Attack Your Debt Instead of Letting It Attack You
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Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create actual amazing relationships. Open phones here at 888-825-5225. That's 888-825-5225. Number one best-selling author, Ramsey personality, Ramsey.

George Camel is my co-host today. Open phones here again. And here's what we do with you folks. We take your calls, and we have no idea what you're going to ask except what you told Christian, our phone screener. We don't set up these calls. We don't make them up. The truth is, George, we don't have to make them up because some of you and some of the people in your life are so freaking crazy.

crazy that it makes entertainment in and of itself just real life. We couldn't even make up some of this stuff. No, much like news and politics, the reality is actually more entertaining than anything you could write or dream up. There you go. So that's what this show is. I mean, fiction's harder to write. Exactly.

So we just take it as we see it. So we're here to help you, all kidding aside, regardless of if you've done something dumb, because if you've done something dumb, that makes you human. I've done a lot dumb. As a matter of fact, I've got a PhD in DUMB. I'm not proud of it, but it is the degree I have, and so we're here to help you not live

In the land of broke due to decisions that you're made when you weren't thinking straight again, triple eight, eight, two, five, five, two, two, five. Thank you for being with us, America. We're glad you're here. Mark is in Columbus, Ohio. If I push the right button, there's Mark. Hey, Mark, how are you?

I'm doing well, sir. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up in your world? Hey, sir. I've been listening to you guys every morning on my way to work on the satellite radio, my car. And I got into a mess here. I make about $125,000 a year. Yeah.

And last year I made $125,000 and then I got a bonus of like $70,000 last year too. And then right now I don't have anything in my savings. I don't have anything in my checkings. I'm broke. I'm paying my very minimums on my credit card. I got about 27 credit cards. I pay the minimum.

And it's like every day I'm paying a minimum on one of those cards, and it's like I miss a card one month, and I forgot I had one, so I'm writing them in my calendar. So every day my calendar is filled with a minimum payment that I've got to pay to a credit card company. How much do you owe in credit card debt? How much is the credit card debt total? About $12,000. Okay, you made $200,000 with your bonus. What'd you do with it?

I don't know. I really don't know. I don't know. I'm trying to figure out. That's what I'm trying to figure out what I do. If we looked at your bank statement and saw where all this money went, where are the top few things we would see? Food, eating out. Grocery store. Yeah, eating out, grocery store. No one spends 10 grand a month at the grocery store, though. What are your vices?

Buying things, buying too many things, I guess. What did you buy? What's the most expensive thing you bought last year? A lot more. Okay, what did it cost? Four grand. Okay, that's a lot of four grand. I used it twice. Are you sports betting? No sports betting, just, no, no sports betting. I don't do any sports betting. You're doing drugs?

Marijuana, if that's considered, you know, just self-medicating, just trying to get out of debt and, you know, leave it at that, you know. Okay. I'm just trying to find the money. I'm not throwing grenades. I'm just trying to find the money because a $4,000 lawnmower, I still got $196,000 left.

so it wasn't like you bought a $50,000 something that you can put your fingers on. So I'm still trying to find, like George said, where the money went. All right, so first let's establish that you're not having fun. You said that. And we need to get back to being on top of this mess instead of this mess being on top of you. Is that a good goal? Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Okay. Have you got the credit cards near you right now?

No, I don't. I just, I don't know. Where are they? They're at home. Okay. When you get home tonight, I want you to get scissors and light a candle and have a plasectomy party and chop them all up. Every one of them. Okay. Yes, sir. Why wouldn't you do that? So,

I mean, I hear you say it all the time, cut them up. I mean, so what do you mean? Like, literally cut them up? Yeah, literally get scissors out, light a candle, and chop every one of the stinking things up. They've stolen your life from you. Shoot them in the face. Yeah. How old are you, Mark? 52. How long have you been living like this?

The last two years. Yeah. There's nothing here fun. So the first thing we're going to do is stop the bleeding. No more use of credit cards and no more credit cards. That's step one. Step two is we're going to do a written, detailed budget and make $120,000 plus bonuses behave properly.

And we're going to write it down what we're going to do with it before the month begins. And if it's not on the budget, you don't do it. So you're not eating out. You're not traveling. You're not doing drugs. You're not doing anything. You don't have any money. You're a broke guy. And so broke people buy food, lights and water, and they pay their rent and they throw everything else at the debt. Okay. And that's what you're going to do. You're going to get real focused like your life depended on it because it does my man.

You won't need pot because you don't need to medicate when you're in control again. Yeah. When you're attacking this instead of it attacking you is what I'm talking about. You feel that emotion? What was that, sir? I said when you're attacking this mess instead of this mess attacking you, there's a growl in that. Do you feel that emotion? Yes, sir. All right. This is time to throw the shoulders back and knock the crap out of some stuff.

Hit it. Hit it hard like it's threatening your family, like it's threatening someone you love because it is. I love you, and it's threatening you. You need to put a stop to this crap and hit it hard, and that involves stopping everything that money is going out to and start throwing it all at the credit cards. The great news is you could be out of credit card debt in just a couple of months.

You'd be 100% free of credit cards. But the credit cards really aren't your problem, because you only owe $12,000. What's the problem is you have no idea where a lot of money is going. It's almost like you're in Congress. Yeah. Yes, yeah. Do you have other debt, Mark? You know, they... Huh? Do you have other debts other than the credit cards? I have a vehicle, $18,000. I bought one of those car vending machines online.

Have you got a girlfriend you've been helping? No, just helping my wife I'm separated from, helping her and the kids. Okay, how much money are you throwing in that direction? I probably threw maybe like $15,000 in that direction. Yeah, I think you're throwing more than that and you don't realize it because you're wanting to be a good guy because you are a good guy. I want you to help your kids, okay? I don't care about your ex. She's your ex.

That's how that works. Okay. If she's not your ex, you take care of her. But until she, when she's your ex, you take care of your babies. And you're very careful and very wise about that. Hang on. We're going to get you set up with every dollar and get you going on a budget, brother.

Statistics show that half of Americans don't have enough life insurance or they don't have any at all. I don't understand this, John. Why don't people want to take care of their family? They think they're not going to die or something? Well, I used to be one of those guys. I didn't even think about it. And one of my buddies said, hey, the only reason to not have life insurance is if you hate your wife and kids. And

And I immediately went and got term life insurance. That's a gut punch. For decades, Dave, I've sat across people who've lost a spouse. They've lost somebody important to them. Me too. And they don't know what to do next. Terrifying. You're going to have a crisis here. You know, you got two options while you're sitting and talking to a young widow. She's concerned about how she's going to invest all this money properly and not mess this up. Or she's concerned how she's going to eat tomorrow. That's exactly right. These are the two options. Yeah.

It's saying I love you to your family. Term Life Insurance. Jeff Zander and the team at Zander Insurance makes it easy and affordable. I've used them personally for 25 years. They're the only people I trust. Go to Zander.com or call 800-356-4282. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host. George Campbell, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. If you're a business owner or you know someone who is, you know that running a business is hard.

