Money Magnifies What’s Already Broken In Your Relationships
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Live from the Ramsey Network, it's The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create amazing relationships. I'm George Campbell, joined by fellow Ramsey personality, Jade Warshaw, and we're taking your calls at 888-825-5225. Don't be scared. Give us a call. It beats sending the DM. This is the way to get the help that you need. We are honored to take your calls. Sarah is going to kick us off in Montreal. All right. What's going on, Sarah?

Hi, Dave. How are you? It's George here. Sorry to disappoint. Is that okay? That's no problem. It's a common misconception. If she wants to jump off now, I don't, you know. No, we're happy to help, Sarah. No, I'll stay on. So my question for you guys today is how do I manage my husband's finances? He told me two weeks ago that he has a gambling addiction. And how do I protect myself?

Wow. Well, good on him for letting you know that this is going on and good on him for understanding that this is the best route. So in the past, did he have full control over everything? So is this completely new territory for you?

So it is. We both have separate bank accounts, and we've been together for 11 years. So I've been wanting to merge our finances a bit more together, but he was very reluctant. And now he has lost millions of dollars in the last 10 years. Lost millions as in he had millions and then he lost it? Yeah.

So he has... Or is he in debt because of this? No. So a bit of both. He has an annual revenue of $1.3 million. He's a specialist, so he makes good money. And I calculated he owes about $1.1 million that I have to pay or he has to pay in the next year or so in order to make sure that we don't get into trouble again.

So he is in debt to it. Are they people or are they like reputable? No, no. So it is past due taxes, provisional taxes, a mortgage line of credit, which I thought a house was paid and he hasn't paid the mortgage line of credit. And he also has the personal line of credit. So how much is tax break it down? How much of the 1.1 is taxes? How much is the HELOC and how much is personal loans?

Okay, so the due taxes for 2024 is $64,000. Okay. Provisional taxes for the upcoming year because we have to pay provisional taxes, so that's $550,000. Okay. The mortgage line of credit is $438,000. Okay. And the personal line of credit is $125,000. Oh, boy. Oh, boy. And this has been going on over a decade. Right.

Yeah, and he just told me that two weeks ago because he was like, I took over fully his finances and he had like maybe $1,000 left in his bank account and everything was maxed. So he needed help at this point. What level of surprise were you? Because I mean, a decade of, I mean, obviously this guy's got a crazy yearly income, but to look up and say, hey, by the way, I have 1.1 million of debt. Did you suspect that or was this a complete shock? Tell us about you.

So I've been doing really well for myself and financially I've grown my network quite drastically in the last five years. So we were both, I was so transparent telling him how much money I was putting away and I thought he was on the same page.

trained as I was so I was like totally totally shocked and I think I'm still under the shock because this has affected me also even though our finances are not together because our plans were to buy a house in Florida our plans were to do like I thought I thought we were doing really well financially because I was doing really well and he was telling me he was investing too is he in therapy

Yes. So we started couples therapy. I'm doing my own therapy. He's doing therapy also for his gambling addiction. Good. On the financial side, what joint accounts do you guys still have? Is your name on anything that's tied to him right now? No. It's never been. So he gave me full control of his finances. What does that mean?

He has no more access to his bank account. He has a visa that we decided that we're going to keep open for like groceries and gas. Is that a credit card or a debit card? Credit card. Credit card. Okay, there's a problem. He does not have his debit card. He does not have his debit card because he was gambling online with the debit card. I guess on the site you can't purchase...

You can't purchase with the visa for gambling. So can we get him a new debit card? We could. I think that's the right move here because you still have given him unfettered access to a line of credit with this credit card. Okay. So now we need to put as many guardrails as possible in front of him, and that also means freezing his credit so that he cannot take out another loan even if he wanted to.

Okay. So you can contact the bureaus. I don't know how it works in Canada. In America, we have three credit bureaus and you can go online and freeze your credit with all three of them. And that way nobody could open a line of credit in his name, including himself. You'd have to jump through some hoops just to unlock that. Okay. Is he still making this income? You said revenue. I think of that as differently than profit. So is that income or does he have a business and that's his revenue?

So he has he's incorporated. So this is like his incorporated. So he every every month, it's about $100,000. We have to pay taxes on that. Got you. Okay, got it. So it is like a business. He's like a contractor consultant type guy.

