you paid off your house with$400 ,000 out of checking.

1:34:07Dave Ramsey:And by the way, you don't need discipline to pay off your house. It actually adds to discipline because it's very hard to get the money out of your house.

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1:35:22Dave Ramsey:Our question of the day is brought to you by Y-Refi. When people get buried under private student loans they can't keep up with, they might think there's no way out of that mess. Y-Refi helps borrowers explore solutions with fixed-rate refinancing and a payment plan tailored to their situation. Go to YRefi.com slash Ramsey. That's the letter Y, R-E-F-Y dot com slash Ramsey. Might not be in all states. Today's question comes from Cameron in Wisconsin. What does Ramsey Solutions recommend regarding robo-investment accounts? There are options where you answer questions based on your tolerance to risk, and they automate the process, and that seems like a simple way for people to invest when they don't know too much about investments or don't have time to manage their account.

1:36:06Is this something you'd recommend? Oof. Well, I like to know what I'm investing in, and so I don't want to just delegate it to the robots and not fully understand what's going on behind the scenes. So the idea is pretty simple. Some people, they're not ready to work with an advisor. They don't have a lot of money. So they go the robo-investment route. There's a low fee. And they feel good about their decisions. And you're probably, you know, you could do worse than that. But it's still not my favorite option when it comes to investing, simply because you're not fully involved.

1:36:40Dave Ramsey:Yeah. George, one of the most requested things we've gotten over the years is for us to actually list the mutual funds that we personally own. Just tell me what to invest in, Dave. What is the mutual fund that you buy? Or have even mutual fund companies have come to us and said, you know, would you endorse our mutual funds? And we made the philosophical decision many, many years ago to do none of that. So you guys don't know what mutual funds I have, nor will you. Because it's not the point of what I have. The point is what you have. And the point is you need to learn enough about the mutual fund for you to buy you an investment.

1:37:22Dave Ramsey:You should not put money in something because Dave Ramsey did. You should put money in something because you looked at it, you understand it, and you have sat with a good SmartVestor Pro with the heart of a teacher, and you've learned about the historical. This thing's 62 years old. It's got this kind of track record, this kind of risk. It doesn't feel bad to me. I like it. and, you know, here's the fees on it, and I'm okay with that, and based on that, I'm going to choose that fund, and I'm going to invest. That's how you should invest. A robo shouldn't pick it. This is not an automated car wash.

1:37:56Dave Ramsey:It's your investments. And, you know, you shouldn't pick it based on the person sitting next to you in your cubicle. What'd you put in your 401K? That's a bad way to select your 401K options. Just looking over Gary's shoulder. By God, 50 % of the people in 401Ks, that's how they picked them. or their company had an automated process that automatically puts them in the dumbest, dumbed-down, risk-averse possible thing, which is really not a good portfolio of mutual funds, and they pick whatever the company dumped them in automatically and didn't even look at it. So this is not how you make money.

1:38:32Dave Ramsey:It's not a good investing strategy. It's like, I'm going to buy a house and never look at it first. I have no idea about the neighborhood. Who knew they had cars up on blocks and shot down the street with Uzis? I had no idea. But I just bought a house there. You know why? Because I heard it was good on TikTok. You know what I mean? No. No. You don't do that. You go look at the house. You look at the neighborhood. You understand. You ask questions about the schools. You say, what's the hospitals like in the area? What's the traffic pattern around here like? You get knowledge about the product before you buy it.

1:39:04Dave Ramsey:And that's what you do with a mutual fund. That's what you do with an investment. Do not buy something because a robo said to. And likely it's going to put you in something too risk averse, like target date funds or a bunch of bond funds. Exactly. And then you don't even know. It almost always dumbs it down. 20 years later, you go, why am I not getting these returns Dave talked about? Well, you're not investing the way we teach. The number of times I pull up in a 401k with a big company, they've got auto processes or they've got buckets of funds. Okay. Here's five funds in the high risk bucket.