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So thanks for hanging out with us. And you can go to ramseysolutions.com slash store, get all of those deals or YouTube or podcast. Just click the link in the description and you're ready to rock and roll. David is with us in Lexington, Kentucky. Hi, David. How are you? I'm doing good. And how are you? Better than I deserve. What's up in your world? Well, I just lost my job and I feel like I pay way too much in rent. I don't know.

Really what to do. Wow. Why did you lose your job? Being stupid. I slept in a lot. You couldn't seem to get to work on time. Yeah, and I worked five feet away from where I slept. So you worked from home? Yes. Okay. All right. What were you doing?

I worked in an automotive BDC call center. Okay. How'd you get that job? Just applying around, got found on LinkedIn. They messaged me. I was applying to everything, and I found a job that was a mile up the road from my house. So the office is here, but I didn't have a car for the longest time, so they let me work from home. What were you making?

Uh, 12 an hour, so about $24,000 a year. Mm-hmm. Well, the bad news is you lost your job. The good news is you didn't lose much. Pretty much sucked as a job. Agreed? Oh, yeah. I was being berated for $24,000 a year. Yeah, I mean, you can make $20 an hour at Target, right? Do you have a car now? Yes. It's kind of a junker, but it can get me from A to B. Gets you from A to Target. Yeah.

Or Dick's Sporting Goods, or name it. I don't care. Almost any retailer is paying over $12 an hour. I'm just making it up right now, and they're all short of help. What's your rent? $8.95 a month. Okay. You live in a lounge? Utilities and everything included. Yes. All right. How old are you? 20. How old am I? 24. Okay. All right. So you were doing...

Auto loan collections? Is that what you were doing? No. Service scheduling. So whenever you needed an oil change or had a check engine light on, I was the person you talked to. So why were you getting berated? People, when it comes to their car, if it's not done now, it's a problem. Okay.

And these were places in New York and all that. I got you. It doesn't matter. People are jerks everywhere. I understand that. It's not just New York. But all right. So, all right. You lost a crummy job that doesn't pay much. Can we agree on that? Yes. Okay. But there's some shame on why you lost it because it was due to a lack of personal energy and diligence. And so you're a little bit ashamed of that. Is that fair?

Absolutely. Okay. All right. Because your voice has absolutely no energy in it, and that's what I'm trying to figure out. It can't be because you lost this crummy job. The job sucked. But it could be because you feel bad. Oh, I definitely feel bad. I mean... Okay. I'm not trying to pick on you. I'm just trying to feed back to you what George and I are hearing on the other end because we want to love you well and help you get moving. Because I don't want you going in for a job interview sounding like Eeyore. Do you know who Eeyore is?

Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I want a level of enthusiasm. I want you to get caffeinated before you go in, okay? Has it been like this your whole adult life, David? Just kind of lack of purpose, no real spark, just kind of going through the motions? Or was there a time where you were lit up, fired up? I was definitely fired up when I worked, um...

I was in a pretty nice job. I made just barely more than I made at the call center, but I was working for a giant manufacturing company. I don't know if you've heard of them, Linkbelt Grains. But what do you want to be doing, David? Have you ever taken a moment to think, here's where I want to be five, ten years from now? Here's the kind of career field I want to be in? I mean, I'd love automotive repair, but I don't know. Okay.

where to start. I can't save money to save my life. I'm down to basically zero dollars. Yeah. Well, you haven't made any money. That's part of the problem. When you're making $2,000, your take-home pays $1,500 and your rent's $895. You've not got any margin in this budget. So I don't think you're horrible at money. I just don't think you made any money. So that's why George is poking around on the income side of your equation.

Okay. So another issue is I've been applying for, I mean, I knew it was a terrible job. I've been applying for about six months and nobody seems to want to take me. Okay. That's probably because of the way you are applying, not because it's a personal thing like David is not worthy. Okay. Because honestly, if you get up and brush your teeth and comb your hair and take a bath and you go down to Target, um,

or whoever down the street at the mall and start walking from store to store to store, and ask to speak to the manager and have a little bit of sparkle in your eye, a little spring in your step, and a firm handshake and a smile, you'll get hired by the end of the day, David, at $20 an hour. That stuff is out there. It is everywhere. Okay? And that might be a temporary stopgap. But you have to leave the house. You can't sit and apply by computer on LinkedIn. Okay.

That's just not going to work. Let me give you an example of why, okay? At Ramsey, we have about 1,100 folks at our company here. We took 15,000 job applications last year. We hired about, I don't know, 700 people, 600 people. No, no, we didn't hire that many, 400 people. Anyway, nothing out of 15,000, right? Right.

So how did those 400 get out of that stack of 15,000? It wasn't by email and it wasn't through LinkedIn. They did something that got them in the door. And one of the things they did is what Ken Coleman calls the proximity principle. So you have to stand up and leave the apartment every day at 8 a.m. dressed and ready for work, smiling, teeth brushed and hair combed.

until you get a job in the next three days. And in the next three days, if you do that, leaving at 8 a.m., go talk to people in the auto repair business. Go talk to people in these big box stores. Go talk to anyone that will talk to you about hiring you and be nice and kind and show up on time and never be late the rest of your life. Learn that lesson. The bad news is you had to learn it. The good news is you got the rest of your life to not relearn it.

So, yeah, get out there and get it done, man. Now, once you get that going, then we need to step up and do what George is talking about and start dreaming about what we want to be. I don't want you to be an auto repair. I want you to own 17 auto repair centers and be worth $8 million 20 years from today. But you got to decide, I'm going to aim at that, and I'm going to go do what it takes and scrap and claw to get that done. And that requires energy.

and enthusiasm and believing you can do it. Hang on. I'm going to send you a copy of Ken's book, The Proximity Principle, and another one, Find the Work You're Wired to Do, that has an assessment in it that'll help you start dreaming big. But in the meantime, go get some eating money today. This is The Ramsey Show.

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George Campbell, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today, number one best-selling author. We're here to talk to you and help you with your life and your money in the lobby of Ramsey Solutions, which you're more than welcome to drop by anytime and watch the show. We do it live from 1 to 4.

And we do the show on the glass, so you can watch it happen every weekday. So come by and hang out with us. In the lobby is the debt-free stage, and Lex and Sarah are standing on it, which can mean only good news for Lex and Sarah that they're debt-free. Welcome, guys. Hello. Where do you guys live?

from Cleveland, Ohio area. Awesome. Well, welcome to Nashville. Thank you. We had a snow just in time to make you feel at home. Yeah, you guys have a little bit of a different definition of a snowstorm than we do. You don't think one inch is a blizzard? What? It's all good, yep.

Yeah, there's no milk in the grocery store, I'll just tell you, because everybody thinks they're going to be inside for the next eight weeks because we have one inch. So how much debt did you guys pay off? About $260,000. I love it. How long did that take? About five and a half years. Wow, good for you. And your range of income during that time? We went from probably $80,000 to about $150,000. Cool. What do you all do for a living? I'm a physical therapist. Mm-hmm.