Exactly. And do you have now in place? Clearly, there was not a plan in place to pay taxes on what he was earning. Do you have that plan in place now? Do you understand what you need to do? Is he setting aside quarterly return? I mean, here it would be quarterly returns. I'm not sure what it is there. It's the same here. So it is the same here. So I've only took over like two weeks ago, three weeks ago. So

I have like about $90,000 in his account right now. So I was thinking about how do I decide what to pay first? Definitely I want to pay the taxes that are due. Yeah. If you were here in the States, I would always tell you to do taxes first. What's the difference between...

Tell me, what are you saying between taxes and provisional taxes? One's payroll, one's what? So due taxes would be like he owes that from 2024. Provisional taxes is you need to pay taxes for next year because it's such a high amount. Okay.

You have to pay one year in advance in order for the government to make sure that you don't get backed up and things happen. I imagine the backed up taxes are the more important ones. Yeah, do the old ones first. And then once you clear those, then start doing the prep for the next year. And then I would go, yeah, do it in order like the debt snowball. Personal loans first, smallest to largest. I imagine they're broken up in little pieces. And then, yeah, I'm attacking that HELOC last. How much is your home worth?

1.5? Okay.

income, I should say. He was pursuing the house and then I would get, after 10 years, my name would be on it because it would be paid off, but it's not paid off. Oh, man. Sarah, there's so much beneath this. All of the lies, the deceit, a decade of this misbehavior. I hope you guys work through it. I hope you clean up the debt. I hope this marriage has hope. Thanks for trusting us with a call. This is The Ramsey Show. ... ...

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Michael's up next in San Jose. What's going on, Michael? I'm doing very well. How are you? Great. How can we help today?

So my father passed a few months ago. Oh, so sorry. Thank you. And the thing is, he left everything to me, his house, his investments, his business. He didn't give anything to my sisters who are estranged and with our mother ever since my parents divorced. And my sisters are...

They have asked me to help pay their student loans because my father left them with nothing. How much was it? Combined, I believe they went to both undergrad and grad. So combined, it's about $300,000. No, how much was the... Yes, thank you for telling me that. But how much was the inheritance?

It's a couple million. It's basically his house, his investment, and his business. When you say a couple million, is that like two million or is that like six million? It's in the age figures. Okay. So we're talking 10 million plus. Yes. Okay. Wow, okay. So he purposefully did not leave any money to your sisters because he had no relationship with them and that was his call to make.

Are they misbehaviors? No, he basically cut them off because they sided with our mother during their divorce. Okay, so they're team mom, you're team dad, and he goes, hey, I'm going to leave it all to my son who's been loyal to me. Yes. Okay. And now they're resentful because they feel like they deserve a portion of this money. Yeah.

It seems like it, yes. Okay. I think this is more relational, emotional than it is financial. You could write them a check and pay off the loans, but I don't know that you agree with the principle behind it or that that would have been your father's heart. Well, yeah. What do you want to do? What's your heart lean towards? I don't want to disrespect my father in any way. Okay. Do you have a relationship with your sisters or is it estranged as well?

It's strange. So they've only come to me only for very unique cases or like, or when they were going to college or grad, they came to both my father and I for money. My father, I know I was there. My father refused to.

So it's been transactional, this entire relationship. But can I ask, because where I'm sitting, and you've given us, thank you for sharing what you've shared so far. What I'm trying to weigh, and George, I don't know how you're looking at this either, but I'm trying to weigh if this was a decision that was made out of dysfunction, which is I'm forcing you to choose sides independently.

And you guys are children, so you're choosing whatever, I don't know, the parent you like the most that day. You know, that sort of thing. And is this your father...

You know, having a kind of just an immature moment. Right. Or is this really a reason that is with good reasoning behind it of, hey, I cut them off because they were misbehaving in this way and they made these poor choices? Or is it literally just simply I don't like your mother anymore and they like her. You're dead to me.

So my mother had an affair. That's why they divorced. My sister said it with my mother because they liked the affair partner more. And I said it with my father because he was my father. Got you. Okay. So you can't see how they would stand by someone who would do such a thing, basically. Yes. I understand. Okay. I think you're going to be resentful if you give this money. And I'd rather them be resentful towards you than you be resentful towards them. Okay.