1:39:37Dave Ramsey:Well, guess who does that? No one. Based on the bucket name. You're not in Vegas. But then I pull up the actual funds. They're not high risk. They're just growth stock mutual funds. They're higher risk than a stupid bond fund, which is in bucket number one. Might as well put it in savings account. In your grandmother's boring bucket. And then you've got the medium bucket and the Goldilocks bucket just right. And so no one does that. And basically most people should probably be in the funds that are in that high risk bucket. but because the way it's named, they're just picking a bucket. They don't want to put any effort into learning about it.

1:40:11Dave Ramsey:Get your butt to school. This is millions of dollars of difference, whether you put it in the right fund or not. I was talking to you. No, don't use a robo. I do these man on the street, you know, interviews from my YouTube channel. We did one yesterday and I asked people how much they have in retirement and I asked them, do you know what you're invested in? Only one person out of 10 or 12 could tell me what they're invested in and it's because they or a Ramsey fan, her and her husband in their 30s,$900 ,000 invested in mutual funds, just like we teach. Wow. And they got to be on George's YouTube channel.

1:40:42Dave Ramsey:Say I'm a millionaire. Pretty cool. That's pretty cool. And all the others just said, I don't know. I have a guy who does it, I think. I've got a guy. I said it in my 401k. The people in HR help me. Good Lord. I clicked a button on my 401k. People are picking your funds? 10 years ago, I logged in. I don't even have the login to the 401k, but 10 years ago, I think I clicked some funds. That's the most of people's knowledge about their investments. And, you know, let me just tell you, winning at anything is a series of intentional acts. You have to be intentional about your investing. You have to be intentional about your marriage, intentional about raising kids, intentional about taking care of your body, intentional about your spiritual walk.

1:41:23Dave Ramsey:You know, no one wins the Super Bowl and then the reporter runs out on the field and goes, how did you do that? And they go, I don't know. I just got off the bus and this just happened. What happened? I don't know. No one says that. They've been studying and playing football since they were freaking six years old. They don't do anything else except throw a ball, throw a ball, get hit by throwing a ball, hit somebody that throws a ball. That's all they've done their whole freaking life. And then they don't know how to do anything else in life because they're so focused on that. And that's how they get to the Super Bowl.

1:41:50Dave Ramsey:It's an intentional act. It's an intentional act. And so, you know, for God's sakes, don't have a robo picket for you. I want an app so I don't have to think. There's not. There's an app. No, there's not an app that keeps you from having to think. Not if you want to be somebody and have something. You got to do the stuff or you got to do the stuff. You got to do the stuff. No robo, no George, no Dave, no Rachel. We're not even going to tell you what invested, what Kelly is invested in. We're not even going to tell you her mutual funds. Because I don't even know. So I can't tell you. So there you go.

1:42:25Dave Ramsey:And although that might get some real serious. But anyway, can you imagine Dave Ramsey's producer put that in there? George's producer put that in there. That would be the big one. Well, the good news is they're not like super secret funds that only Dave has access to. No, they're ridiculously boring. And you probably have changed it almost never in that period of time you've been investing. I can't. I don't remember changing it. A fund may have moved and switched around. I don't think I even changed it then. You probably don't look at it much now that you know what you're invested in. I pull it up enough to know what's going on with it because I'm intentional, but I'm not like, oh I'm panicking Trump bombed Iran I'm like no it went down prices went down good I can buy more it's on sale it's on sale today that's the whole thing so be intentional you know I used to get a lot of hate mail for this and I haven't done it in a while I hadn't had a hate mail in a minute you want some more hate mail here we go the rich get richer and the poor get poorer well now you've done it Dave And you know what?

1:43:30Dave Ramsey:You know where that saying comes from? The Bible? No, it's the truth. Oh. That's where it comes from. I thought there was a proverb in there somewhere. The rich get richer and the poor get poorer. And you know why? It's not because rich people are evil. It's not because they're smarter. It's not because they're prettier. It's not because they stole money. It's not because they did something wrong. They had a series of habits and principles that they operate their life on. and they continue to do that. And you know what poor people do? They have a series of habits and patterns that they operate their life on, and that will make you poor.