I work in customer service at a chemical company. Okay. Excellent. Cool. Five and a half years. Did you pay off your house? No. No. No. What was the physical therapy? There you go. Hello. $260,000. You got $150,000 in student loan debt, right? You are pretty much right there. Okay. All right. Wow. Yep. All student loans. Okay. Most of the $260,000 was student loans? All of it. All of it. All of it between the two of you? Yes. Whoa. Whoa.

Yeah, we paid down about four grand. She had four grand in credit card debt when I met her. Yeah. We got that taken care of before we got married and then did Financial Peace University. Yep. Wow. So you've been married about six years? Seven. Yeah. And the first thing you had to do is climb a mountain of 260,000. Yep. Yeah, we called it our first mortgage. That'll do it.

Now the mortgage is going to seem like a piece of cake. Yeah, it's not so scary now. You mean that house only costs that? Oh, my gosh. Yep, not so bad. Yep. We can do that. We've done that before. Wow. Good for y'all, man. That's amazing. So how did you end up in Financial Peace University as newlyweds? So my mom actually got up for us for Christmas. Oh, joyful from the mother-in-law. 2018, yeah. I taught...

financial literacy down in Cincinnati for a couple years so I was familiar with your books because one of the local banks supplied us with a bunch of supplies from the financial piece stuff that I was teaching to 8th graders so I was familiar with it

Okay, very cool. And then he said, maybe I should do it. Yeah. That would be cool. Yeah. So Sarah, when he comes in, you go, okay, this is how we're going to do this. What'd you say? Well, I mean, he had mentioned it multiple times before, but I feel like, you know, I hear a lot of people say like kind of, I was a little Dave-ish. Like I wanted to, oh, I went to school for so long. I deserve to live my life and all that kind of stuff. And then, yeah.

you know, I had that moment where I sat down and added up all the loans and I'm doing income based repayment and the interest is just making the total number go up and up. You're going to be 84 when you get out. I'm like this absolutely ridiculous. So, you know, I got mad at it. We got the course and,

Just kind of... Game on. Took it from there. Anger plus information. That's what you needed. Yeah. Good combo. You know what? That's a good formula. That's a good combo. Mm-hmm. It really is. Yep. That's legit. And we came back after the first class, and she cut up the credit cards, and... Yep. That was it. Yep. Done. She ran business. Yep. Absolutely. Game on. Okay. That's a great way to start a marriage, to be on the same page and have a villain to fight. Yeah. I mean, the dragon must be slayed, and we're going to do it together. Absolutely. Yeah. Yep. We're going on a quest here, a journey. Mm-hmm.

Well done, y'all. Man, that's amazing. That's a long time. Yes. Yeah. Five and a half years. Yeah. How did you stay with it for five and a half years? You know, I always say that like...

that anger and I put I feel like I put a lot of the blame I guess on myself and the responsibility of it of not wanting to run from it and just owning it that like I made this decision to like take this money out and I wanted it gone from my life

You know, we faced a lot of life along the way too. Sure. You know, you start this process and then a year later there's a global pandemic, you know. Oh, yeah. So, you know, we faced job loss. We faced... Wheels literally falling off our cars. Yeah, we replaced three vehicles. That's why I was saying we should have added up how much we cash flowed during this time too. Like the amount of money between three cars, you know,

We were blessed with, you know, we had grew our family. We had two kids. So just all of these things, like, you know, we were so fortunate to be able to keep like our four walls during this whole time. But there was a lot of stuff that slowed it down and did kind of feel like a mountain that was really hard to climb. But I leaned a lot on our faith. You know, I had been absent from the church a

quite a bit, you know, like before we got married. And then so we leaned into that and that support group and knowing that, you know, sometimes your problems lead to the goodness at the end, I guess. That's beautiful. So what was the hardest sacrifice lifestyle-wise you guys had to make for that period of time?

So I grew up, my dad has the same rake that he had before I was born. So for me, the money part of the problem wasn't an issue. I think there was just a lot of pressure from friends and family, not even intentionally in a bad way.

But just like, oh, she does home health. Like you need a nicer car. Like just take out a loan. So just fighting that kind of stuff was difficult. I think just resisting like the normal of what people find to be normal, you know, like where like the vehicles is a good example, I think. And just like how you want to make upgrades to the home or whatever.

buy newer and nicer things or like with the kids like they need this or that those kids don't need anything besides like to be loved right you know they don't care that they're sleeping in a crib that I got a Facebook marketplace like they don't know the difference so I think like just like those things like really like

Knowing that we had everything we needed and most of what we wanted, I think. You redefined the word need in your household. Yes, yeah. I think, you know. It's huge. Yeah, yeah. A lot of just giving up the wants, I think. Yeah, we've often taught that contentment is the most powerful financial principle. And you were functioning in that. That's what you're saying. Yeah, yeah. We just don't have a very big, I'm sorry. We just don't have a very big like material chase. Like material things are not.

I mean, they're important, but they're not what drives us. That was an advantage through this, and it helped you get through it. It's a superpower to not care what other people think. It's tough. No, it's not easy. Especially when it's the people you care about. Well, way to go, y'all. That's amazing. Because really what happened is you get married, you have a couple kids, you go through several cars, you climb this mountain, you reengage your spiritual life, you dive in deep. There's a whole lot.

lot of personal growth is happening during the six years i mean you're not even the same people you are when you start talking about this yeah uh it's pretty incredible y'all y'all are impressive thank you very cool thank you thank you very powerful you guys uh helped a lot along the way though i was just sitting here yeah but yeah george george maybe i was instrumental thank you way to go y'all very very proud of you who was bragging on you on the way

Well, I mean, I think everybody was really supportive. You know, our family, our friends, coworkers. So, you know, there's a lot of people. I hopefully kind of watch it and cheers on today back at home. I want to say hi to our kids, Finley and Max.

They're with grandma and grandpa, and we get to be away from them for the first time, really, since they were born. I see why you wanted to travel to Nashville. Welcome to Nashville! Yeah, I like it. Good, good. Hey, what do you tell people the key to getting out of debt is, now that you've paid off $260,000 in five and a half years? Oh, man.

Just to know the difference between your needs and your wants. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's the biggest thing is just finding that contentment and knowing that like, you know, we're just so blessed with the things that we have.

You did it. I'm proud of you. Well done. Lex and Sarah, Cleveland, Ohio, $260,000 paid off in five and a half years, making $80,000 to $150,000. They did it. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Three, two, one. We're debt-free! Yeah! Yeah!

Wow! 260,000, the same number of times Biden said he was going to forgive it. That's right! And then they paid it off. Yeah, let's not wait around for that to happen, because it didn't. Yeah, didn't, didn't. Oh, man. Oh, there's that, it didn't. This is The Ramsey Show.

You know how when you go against what society thinks is quote normal, like avoiding debt, it feels weird at first? Well, I'm here to tell you that is okay. I want you to be weird if that means you're being intentional, including how you budget.

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Well, as predicted by the Ramsey team and me and George, the real estate market is beginning to thaw as the snow thaws. And I mean, we told you in November after the election that

probably what would happen would not be instantaneous and that gradually the market would begin to heal as springtime came around. So we are seeing in the real estate market an uptick in activity. We are seeing interest rates down very slightly, just a little bit, and no big dramatic anything in the real estate world. There's no sudden supply. There's still a shortage.