Okay. There's no easy answer here. They're going to hate you, but it sounds like they didn't like you to begin with. They just used you for transactional moments. And so I don't think this is going to change anything. If you say that wasn't my father's wishes, I'm sorry. Listen, I got more to, I feel more to it than that. How, how, how old were you guys when this happened? I was 17. My sisters were 15 and 13. That's interesting to me. I,

listen, I don't think there's a wrong or right to this. I really don't. It feels very extreme to me that I'm just, I'm not saying I'm right. I'm just telling you my thoughts. It feels extreme to me that a parent would put children in a situation where they have to choose. Um, and because some, something about the situation made you guys feel like you had to choose, right? Um,

And not really. I mean, the thing is, I did not know about my parents affair. Apparently, my sisters did. And they said, and yeah, they said nothing, which is not on your that's not on your the daughters. It's on the parent to not put them in the position to keep that secret. Like kids are kids, teenagers, they're kids. A 15 year old doesn't have the emotional bandwidth to navigate that. Yeah.

And probably thinks, oh, I'm going to be disloyal like they kids don't understand what role to play in that. Now, looking back on adults, we can look back and go, maybe I should have done this. Maybe I shouldn't. Who knows if they've done the right therapy to work through those things. I just feel that on a surface level to punish the children for a spousal misbehavior because the children didn't react in the way that.

the adults felt should have happened. I do struggle with that. I'm not saying you're wrong. I'm just telling you called in. So I'm saying I do have a little bit of a struggle with that. It's not an error on your part. It feels like an error on the dad for saying, I'll show you and kind of putting a lot of that sting and unforgiveness for what mom did on the kids. That's I'm no I'm no therapist. So that's just my two cents.

This is tough. I'm not going to lie. So, yeah. So my father, he suffered very greatly from the divorce fear emotionally. I know because I was there. Sure. Yeah. Rightfully so. He dipped into the alcohol. He dipped into alcohol for a while, but he built himself back up, you know, and he showered me with love and attention because I was the only one that he had. Yeah.

And I don't want to in any way disrespect his wishes. I think he had a purpose to when he wrote his will and he never changed it. I think he had a purpose to when he refused my sisters for the college. And that's only a drop in the bucket. There have been numerous instances where...

I know that my father has tried to reach out, especially when my sisters had their kids. And they didn't want anything to do with him. So can I ask this question? Did they, okay, he wrote them off because they followed mom. Did they then write him off because he wrote them off? Was it, do you see what I'm saying? Who wrote whom off first? My sisters, definitely. Okay.

And what was their reason for writing him off if he was completely an innocent party in all of this? I don't know. That's the part I'm trying to understand. It's one thing for them to be like, we still like mom. Like, we don't want this, you know, and for whatever their reasons were, they continue to have a relationship with her. But what would make them completely disassociate from dear old innocent dad who did nothing wrong but love them?

It was basically, from what I understand, the affair partner was very charismatic. He bought them a lot of stuff. And this was back when my father's business wasn't successful. Okay. So much to say he probably bought their love and affection. Got it. Got it. So it was a materialistic relationship. Here's my final take on this. Again, not trying to play armchair therapist, but I think this, you're not ready to forgive anybody.

your sisters and cause reconciliation and giving them this money feels like you're taking that next step. Is that accurate? Yeah.

I know that the thing is that I want the old grudges to die. At the same time, I want to respect my father's wishes. And because my father was a God-fearing man, he was very devout. And I know that forgiveness is in the Bible, but I don't know...

You're right. I am not ready to forgive them for the pain that they caused my father, neither my mother, neither my sisters. That's it. You just said it out loud. You're not ready to forgive. You're not ready. Don't forgive yet, but I think you should eventually. And my final take is, I do think that him cutting them off was a little bit of dysfunction on his part. And I don't think that they necessarily deserved that. It doesn't sound like I wasn't there, but based on what you said,

I don't know if I'd want to keep that dysfunction going. Yeah. And I want you to be giving out of joy. That's how giving should be done. Not out of, oh, I just hate to be doing this with a clenched fist. So I'd read that Bible again and see if all that grace and mercy talk might eventually heal some of this relational dysfunction.

So sorry, man.

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Hi, thank you for taking my call. Absolutely. Okay. I am a saver. I'm frugal, and I've been saving many years. I am on step seven of Dave Ramsey's plan. Awesome. No credit card debt. I own my home, 25%, 401K, 529, et cetera, et cetera. Wow. Incredible. Okay. I have been dealt...

A family blow. I have children, and just recently my beautiful child has been diagnosed with schizophrenia. So my question is, how should I shift my savings goal with my child's new diagnosis? Because everything I've done is for them, and I'm kind of stumped.