1:44:10And keep you there.

1:44:11Dave Ramsey:You don't break the cycle. Now, there is an exception to that, to be fair, just to limit the hate mail just a little bit. Sometimes people are poor because they've been oppressed, and they've been in a situation politically or racially or something else where they've been oppressed. That's not their fault. but most of the time in America when someone's poor it's because of stupid butt choices. I've been broke but I've never been poor. Poor is a state of mind.

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1:45:59Dave Ramsey:I just opened up my daughter's Instagram account, Rachel Cruz, and I seldom get cracked up. And that cracked me up. So her and Winston toasting a glass of wine. Couples who enjoy good food and wine have a much higher success rate than couples who don't, according to a study I made up. She's got your DNA. That sounds like something you would say if you were a female. 88 % of the statistics are made up on the spot, I'm just saying.

1:46:30Dave Ramsey:Ironclad research from Rachel Cruz right there. According to a study I made up. That's great. That's so Ramsey. Callie is in Detroit. Hey, Callie, what's going on? Hi. My husband and I just had our second child, and we've been debating for the past few months whether or not my husband should quit his job and be a stay-at-home dad and part-time do self-employed with our woodworking business. But we wanted your advice. He's part-time self-employed at his woodworking business. No, that's what he would do in addition to being a stay-at-home dad. Oh, I see. He works for a company. I see. So what does he make today?

1:47:09He makes$162. And what are you making? I make$187 ,000 and then like about$20 ,000 in stock best of the year.

1:47:24Dave Ramsey:Okay.

1:47:28Dave Ramsey:I take it he hates his job and you don't. Yeah, my job is really flexible. It's fully remote, and I'm really passionate about it. And he does not enjoy his job, and he has to drive into work, and it's about an hour commute. And so it just puts a lot of the parenting strain on me in addition to my job. And we just think the lifestyle would be much better if I had my job. No, I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about he hates his job. Yeah, he also hates his job. So he's running from something, not to something. I think it's both. Yeah. If he loved his job, you wouldn't even have made the call.

1:48:09Dave Ramsey:You would have hired a governess or a nanny to help you while you're working from home as a remote.

1:48:19I think it's like with our first, I stayed at home with our first. So it's part of our values as well. We don't want to pay someone else to parent our kids. Well, you're there.

1:48:31Dave Ramsey:You're going to be in the house because you're remote. Yeah. Yeah. You're not sending them off to boarding school. Somebody put them down for a nap while you finish up a Zoom call. Yeah, that's a good point. Yeah, and that's one of the options we're considering is hiring a nanny. I don't think your husband signed up for this because he has sat around for the last 10 years wishing he was a full-time dad, sitting at home changing diapers. I think your husband signed up for this because he's trying to get away from his job and because it's what you want him to do. Interesting. Here, I'll just hand him the phone.

1:49:10Dave Ramsey:Oh. The plot thickens. Hey, you hate your job, and you're wanting to come home is my supposition to get away from your job. I wouldn't go so far as to say I hate my job. For what I do, it's actually the best job I've ever had, which makes it difficult to wait. Okay. It is stressful, but still the best job I've had in the field I work in. Okay. Well, I do relate to my wife's comment that, you know, we're struggling with the idea of would we be paying someone else to raise our children? Yeah, I don't I don't suggest that. I get the value. OK, my wife was a full time mom, raised our kids. OK, both of my daughters do have careers, but both of them have a, you know, and both of them have some help.