Uh, there's no huge drop in interest rates instantaneous, which didn't expect to have happened. Um, I didn't anyway. Um, and, uh, so the real estate market is starting to move again. Uh, and so the, uh,

The thing we've told you for 30 years is still true, that when it comes to buying a house, a home for your family, real estate's a great investment when bought properly and at the right time in your plan. And what happens at your house, in other words, what happens in your house is more important than what happens in the White House. And so Donald Trump's not going to buy you a house. Joe Biden didn't buy you a house. It's not their job, either one of them.

And it's your job to buy a house after you get out of debt, have an emergency fund, and when you can afford the payment on a fourth of your take-home pay on a 15-year fixed rate. And that's very doable once you get your crap together. But, you know, there's people worried about tariffs driving construction costs up. There's people thinking that the government's going to get in the housing business and drive supply up, which will bring prices down. Not going to happen.

Tariffs aren't going to drive construction costs up, not appreciably, even if there are tariffs and there aren't any yet. Hello. Basically, the White House has a lot less effect on the housing market than you think they do. Well, no, but the effect they do have is and they are starting to have that effect is to make people believe again. So the economy starts moving.

And when people are hopeful, they purchase things. They invest. They get off the side when they are hopeful. And if you believe, whether you're Democrat or Republican, if you believe the economy is going to get better, you will make moves that make the economy better. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy. And housing is one of the elements of that. And I do think that's going to happen. And I'm not going to...

give President Trump the credit for having grown the economy. I'm going to say the American public grew the economy, but it is if he gave them hope and caused them to do that with cutting spending, which they're obviously doing

pretty rapidly and pretty wildly. It's kind of fun to watch. For a guy who likes to cut spending, I mean, I'm in hog heaven, right? So, you know, that's a good thing. And I know it's your grandmother's program or whatever they cut, and some of you are pissed, but I really don't care.

cut spending. And you've been spending more than you make like some kind of drunken congressman. So that's wonderful. And if that kind of thing gives people hope, and if he puts pressure on the Fed and causes interest rates to go down, that gives you hope and causes you to go into the marketplace, the real estate market's going to take off. So I am predicting a healthy, good, functioning real estate market again by fall. I don't think it's going to be

a boomer bus thing like it was after COVID. It was crazy. But I think it's going to get moving again, and it's been very stagnant. What do you think? Yeah, it's definitely been crawling, and I think it's going to take longer than we all want it to. And so for those folks who've been sitting on the sidelines waiting for something drastic to happen,

Quit waiting. If you're ready to buy a house, like you said, don't time the market. Time your own financial life and go, now is the right time for us to buy. This is the time to buy. I'm looking at several pieces of real estate right now, and I'm not doing that because Trump's in office. I was doing it before he was in office, and I will keep looking. But I'm only going to do the deal when the deal is right, and it fits in our budget.

you know, our parameters on how we do real estate. And you're paying cash. And for those folks that, you know, they're taking on the mortgage, Dave, and they're going, well, Dave, the rates are so high. What do you say to them about the rates? You marry the house and you date the rate. So when it does dip down, you just refinance. You know, it's not that hard. Just don't, you know, don't buy too much house and don't be crazy. But your interest rate, if interest rates go back down to three, and I don't know if they will or not, I never thought they'd be there to start with. So what do I know?

Um, but anyway, the, if they do go down, it's not that big a problem. Just refinance. And, uh, you have a little bit of cost and within a, you know, 18, 24 months, you'll get your money back and you'll be rocking along, making the better rate then after that. So, uh, don't let that keep you out of the market. If you're waiting on rates to come down, that's dumb because as soon as they go down, you're going to see some stimulation house prices. They're going to offset them going up.

So, you know, go ahead and get in when you're time. But you need to be out of debt. You need to have an emergency fund in place of three to six months of expenses, debt-free, and, you know, with a good, strong down payment. We'd like to see, if you're not a first-time homebuyer, it should be at least 20% down because you can avoid PMI, which is private mortgage insurance, which is about $75 a month per 100,000 borrowed.

It adds up. So, I mean, if you borrow like $400,000, that's $300 a month that you're paying for insurance for the mortgage company to insure them in case they foreclose on you.

That's what PMI is. It's a risky buyer fee. It's a risky buyer fee because you didn't put down 20%. That's a good line, George. Thank you. I worked hard on that. Yeah, because, I mean, I've been doing this 30 years. I never came up with that. That's pretty good. Yes, that's a win. But there we go. But if you don't put down 20% and you still buy, we're okay. We're not mad at you.

We're just saying you could save a lot of money if you did put down. So a good down payment or your house payment on a 15-year fixed is no more than a fourth of your take-home pay. And your take-home pay is not after insurance and 401K. Your take-home pay is after taxes. What are you taking home after taxes? That's the number we're talking about. So I'm not talking about your check. I'm talking about what you're – that's called take-home pay. It's not – your check is different than take-home pay.

So you got health insurance premiums and the 401k. That's not that's not in the mix. OK, so but anyway, yeah, because you need to be able to cash flow this thing and get it paid off and move along to the next step of wealth building. But real estate is good. It's not horrible right now. It's not booming, but it's definitely not horrible. It is way better than it was four months ago. Way better.

I mean, I've got a couple of properties on the market that zero people were looking at. And now people are in there every week and every day looking at them. And so, I mean, we're actually seeing activity happen, you know, on those properties. And they're not rentals. I mean, those are sales. So it's happening. Real estate is moving again. It's very, very quiet about it because there's all this other stuff in the news.

And nobody's talking about real estate much, but we are here because you talk about it at home. And you're thinking about, should I buy a house? Should I buy a house? What happened? Is Trump going to end the world? No, he's not going to end the world. And no, he's not going to make your life better by sending you money. It's not going to happen. And I told you that was going to happen. I told you that about Biden. So you guys got to be grownups and go for your own destiny.

Yeah. Quit waiting around. Regardless of what's happening in the economy, you can affect it a lot more than anyone else. So we've got a lot of resources too, Dave. Our team built a real estate hub with tons of resources, tools, calculators, articles, even a video course, ramsaysolutions.com slash realestate.

and we'll be talking about real estate investing here soon. Yeah, we're going to do a second time we're doing the Investing Essentials virtual event March 4th and 5th. George and I are doing that. That's a virtual event. Tickets are $199. You can get your tickets at RamseySolutions.com. It's two nights. The first night is two hours on investing and investing philosophies. The second night is two hours, and most of it is on details on how to do investment analysis real estate.

real estate investment analysis. Using real examples from your portfolio. I'm going to go through. I'm going to open my playbook. It's only the second time I've ever done that. And I did it this time last year, and it was a big hit. So they talked me into it again. Well, stuff you've never talked about on the show because you're like, this is too nerdy. I got to tell you, the whole stinking night, these two nights are both nerdy. So if you're having trouble sleeping,

You know, we can help you with that. Okay. But if you're a super nerd, you're going to love this stuff. If you're really into investing, oh, we're going to give, we're going to give you the meat and potatoes, baby. George, George, some meat on the bones. George, George is a super nerd. I'm just saying he can do it. Love it. Can't wait. March 4th and 5th at Ramsey solutions.com slash events. The, uh, investing essentials virtual event. This is the Ramsey show.