And I'm actually, you know, not sure what to do. Is this, so the financial side of this, first off, I'm sorry, that's got to be really tough to deal with. What does that mean care-wise? Is it something that there's a lot of appointments, a lot of therapy, and you're hitting your, you know, out-of-pocket max every year? What does that look like? This is a recent, this is very, very recent. I have had hospitalizations recently.

But yes, the medical bills are coming in, but he's 21. And obviously at 26, I can't keep him on my health care plan. I'm actually building a case for a possible, what is it, Social Security? I don't know. It's really hard to do. But I don't know how to plan for this. I mean, obviously you plan for your kids to...

do well emotionally, financially. And this has been a stump and he's not doing well on medication. He has something called akathisia, which is the side effect that is actually as worse as the problem. He's being an internal, internal cure. Okay. So I, you know, he's not stabilized yet, but it doesn't matter. I mean, the bills are going to come.

And I don't mind paying, you know, deductibles, but I need to know, what do I do? Oh, boy, this is... I mean, I work. I'm not a millionaire. I'm not nothing like that. How much money do you have in savings right now? I don't have... Are you talking 401k? No, just like a savings account. How much liquid money could you have access to without tapping retirement? Oh, boy.

Well, I've been saving for my kids myself, probably about $20,000. Okay, so $20,000. And what has the medical care been so far? What's that cost? Oh. Has it been $5,000 a month? No. $500 a month? No. Right now we have pretty decent health care. What kind of health care plan is it? Is it a high deductible health care plan? No.

No, it's a plan that will be discontinued soon. And it will have to go on my plan. But I probably paid between ambulance and all that at least a couple thousand in the last maybe six months. Okay. So let's just say for ballpark numbers that this is going to cost $1,000 a month. And every single month out of each paycheck, you put $1,000 away. Could you do that?

No, I don't think so. I mean, I would have to adjust my 25%. Yeah, let's say we had to adjust it down to 15 or 20 right now. Would that give you the wiggle room? I think it would give you some great peace of mind to have this. We call it a sinking fund. I hope I don't have to do $1,000 a month. I hope so, too. Does healthcare have a maximum deductible? Exactly. So what is the out-of-pocket maximum? Okay, go ahead.

I don't know. It's going to be shifted towards me soon, and I have a high deductible plan, but not yet. Then you likely will have access to an HSA, a health savings account, with that high deductible plan. I do. Good. I do, and I max it out. Wonderful. When he comes to my plan, I'll have to max it out, but my fear is at 26, you know? Well, that's five years down the road.

Let's get through tomorrow and then we'll worry about what happens five years from now and figure out what care looks like. You'll have a real clear picture at that point because this is still pretty new. So I would personally just try to focus on what's going on this week, this month, this year, and that'll give you some peace instead of going, well, five years from now, what's going to happen? That's going to just create unneeded anxiety. Yeah, and that gives you plenty of time, like you said, to continue to apply for his SSDI or whatever is available to him.

you know, for income. And then you can start to look down the track and say, okay, what does healthcare look like for someone who can't take care of themselves? They're an adult and they've got these mental challenges. So that gives you some time to kind of sit with some real experts in that insurance space. Cause I don't feel like I would be able to tell you exactly what the best move would be for that six years from now.

So you're saying like for now, just to shift my contributions and put it more into a saving? Yes. I would have a bigger cash cushion because we just don't know. What if there's a treatment that costs $20,000 up front?

And that's what the way you decide to go. I want to make sure that you have money to do all this. You never go into debt for this. You never have medical debt. It's one of the leading causes of bankruptcy. And so having good health insurance, knowing your out-of-pocket max, maxing out your health savings account if you have one, that's a great use of that HSA because the money goes in tax-free, it's growing tax-free, and you can withdraw it tax-free for those qualified medical expenses.

Okay. So those are the pieces I would do is figure out the out-of-pocket max, figure out what that next move is for the insurance, figure out what that looks like to max out your HSA every month or every year, and then begin developing a plan. Are you on an every dollar budget right now?

No, no. Trust me. I live frugally, but not to a point. The budget at this point, it's... The every dollar budget, I'm going to gift it to you to check out. You've been so frugal, but right now there still feels like there's a lot that's just kind of floating around out there. And this budget will just give you a very clear picture of what your next month looks like.