1:49:58Dave Ramsey:But they're not they send their kids off to boarding school and they're not in a daycare and they're not any of that. It's just a part-time nanny situation to supplement the time that they need to be at home because they're very flexible like your wife's situation. So anyway, I can relate to what you guys are after here. um and yeah i

1:50:23Dave Ramsey:i'm i'm always the one i want to push back and always make you think make sure you're thinking about what your real motive is under the motive because you're walking away from a couple hundred thousand dollars so you need to have a really really really really good reason for doing this and um i don't run into a lot of people that um that the guy wants to come home and if you want to i'm not mad about it it's okay i'm not saying you're doing something morally wrong but um but you're you know you're dropped you're leaving a couple hundred thousand dollars or eight whatever you make hundred sixty thousand dollars on the going from 370 to 207 is what would happen and And so you need to have really thought that out because the part-time woodworking thing is kind of a joke as far as that's a throwaway.

1:51:13Dave Ramsey:That's like acting like you're doing something else. And by the way, who's going to watch the kid while you're doing that? So, you know. It still leaves a gap potentially. But anyway, so I, this feels like, it feels in the air like something else is driving this. Other than you just woke up, sir, and said, I really don't want to work anymore. I want to be with the babies all day long. I don't think that's what happened. I, you know, I don't, I don't hear that here. But y 'all do whatever you want to do. I'm not mad at you about it. And it's not a, I think it's a value, like you said earlier, you guys both said it.

1:51:54Dave Ramsey:And I agree with what you said, Sarah. It's a values-based decision. Oh, not Sarah. I'm sorry, Callie. And so, but it's a values-based decision. And if you guys choose to do that, then you need to think through exactly what that means from an identity perspective, from what the trade-offs are, and really go deep on a spiritual and emotional relational discussion on what's really driving this. And it, I don't know, I just, I got to check on it, but I could be wrong. I like the idea of a trial run with a nanny, see how that goes. And if it just pains you to not be there with the kids, then you know.

1:52:35Dave Ramsey:Yeah. Well, and again, a nanny is not a full-time gig here. It's a supplementing mom who's already in the house. and, you know, if she was at work, you know, in a physical location away from the house, that'd be a completely different discussion then. But because a nanny is then, quote, someone raising your kids, unquote, although that's overstated because it's not really what happens. Your children, when they're in school all day long, someone else is not raising your children. You're still raising your children. Yeah, if this is the case, when they get old enough that they go to school and continue down that path.

1:53:11Dave Ramsey:Exactly, that whole thing. But, you know, again, my children went to school and someone else did not raise my children. It was not a boarding school. It was a public high school, public elementary school, and someone else did not raise my children. So that's not an accurate statement when you have other people involved in some of the hours of their life. They also went to Sunday school on Sunday morning, but someone else didn't raise my children. Spiritually, I did, spiritually. You know, their spiritual walk is largely my fault. Hello. You know, one way or the other. Yeah, the parents will still have the most influence.

1:53:47Dave Ramsey:That's interesting. Yeah. That's interesting. It's a good discussion. And I want you to go deep with the discussion and double, triple check both of your motives. And don't overstate things in hyperbole to justify it. And someone else raising my children when a nanny's helping part-time is overstating it. A little extreme. I'm going to have a part-time woodworking thing, but I'm going to be at home full-time with a kid. No, you're not. I don't know how part-time, but I mean, one hour a day, it's not, you know. And, you know, with a monitor, I don't. It's probably not going to add meaningful income on top of the 207.

1:54:23Dave Ramsey:Exactly. So, yeah. And then, you know, what is it? And then what's five years look like? And what's two years look like? And what's one year look like? And is there an exit possibility from this situation? If we get into it and we don't like it, what are we going to do? How could we return to something that looked more like what we had before? I don't know. All of those things are things I want to talk through clearly. But, again, I'm really not mad at you about it, saying it's a horrible idea. There's just something bothering me, and it's not just that I'm a child of the 60s.

1:55:10Thank you.

1:55:42Dave Ramsey:Hey, guys. Dave Ramsey here. Every day on this show, we help people work through real money problems and figure out what to do next. Now, you can get that same kind of help anytime with Ask Ramsey. Ask your money question and get answers built on Ramsey principles we use on the show. Whether you're making a decision or just want something explained, Ask Ramsey is here to help. It's fast, simple, and free to use. Go to RamseySolutions.com and try Ask Ramsey today. That's RamseySolutions.com.