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I'm Dave Ramsey, your host. George Campbell, Ramsey personality, is my co-host today. Thanks for joining us. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Charlotte is in Richmond, Virginia. Hey, Charlotte, welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hi, thank you so much for speaking with me. Sure, what's up?

Well, my husband and I have a home that his parents are about to move into in a few months, and we want some advice as to whether it's better for them to just be deeded the house, or if we do have them just pay us the mortgage amount, what should we put in a contract just to keep our family relationship healthy but keep everything legal and just secure? Wow. Well, the reason you're calling is because you know you're skating on thin ice asking for trouble. Yes.

And you're asking how to avoid falling through the ice. And the best way is don't skate on thin ice. Don't do the deal this way. Why aren't they getting a mortgage and buying it from you? We all, we're kind of doing a house shift. His sister's coming from a very expensive part of Washington, D.C., and she will move into the parents' home and be deeded their house.

and the parents will move into our smaller home and downsize. And all of the mortgages are so cheap because the homes were purchased years ago compared to refinancing and adding about $100,000 to $1,000, well, hundreds or thousands of dollars more. The sister gets a free house. The parents get your house free. What are you getting?

We, my husband and I have two homes. When we got married, we both bought a house into the marriage. So this would be the house that we've just had renters in. I know you missed my point. You're giving the parents a free house. They're giving their other daughter a free house. What are you getting?

That's why I'm calling. Nothing. Okay. So I'm confused why we're doing this. This is going to cause resentment real quick. This is not a house swap. Sister got a house, they got a house, and you didn't. That's different. So you want them to move into the house and pay you for the house. Is that right? Yes, and they're fine with that.

Okay, why don't they get a mortgage and just take the house, pay you with the mortgage, like a normal buyer of a house would do, and just pay you and you sell them the house? Okay, I'm writing everything down. Well, I mean, I'm asking, is there a reason you all hadn't done that? Because that's kind of the obvious way to do it. What's the price you would sell it to them for?

That's the issue. Where we are, the home would go for $380,000 and we only owe $190,000. But I am aware that if they purchased it at the market value right now, we have a, I think it's an $1,100 mortgage on that house and it probably knocked them all the way up to $1,800, if not more. Yeah. Yeah.

And you're saying that's too much? If they're going to buy a $380,000 house, they're going to have a mortgage amount that they pay. What's wrong with that? They can't afford it? Oh, they can. I guess we just want to...

We want to be a blessing to family and not make anybody have to pay, you know, 800 plus more a month if we already have the homes in our name. Well, you can't transfer the deed with that mortgage in place. That mortgage that you have is not going to survive this deal. Okay. There's a due on sale clause in the deed.

Would it be better than just to have the contract for a renter? No, it would be better if they went and got a mortgage and bought the house from you. If you want to discount the house to be a blessing, instead of selling it for $380, sell it for $300, I'm fine if you choose to do that. I'm still confused why you need to do that. But if you want to do that and that's what you want to do, just sell them the house a little cheaper and let them go get a mortgage and hand you a check.

Okay. If they buy it for $300 and you owe $190, they're going to hand you a $110,000 check, right? Right. Right. And that's a deal. I'm making up the number. I don't know what the number is, but I don't care what you sell it to them for. And they're giving a deal to your husband's sister, right? Mm-hmm. Okay. Okay.

And so really, and then you give them a deal. So really the truth of the matter is when all the smoke clears, you actually gave your husband's sister a deal. Yeah. If you trace it back. Yeah, because you didn't use, they didn't use, because they're getting a deal on your house.

And that enabled them to give the deal over there. So it's much like you did it for the sister instead of for them. So I don't know. I don't know what you want to do. I would not have them pay you a monthly rent and I would not have them pay you a mortgage. And I wouldn't do it for free because now you're actively losing money every month because you still have to make your mortgage payment.

Right. We wouldn't do it for free. They would cover what we would owe monthly. We just want to make sure there's no legal repercussions, and we definitely don't want to do a handshake deal. We want to have a contract. I would not have a contract because – all right, let's talk about it. I'll go one more step, okay? There's two or three principles going on. One, there's a legal principle. If you do what's called a contract for deed, and they move into the house and start acting like the owner of the house –

You've had what's called equity of title has transferred and the due on sale clause in your mortgage can activate and your mortgage company could foreclose on you. So don't do that. Don't do that. Okay. And if they move in and just start renting from you, then they don't own the house and they're at risk. And you've got to figure out some kind of a deal someday when the house goes way up in value, who gets that money?

them or you i wouldn't get into all that i would simply sell them the house at a price and let them go get a mortgage pay off the mortgage that you have put the difference in your pocket and they still got a deal okay and then they have a mortgage payment and it's their problem just like it is today today they own a house you're not involved in that house right right that's the way it should be

That's the legal side of this. Now, then the other side of it is the emotional and relational side. The borrower is slave to the lender. When you eat dinner with someone you owe money to, it tastes different because it messes up relationships. And no contract in the world makes that go away.

That's a spiritual principle, a philosophical principle. So please don't do the deals you're talking about doing. Your family is going to end up harmed. You're going to end up harmed. People are going to end up not liking each other. It's not a good idea. So just pick a price. If it's worth $380, we're going to sell it to you at a discount of X. Let them go get a mortgage for X. And if they don't want to do it...

And if they don't want to do that, then you really don't need to do this deal for sure. You don't need to do it for sure anyway. This is the Ramsey Show. Taking care of your health doesn't have to cost a fortune. That's why Field of Greens is in my house. Field of Greens is made from fruits and veggies selected by doctors to support your heart, liver, kidneys, and metabolism. And here's the best part. They're so confident your doctor will notice your improved health, they offer a money-back guarantee, no questions asked.

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Slice Ramsey might not be in all states. Today's question comes from Chase in Florida. My aunt recently reached out to me for advice since I'm considered the financially responsible one in the family. She's 37, and we come from a low-income family. She worked at Tesla for six years and recently discovered that her old Tesla stock holdings are now worth $650,000. Woo!

I love it. That's great. She currently works as a project engineer earning $70,000 a year. Her monthly rent is only $1,000 and she has $20,000 in debt which will be paid off this year. She has retirement investments but no cash savings. She's hesitant to sell the stock because her goal is to let it reach a million dollars before selling. She's also concerned about the tax implications if she sells.

I've explained that this mindset borders on gambling, emphasizing the danger of investing in a single stock. If you were in her shoes, what would you do with $650,000 in Tesla stock? Oh, that's so fun. Yeah. What a great relationship that she comes to him with this big win and asks him what to do. And he's saying, you've got too much risk here.