How much money you will have left over to put toward the medical savings goals, how much money you have to give to spend, what are your bills adding up to that'll just put some actual facts on paper, because right now there's a lot of emotion. And I found that focusing on the facts helps me kind of get out of that cycle.

I have one more question related to him. I, as a parent, did the 529 for him. One of my child has used it, and he has a decent amount in his 529, and he'll, as far as I know, I don't think he'll ever touch it. It's in my name and his name. I mean, is that like my little emergency thing for this? I mean, I...

I wouldn't use it for the medical costs. There are some new stipulations where you can roll it over. Okay. You can roll over up to $35,000 with the new Secure 2.0 Act. There are some stipulations about how long the account has to be open for, but that could be a good way to use those funds later on down the road if they're not used for college. But I wouldn't contribute more to it right now, but I also wouldn't touch it. I would just use the HSA and any savings that you have.

All right. I will do that. Oh, Jennifer, I'm so sorry you're going through this. You're an amazing mother and you've done a great job following the plan. And it's for a time such as this. The reason we follow the Ramsey plan is because we don't know what life's going to throw our way.

And you've set yourself up to where you can actually breathe and cover these costs without exacerbating the problem, going into debt and causing financial stress. So I'm really proud of you. Hang on the line. We're going to gift you every dollar premium to walk with you as you attempt to cover all these medical costs that are coming your way.

We're wishing them the best. I know, I know. That's so tough. So, so tough. Wow. Good reminder for everyone out there. A lot of lingo was thrown around about health insurance and what's the out-of-pocket max, but there's so much to know when it comes to insurance, and it's not to be nerdy, and you don't have to be an insurance nerd. It's because it affects your real life. Yeah, and you said it's medical debt and all that, number one cause of bankruptcy, not being prepared for those things, so...

Yeah. So if you guys want to learn more, you can go to RamseySolutions.com slash insurance. We've got a great hub there that can help you understand all of this stuff. Not because you need to nerd out, but again, because this helps you live out the Ramsey plan with less stress, less headaches, less, oh my gosh, I didn't know. We want you to be very aware. Financial literacy is available if you just reach out and grab it. So RamseySolutions.com slash insurance is the place to go.

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If you're tired of living paycheck to paycheck, you're wondering where your money's going, your first step is getting on a budget. And our team is hosting free budgeting trainings this month where you're going to learn step-by-step how to make and stick to a budget using EveryDollar. Plus, you can get your biggest budgeting questions answered in a live Q&A with our team. So don't miss it. Spots are limited. Sign up for free at EveryDollar.com slash webinar. Chris is up next in Atlanta. What's going on, Chris?

Hey, sir. How are you? Good. What's going on? Oh, not much, sir. Thank you for taking my call, first of all. Just wanted to run something by you. I've got about $20,000 in debt. It's about four different accounts that...

It's interest-free for between 36 and 48 months. I've got 36 in my emergency account. And just my wife's not a big fan of, you know, cutting a check just to pay it off. You know, we've got the cash. But just wanted to see, you know, your guys' opinion on whether to keep that and just pay it off so the interest doesn't accrue or, you know, or keep making those payments. I mean...

You know what we're going to say. We're going to tell you to pay it off, you know, instantly. But the problem is not that. It's you doing something without the onboarding with your wife. Like, you guys got to be on the same page. So I wouldn't suggest you just go do a thing without you both being on the same page.

Right. What's her problem? I mean, I've been listening to you guys a lot longer than, you know, she doesn't listen to you guys at all. But, you know, I've really got on board with y'all's plan and just, again, seeing what you guys, you know, had to think about that. Well, yeah. Like I said, we're going to tell you to pay it off. My question is, why does she... You're asking me how to get her on board? Yeah. Yeah.

Well, I think I can. I just need to take a plan to her. Like I said, we have the cash to pay it off. I don't think she needs a plan. I think she needs a good reason. What's beneath all this? I don't think she needs a fancy plan. She needs a good reason to pay this off. And right now, she's not really feeling the financial pain. Have you been shouldering a lot of the financial stress in the household and she's unaware? Or does she just think she can outsmart this financial system and do it another way?

I don't really think she knows you guys' plan. The money is there. I'm the breadwinner. She just works part-time and takes care of our two kids. I'm about $150,000 a year income. I've got a 401k through my job. I maxed out hers and mine. I've got a brokerage account. That's why she doesn't feel it.