1:56:27Dave Ramsey:Our scripture of the day, Proverbs 16, 3, commit to the Lord whatever you do and he will establish your plans. George Bernard Shaw said, if all the economists were laid end to end, they'd never reach a conclusion. That's good. That's funny. Hey guys, in 2023, the stock market was up 26%. In 2024, it was up 25%. In 2025, it was up 18%. In those three years, if you had put money in, you would have made an 87 % rate of return in three years. You would have doubled your money almost. Now, I don't think the stock market's going to do that all the time. But some of you have been sitting with money in a checking account while that happened because you don't have a SmartVestor Pro in your corner to teach you about investing.

1:57:19Dave Ramsey:You need to learn about investing. When it is time for you to invest, you've gotten out of debt, you have your emergency fund, you need to have someone that can help you. and we've been connecting listeners to SmartVestor pros for over 20 years. They'll help you create a plan and they'll teach you. And then they'll help you make informed investing decisions. You will decide, not them, not me. Go to RamseySolutions.com slash SmartVestor and find a pro near you and quit missing out on all of this. See, the news doesn't talk about the stock market when it's good. The only time they talk about it is when it's bad.

1:57:54Dave Ramsey:So you've been missing out because no one was telling you, including us we didn't tell you we should have told you it's been great and you missed out it's up 13 this year go check your 401k if you don't believe us if you're invested in the right things yeah for real sarah's in louisville kentucky hi sarah how are you i'm well how are you better than i deserve what's up so my fiance and i are getting married um we've already set a date and we are getting civilly married. I am the youngest of my parents' children. I'm the only girl, and there are no female cousins, and my fiancé is the youngest boy.

1:58:36We have decided not to do a traditional wedding, and we're not even going to get married by a pastor. We're actually getting married by a judge. And our families, I think my family already knew how I felt about spending that type of money on a day, but we're getting some pressure as if we are being, I don't know, dismissive because we don't want to spend that money. Our plan that we've already started on, we are buying a home.

1:59:09Dave Ramsey:The money that we're going to spend is your money, not theirs. Am I right? Correct. Okay. So it's not like his mom and dad have offered to give you$50 ,000 for a wedding? no no my parents are giving us some money so they also are going to they're going to give us about 40 000 and they want to spend um they want to throw me a you know because they're very traditional a wedding celebration party and i said okay but the cap i said i really don't want i would rather that money go towards the house but they did say well we will still give you money towards the house. Okay, so you're having a wedding celebration party to, so family and friends can enjoy this celebration with you, and your parents are paying for it.

2:00:00Dave Ramsey:It's costing you nothing. Yes. And you're getting married by a judge, and that's the plan, and his mom doesn't like it.

2:00:10Well, I won't say doesn't like it. I would say the family, and it's really not, his mom is being respectful. You know, I think the dad of the mom, he just expected us to be more traditional, to be married by a pastor, to actually have a wedding. I'm not doing, I did not do a bachelorette party, a bridal party or an engagement party because. But his dad doesn't care about any of that.

2:00:35Dave Ramsey:You added that. I doubt it. His dad doesn't care if you had a bachelorette party. I promise his dad doesn't care. Okay. But he is kind of worried about you not having a traditional wedding with a pastor because he's a person of faith. Yes, and I guess for me, I just, I don't, we are buying a house. I know, but having a pastor marry you doesn't cost any more than having a judge marry you.

2:01:04True.

2:01:05Dave Ramsey:Okay. That is true. So what is his hang-up? I'm trying to figure out who's pressuring you other than in your head. Well, their hang-up is that we are not in really—they are not—my parents are handling a lot of the party, and there's really no involvement from that side of the family. And because I'm definitely like, I don't want to have a— Okay, but that's not a money thing. That's a relational and communications thing.

2:01:37The question I have definitely is how do I communicate? Like, is there a better way to communicate? We just think that's a waste of money. I don't want to go into it, you know.