And he's spot on. He's so cool. I love this. And I do agree. This does border on gambling, waiting for your single stock to go up another 30-something percent so that you can cash out at the right time. That scares me. Yeah, you're going to have taxes. Welcome to making money.

Sorry, but that goes to the territory. Capital gains. But the good news is, you know, if you hold that asset for over a year, that would hit the long-term capital gains tax. Exactly. And she's had it over a year. She's been there six years. Yeah. So her old Tesla stock. So we know it's over a year old. So it's going to have long-term capital gains. So it'll be at a 15% rate. So it's not going to be that bad.

You're going to pay probably $100,000 out of this, something like that. And that's if you cashed it all out at once today. And you are. So she could be debt-free today and be in a different place financially. $20,000 and go buy a house. Yeah. That's what I would do. She's 37 years old. She's a renter. She has $20,000 in debt. This would change her life to cash this out. Go buy a house.

That actually goes up in value instead of potentially, who knows what's going to happen with Tesla. They may continue to go up. I'm not dissing Tesla, but I'm not buying it. If you're 37 years old and you have $650,000 in cash stacked in the middle of the kitchen table, what do you do with it? Would you invest in Tesla? Go buy Tesla stock? No. Go buy any single stock? No. Go buy a house? Yes. No.

Now we're talking. Going to go up in value and you have no payments and you make 70 grand a year. And now you're going to have another million dollars in just a few minutes if you do this. Because now you can load your 401ks, your Roth IRAs, you can stack cash. You have zero debt and, you know, and no house payment of any kind, no rent going out. And so that's a couple thousand bucks a month minimum. And we're talking about putting maybe $5,000 a month away now.

And that's going to be another million dollars very quickly in a good series of mutual funds in your Roth IRAs and 401ks. So 100%, that's what I'm doing. Not even a hesitation. And the way you can sometimes – see, the thing is when you own something, sometimes it's hard to pry the fingers off of it. But if you just reset it in your mind and say there's a stack of cash in the middle of my kitchen table, would I go buy Tesla or stock with it? No. No.

Would I go buy Apple stock with it? No. Both great companies, both probably going to go up. Still wouldn't buy, have all of my eggs in one basket, and I still would go buy a house. You're a 37-year-old single lady. You own a home, cash paid for. Guess what they're going to do? They're going to go up in value all the time.

Pretty cool, George. Pay the taxes. Oh, yeah. People are so scared of paying taxes. I don't want to do anything because of the taxes. It's like a boogeyman. We don't know what it is. So just add it up and you go, oh, that's what it is. Oh, it's not that big a deal. Yeah, get with your tax pro. Probably $85,000 or less. And they'll go, here's what it is. All right, I'll pay that out of the proceeds. Move on. It's almost like it's found money anyway. I recently discovered...

That's quite old. Quite the thing to forget about. Kind of found money, you know, I mean, so it's like, and now I'm worried about giving up a little. No, don't. Because, again, I am not predicting Tesla's success or failure, or I'm not betting for or against Elon Musk as a business person. None of that. That's not the issue. The issue is it's a single stock.

If you had it all in Microsoft or Dell or Apple or McDonald's or Coca-Cola, I don't care what you, what you name some big stable company that's not brand new on the scene and not cutting edge technology. That's a little weird. You know what I mean? Name one of those. And I still going to tell you not to do it. So I don't do it. I don't have, I don't have $650,000 in a single stock and I got a lot more than $650,000. So I, why, if I thought it worked, I'd be doing it, you know? So no, no,

That's it. I hope that was clear, Chase. I don't think Dave can be any more clear. Dave has trouble with clarity. He sometimes has trouble telling people what he really thinks. Roberta is in Boston. Hey, Roberta, what's up? Hi. Thank you for taking my call. So my question is...

I am a stay-at-home mom, and I haven't worked in a long time. My husband and I, we are in debt. And since I've been starting watching your content, I am just done with it. It's working. It is.

It is. So this year, I am being very intentional. We have about $18,000 in credit card debt, and his truck is about $45,000 every year.

Huge, huge payments, almost a grand a month. So, yeah. So I just want to get those credit cards out of the way, get his credit better, maybe refinance the truck, get better interest, you know, and and see the money because he makes money.

Okay. Like he makes about $12,000 a month and we are just getting by the money comes in, the money comes, goes out next month, start from zero again. So, uh, since December, um, I haven't worked since 2013. Um, and I don't intend to work. He likes this. I do too. It works for our family, but I got a side gig just helping a friend for a couple of months, you know,

I'm making about $230 a week. And then I said, well, this is going to go towards credit cards because we just going to bang these credit cards. I don't want to see these payments anymore. And the money is just going into the account and disappearing with our normal bills, you know? And I'm getting very frustrated because I'm like, I'm, you know, I'm doing this. It's a little extra and it was supposed to get the credit card style. Anyway,

Being in that, also one of my huge goals was to go back to homeland to see my family. I haven't seen my family in about 16 years. So, and then we keep putting it off. Where's home, Roberta? It's Brazil. I'm from Brazil. Okay. I was born and raised in Brazil, and then I moved here in 2008. And I haven't been back ever since. I want you to take that trip, and I want you to sell his truck.

And I want you to pay off your credit cards before you do it. And I want you guys to get on a budget and make your money behave. Because all you're doing is throwing all the money in a pile and then wondering why it burns. You're not making this money behave. He makes really good money for you guys to be this broke, doesn't he?

She didn't like my answer. Just gone in a poof. A little puff of smoke there. But that's the truth. If you really want to go on this trip, what are you willing to do? What are you willing to give up? And that might mean the truck gets sold yesterday because that's a lot of truck. That'd get you out of debt real quick. Use your savings plus sell the truck. You're out of debt this year. Ta-da. Almost like we've done this before. Book the trip by Christmas if you do it that way. But I think we found the problem. Don't know that he's going to want to get rid of that truck. That's the next job.

Oh, this growing up thing. It's hard. This is The Ramsey Show. The Ramsey Show.

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George Campbell, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today in the lobby of Ramsey Solutions on the debt-free stage. Matt and Kate are with us. Hey, guys, how are you? Hey, good. Hi, we're doing great. Welcome. Good to have you. Where do you live? We...

Oh, sorry. North Indianapolis. Okay, fun. Welcome to Nashville. Good to have you. And how much debt have you two paid off? $112,500. All right. Way to go. And how long did this take? About 10 and a half months. 10 and a half months. Wow. And your range of income during that time? $144,000 to $177,000.

Nice jump in one year. Oh, yeah. What do you guys do for a living? I work for the United States Postal Service. And I'm a licensed marriage and family therapist. Awesome. Way to go, guys. What kind of debt was the 113? Two auto loans and student debt loans. Ah, most of it student. Yes. Yeah, yeah. The majority student. Yeah. Okay. Wow. So how long have you guys been married? Uh,

12 years. Yes. So after 11 years, you look up and say something's got to change. That's about right. And you run into us. Tell us the story. How did this all happen? Yeah. Well, in the summer of 2023, we just bought a new home and we were in the process of remodeling. And thankfully, he's really good at that. So things were going very smoothly. But he enjoys remodeling a lot more than I do. So I needed something to distract me as we were tearing up floors.

And we talked a little bit about our finances and feeling like we needed to get things on track a little better. And so I started listening to the Ramsey show as we were doing processing, like work in the house. The old podcast sneak over. Yes, it worked for us.

So you just low-key brainwashed him into going, you don't need to do this debt thing. We make good money. Why are we paying these payments? That's right. Yeah. I was like, you should listen to this. And he had a little hesitation at first. He was working. He was working. Exactly. He had a lot on his mind. Yeah. But then once he started listening, he really got motivated gazelle intent so fast. Oh, yeah. I listened to the book on the way to work and then just got hooked and there it was.

Within a couple of days, we were on a car lot and he was trading in his Jeep Gladiator for a Chevy Sonic. Whoa. Yeah. That's a big guy in a Sonic. Yes. Origami. I fit myself into it most days. Makes a couple of folds. Yeah, it does. Yeah. Just a little bit. That's sacrifice right there. Oh, yeah. Way to go, guys. You went from like no urgency to a thousand percent urgency. Oh, yeah.

yeah way off the charts yeah it's over in a blink of an eye you're dead free absolutely a little bit of sacrifice for a little bit of time for such long-term gain oh yeah was it worth it 100 yes i mean you gave up the gladiator yes yeah yes yeah yeah yeah absolutely it was okay yeah you did it fast i mean yeah you part on the coals that's pretty cool yeah so as a marriage uh family therapist you just wish your

would embrace the principles that quickly and with that intensity. Yeah, I mean, that shared vision that we had, right? Like, I've seen how important that is in marriages, and us being able to unite on this was so strengthening for us, too. So I would love for people to be able to experience that in their marriage. I mean, if you told them to go do something and they did it with that kind of intensity is what I'm talking about. Oh, yes, that's 100% true. And you're healed! And do it! Yes!

And I assume now you have some great stories to share from being in the trenches and how this has helped your marriage and got you guys on the same page. You probably feel invincible now. You're like, what area of our life can't we affect? Yeah, and that's exactly what it is. It's just like, you know,

We can do anything now. It's a very come at me bro mentality. Very much so, yeah. Wow. Good for you guys. Well done. Thank you. How does it feel to be free? Amazing. Yeah, just amazing. It just felt so like you don't feel like how bogged down you are by the debt until it's gone. What was the biggest sacrifice, the hardest thing?

Getting rid of the Gladiator? Yeah, that was probably it, yeah. Yeah, like we had to lower our lifestyle, right? We hadn't even noticed how much it had creeped up in some ways. And going from school pickup line in a Jeep Gladiator to a Chevy Sonic has a little bit of a different feel to it. Yeah, a little bit of a different feel. But none of those people on that line are paying your bills. Exactly, exactly. I have to remind myself that. I'm like, hey, you know what?

I don't need that payment. This car gets me an A to B. Well, and you're sitting in that line looking and you're going, and you got a payment. And you got a payment. And you got a payment. Absolutely. You quit looking at cars the same. That's very true. I'm no longer impressed with you people. I feel sorry for you. It's very cool. So you still have the Sonic? What's the game plan here? I just run it till the wheels fall off. I travel for work a little bit. So I'm like, it gets great gas mileage. So I'm just going to keep it. And I'm like, hey, it's paid for.

And once it breaks down, you'll have the cash. Yeah. What a peaceful way to live. Oh, yeah. Yeah. That's amazing. What do you tell people the key to getting out of debt is? Just...

shared vision and goals is this yeah you gotta have the same goals to get through it yeah I would say like the every dollar app like having that conversation every month about what we wanted our money to do and just being really united on that um and just like the vision of wanting this to be something that ripples beyond us to like our children like us wanting to involve them us wanting them to see the process so hopefully they avoid the decisions we made um that made it really easy for us to feel that momentum yeah yeah

So they weren't, like, damaged by the problem? No. No, I think they're okay. They don't need counseling themselves. I don't think so. We need a little shirt to say, I survived Baby Step 2. Because there are actual Facebook groups of angry teenagers, I'm just saying. Oh, okay.

The I hate Dave group or whatever. My parents went on this Dave Ramsey thing. I don't have a life. Thankfully, we got them when they were younger. So we believe in that. Well, mom's a therapist, so you can handle any trauma that comes your way. Bring it in house. I like it. Good for y'all. Well done. Proud of you. Who was cheering you on as you went?

Just friends and family. Yeah. Yeah. We had a small circle, but they were very vocal, and that was amazing. We kept it pretty small because we wanted the voices to be people who were encouraging us, and the friends who were there alongside us made it just so helpful. Yeah. Yeah. If you get the circle too big, you get a loud mouth in there. Yeah. That's true. Yeah, that's good. Way to go, guys. Proud of you. All right, bring the kiddos up. Let's introduce them. Names and ages. All right.

So this is Livvy, and she is nine, and this is Jane. She's seven. All right. Beautiful. Hey, they look like they're okay. I believe they're going to make it. I think so. I think they're good. Matter of fact, their mom and dad changed their family tree. I'm pretty sure they're going to make it. You guys are heroes. We're proud of you. Well, thanks. It's an honor to meet you. Thank you for coming down to Nashville and sharing your story.

Thank you. We got a couple of gifts for you. We got two every dollar subscriptions good for a year so you can use them, pass them along to someone else to give them some hope to do this journey too. Awesome. When someone asks how you did this, you can show them. Yeah. Here you go. There we go. Here's the tool to do it. Matt and Kate.

Livvy and Jane, Indianapolis, Indiana. $113,000 paid off in 10 and a half months, making $144,000 to $177,000. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Ready? Three, two, one. We're debt-free! Yeah! That's awesomeness right there.

I guess there is hope, Dave. I've been reading the headlines. Everything's so tough, inflation, and yet here's this couple who goes, nah, we're going to do our own thing. Mic drop. It's just wild how that works. So you've been doing this 30-something years, and there's been debt-free screams every year, regardless of what's happening in the economy. Every week. Every week for a long, long time. And, you know, they did it in 10 and a half months. The other couple had $260,000 in a different hour, five and a half years.

So sometimes it's fast, sometimes it's slow. Sometimes they make a lot of money. Sometimes they don't make a lot of money. But in every case, they just looked up and said, I'm in control of my destiny, and I'm not going to let these financial companies, student loans and cars and credit card companies and SoFi and whoever else control my life anymore. I'm not going to be in control of some stupid bank.

I'm going to get, I worked too hard to be this broke. And, um, it's fabulous, fabulous. And they just, you know, they're, they're remodeling a house, scraping up some tile and turn on a podcast and go, okay, let's do it.

And other people, we beat on them for 10 years and can't get them to do it. Takes a long time to get to that point. Yeah. They just flip the switch. I'm not. Yeah, this is what we do. That makes sense. Let's do it. Let's do it. That's simple. Let's do it. And the faster you get to that inflection point, the better off the rest of your life is going to be. Oh, absolutely. Do what it takes to get angry. Good. Yeah. That's how that works. Wow. Good work, guys. Good work. We're proud of you. This is the Ramsey Show.