2:01:47Dave Ramsey:No, I wouldn't. I wouldn't. I would just say, here's what we want to do and why. And is there an issue you have with that? and let them tell you instead of you trying to figure out what it is? Because you don't know. You haven't even been able to tell me.

2:02:07Well, I know that the issue is basically that definitely we are doing this on our own and there has been no type of allowance. Well, usually the groom's family doesn't write checks except for the rehearsal dinner traditionally. Yes, yes, but we're not doing a rehearsal dinner.

2:02:25Dave Ramsey:And I honestly doubt that the whole family is upset that they're not having to pay for a rehearsal dinner. Or plan it. It's not like that's super fun for most people. So what kind of involvement are they wanting? I've been in a wedding.

2:02:43I guess I really need to dig into that more. Here's the thing.

2:02:48Dave Ramsey:Here's the thing. I want you to do what you want to do. You're the bride. and unless someone is financing their personal wishes, they don't get a vote. Like in the case of your parents. Your parents desire a party and they're going to pay for the party and still give you the gift they promised above that. And so your parents have handled that appropriately. Therefore, they get a vote. And you let them have that vote and agreed to that party. You see what I'm saying? That was a process that was perfectly handled. I would consider the same thing on the actual service itself and say, You know, it means a lot to his dad because he's a person of faith to have this done by a pastor in a church, and it's going to cost exactly the same money, and it doesn't offend me.

2:03:30Dave Ramsey:If it does offend you, then you don't have to do it. But if it doesn't offend you and you're neutral on that, then why not do it there instead of the judge? Because you're trying to make this out like it's an economic thing, and it's not an economic thing. Nothing you've described to me is anybody getting hurt economically. No one's wasting any money here except your parents, according to your process. and your parents are doing it gleefully as I would, by the way, I like a big party at a wedding. I mean, the first time we saw Jesus do miracles was at a party at a wedding. So I'm in for parties at a wedding.

2:04:00Dave Ramsey:The wine was flowing. That's it. And so, um, but I mean, I'm like the, all the old people in this story. I'm, I'm traditional in your story. So, but your mom and dad have handled this perfectly. And somehow there's some kind of a burr in the saddle on the other side. And I would just do something very simple and plain and inexpensive. And what can we do that would be, that would make you guys happy? And then see if you want to do what they're talking about. And it could be something as simple as, you know, you run down to the local church and the family that the pastor's gone to that church a hundred years.

2:04:35Dave Ramsey:Everybody's gone to that church. That pastor knows everybody baptized your fiance and, and you know, for 50 bucks, he'll do the wedding instead of the 50 bucks you give the judge. And if that's, if that's all it is, and it doesn't bother you, Sarah, then it's revenue neutral, meaning it's the same cost, then why not do it? That's what I would get. I like that plan. And then everybody's a little bit happy. I couldn't find the problem. Yeah, I think it is a lot, like you mentioned, it's more feelings because we just don't have the information. Well, I read into what I think people are thinking way too often when I don't ask them.

2:05:12Dave Ramsey:Without communicating. What they're really thinking. Sometimes I do it with a caller. There's just so much. Yeah, that's true. There's so much emotion around a wedding, and there's different families and different values and backgrounds. And I think most people just don't have the conversation early on to say, hey, here's our plan. We all on the same page? Yeah, I wrote all the checks, and I'm still happy that none of my kids eloped. You don't regret that money. I had a blast. It wasn't money wasted. And I can't wait to be at my grandkids' weddings. And I may write those checks. So there, shut up.

2:05:46Dave Ramsey:Clip that one, too. I want to send that to the grandkids. Let them know. Well, they already know. Try to keep the old man alive long enough. That's it. That puts the Sour of the Ramsey Show in the books. We'll be back with you before you know it. In the meantime, remember, there's ultimately only one way to financial peace, and that's to walk daily with the Prince of Peace, Christ Jesus.

2:06:16You