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Investing can be overwhelming, it can be confusing, and it's not something you can get in a 60-second social media post, or worse, a 30-second TikTok post.

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The second night will be largely real estate. I'm going to open my real estate portfolio and my, at least some of the portfolio, and my playbook. How do I do real estate? And I bought and sold real estate for years. I own several hundred million dollars worth of real estate. So if you're interested in real estate investing, we're going to go into it at a different level than most people can and at a different level than you've ever seen me do.

So I've only done this one other time. So check it out. Get your tickets today at RamseySolutions.com slash events. Click the link in the show notes if you're on podcast or YouTube. The Investing Essentials event. It is coming up March 4th and 5th.

And, George, you've got some stuff you're adding to it that we didn't do last year. Yeah, we're going to really get into the weeds with choosing mutual funds, different investment traps. And on top of that, Dave, you know, we think about $199. If Dave Ramsey said, hey, I'll coach you up for essentially $50 an hour –

There would be a line out the door. So this is a great value to just really pick your brain when it comes to real estate. And I'll be the proxy for the audience. Anytime I go, hey, Dave, you nerded out a little too hard. Unpack that for us. So I'll be there to help translate a lot of the lingo for the people out there to go. This is the right way to do it from a guy who's actually done it. There we go. And a guy who's on his way. You know, I'm not I'm not hundreds of millions in real estate, but I do own a single home.

That's a win. That's a win. Free and clear. That's right. So there you go. Shane is with us in Richmond, Virginia. Hi, Shane. Welcome to the Ramsey Show.

Hey, good afternoon, guys. I had a quick question, and hopefully you guys can be like the deciding factor in my family. I was wondering, I'm rolling pretty fast here with trying to kick down my debt, and I was wondering, should I sell my car, use the proceeds, maybe get like a beater, and then, you know, use the rest of the money, kind of pay off the last little bit of student debt that we have? How much left do you have? We got about $5,600 left.

For the student debt, my car, I owe like $14,000 on it, and I'm thinking I'd probably make between $5,000 and $8,000 private sale of my vehicle. Do you like the car? I mean, it's a Tesla, so I know George might be a little biased on this, but yeah, I enjoy the vehicle. You're selling it for $5,000? That's all you could get for it? Well, no.

Well, that's what I would get off. Above the $14,000. That's the profit you'd make. You'd get $19,000. Yeah. Oh, heck yeah. Okay. What's your household income? We make about $185,000. If you like the car, I would not sell it. You do not need to sell it to get out of debt. You're making money to get out of debt. If you want to sell the car anyway, that's fine.

But this is not a fire situation where you have too much car for your income or net worth. You call me up making 70 grand, you owe 56K on your F-150. I'm selling your stupid truck, okay? Okay. Because that's out of control. But you owe $14,000 and you make 185. Stroke it, man. Pay it off if you like the car. If you want to sell the car anyway and knock this stuff out, that's fine. But do you need to sell the car to get out of debt? No, you do not. You need to tighten your budget.

Right. Yeah, I mean, my wife doesn't want me to, and me and my little cute Frenchie over here is like, sell it. Oh, you got a French Bulldog, too? Are we twins, Shane? You have a French Bulldog that talks? Keep that. Maybe sell that one. You get a pretty penny for a talking French Bulldog. Keep that. That's valuable. Sell the dog. Yeah. What make and model and year is the Tesla? It's a 20 Model 3, the long-range dual motor, all-wheel drive. Yeah, that's a great vehicle.

And unless you have a severe change in income, I would just keep it and aggressively pay it off. You didn't say you hate the car. Okay. And the money, the numbers you're giving us are not dictating selling the car. This is worth celebrating. Number one, Dave Ramsey didn't tell you to sell the car. Number two, he let you keep a Tesla. This will go down in history. I just said, do what you want to do. That's all I said. It wasn't a recommendation. Live your life. It wasn't a Tesla endorsement. Don't get all hoppy here.

I got excited. I got to take a win when I get one. I know. I saw it plugged in next to my truck outside, so I'm just saying. Sorry about that. I like to push your buttons. I know. Why do you park next to me if you're going to plug in your car? You're the one who chose to put your parking space next to the electric charging. That's on you. Well, that's actually on the person who designed the building, which would be Rachel's husband. Okay. Ken is in Spokane, Washington. Hey, Ken, what's up?

Well, hi, Dave. First time caller. Thanks for taking my call. Our pleasure. How can we help? So my mom has a reverse mortgage. She is 91 years old, has been in the reverse mortgage for a long time.

And so we are concerned as kids what our liability may be in the event when it comes. None. Basically, we have to deal with it. Zero. Zero. The only liability is that it's a lien against the house. You get ready to sell the house, the loan has to be paid off, but so does a regular mortgage. Okay. So, I mean, if she passes away and the kids sell the house, you're going to pay off the loan, right?

as if you had a regular mortgage, but there's a lien against the house. But you personally don't have a debt, and I'm hoping that the house is worth way more than the balance on the reverse. It's not supposed to go over 65% LTV. There's probably about $40,000 to $50,000 in equity in it right now. The loan is at about $250,000. Wow, this thing's creeped up. So the house has gone down in value. It's not done well.

Okay. Well, it's, there's 17 years into the reverse mortgage. Yeah, but it's still not supposed to be, it still shouldn't be over 65% loan to value if it's structured right. But anyway, it is obviously, but yeah, so you would sell the house and put 40,000 bucks in the heirs pocket and pay off the reverse. If the house doesn't get sold and it gets foreclosed on, none of you are liable, but you would lose the house. Right.

The estate would lose the house. They're just less and less to inherit as time goes on. So that's really what you're looking at here. But you're not liable unless your name's on that mortgage. Did any of you sign for it? No, none of us did. Okay, then what we told you is correct. You're not liable for someone else's debt, even if they're kin to you, period.

The only exception would be a husband or a wife, and in some cases there's some common law in some states. But if your parents out there, if you folks listening, your parents pass away and they've got $2 million worth of debt, unless you signed for it, you're not liable. Those people are just not going to get paid. The burden falls onto the estate of that person. When you die, your estate is what you own minus what you owe.

And if there's not enough to pay what you owe with what you own, the bank shouldn't have made that loan and they're going to lose their money. That's a risk they took. Because the heirs, the children, the grandchildren are not liable in America, period. That simple. Now, in the 60 seconds that we have, reverse mortgages suck if a financial product is being sold wrong.

between Snuggies and walk-in bathtubs, you're watching a TV show that is catering to elderly people, and they're selling you crap like gold and like stupid reverse mortgages with washed-up actors that are ancient. They're older than the person they're trying to sell it to. And so sorry for the insult to my

I have great admiration for Magnum PI, but no, don't do it. Don't do it. Don't buy a reverse mortgage. It is one of the worst financial products on the market today, period, under no circumstances do a reverse mortgage. Huge fees, bad interest rates, foreclosure rate is eight times the national average on traditional mortgages. Do not do reverse mortgages.

Hope I wasn't unclear. This is The Ramsey Show.

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