I think we're, we're ships passing in the night. So what we're saying is there's a plan. We can give you the plan. You've been listening. You've started to kind of figure out what that plan is, but the plan means nothing if you don't have a reason to do it. And,

And you're saying, hey, in my mind, I've kind of figured out a reason to do this. For you, based off what you've said, it just kind of feels silly to keep that debt around. So that's a good enough reason for you to pay it off, right? Some people need a little bit of a deeper reason in order to feel the uncomfortability that you're talking about.

So they need something to kind of cling to to go, hey, I'm doing this for my family or I'm doing this because junior is going to be going off to college and I want to make sure we have the money to pay for that. Or I'm doing this because I grew up poor and I never want to feel that feeling again. Like people need something to kind of cling to like a buoy in the water. So what do you think that...

That would be for your wife, because what you painted is kind of like the most dangerous position in America, where you make $150,000, you make enough to kind of keep the bills floating in the air without it really...

hurting too much not cramping your life it's not cramping your lifestyle until something happens right and that's when they call us when somebody loses a job or when you know something it rains it pours right so she hasn't felt the need to go to you know such extremes and i'm putting extremes in quotes so you've got to figure out a deeper why that you could get her to get on board with this without a financial crisis happening

Yeah, I understand totally what y'all are saying. I think we have $35,000, $36,000 in our emergency fund, fully funded in six months, and got the investments I told you guys about, and putting $20,000 towards it to pay off these debts for different accounts that are interest-free. Her argument is that

She wants to, you know, just keep paying those payments every month that are interest-free before the interest accrues. And I want to just get rid of the debt. And, you know, we have about $15,000 left, you know, after $20,000 is paid. Yeah, you still have $16,000. So she wants to take it right up to the edge and then pay it off in a lump sum. Yeah, she's just scared about, you know, just stroking that $20,000 check to get all of them paid for. And what is scary about that to her? Have you dug into that?

I just, you know, just writing that big a check when we can just make. But it's not just that. It's not just that. There's something that's causing her. And that's the deeper question. The security gland is flaring up. So now your job is to position this debt as a threat to her security. If you can do that, we win this argument.

You go, hey, owing other people money puts us at big risk. Here's all the interest we're going to owe. Here's what could happen if we miss a payment. This is designed to screw us and we fell for the trap. And truthfully, this is a symptom of a bigger problem. We've been floating through life, making amazing money, and we haven't been on the same page. This is our chance for a fresh start. Are you with me? That's a different conversation. Yeah.

You can even take it to the next level because if I'm in your situation, if I'm you, Chris, I'm thinking who's the breadwinner? You are, right? You said she works part time.

So I'm thinking, oh gosh, if I were to get hurt or be laid off or lose my job tomorrow, yeah, we have $36,000 saved, but we have payments on $20,000 of debt. So we're going to go through that savings lickety split because not only do we have to do the things that just are our basic budget, but now we have to pay these bills too. I don't like the feeling of that.

And I want to be in a safer position because as the man of the house, you know, those are the things that I'd be thinking. So your homework, Chris, I think is to...

get down beyond the math into a more emotional, like, granular level on what you feel about this. That way, you can talk to her that way, which will probably cause her to start talking that way. But if for you, it stays surface on, we just got to pay this off. I mean, I know we got this money in this account and this money in this account, but I mean, it makes sense to pay this off. It's just not enough to get her excited about that. Money's very emotional. Yeah.

Yes, yes. Yeah, very. I've gotten a little less emotional about it with listening to you guys and just getting it done. And that's your personality type. I love that. That's the personality type that kills it on the baby steps because they go, what is the plan? Ready, hut.

You know, and they just bowl through. Why am I getting sports analogies? They're like going through the end zone on it. Right. And other people are like, oh, my gosh, you want me to change my lifestyle. But this is what I'm used to. And I feel great when I see that money in the account. And I feel good like that because when I was a kid, I always felt insecure about money. So when I see that number, right. So you got to get on her on her emotional level and show her, hey, look, we're going to get rid of these payments and we're going to restock the emergency fund in this amount of time. Yeah. Give her some facts.

So by the time that debt was going to be paid, if you took it to the edge, you could have been right back where you are, except now you got no payments. No payments, yeah, because anything other than that, I just have my mortgage. Exactly, yeah. And question, is she working part-time because she wants to or because she has to? She wants to. She does hair, and she had a career. She got laid off during COVID, but kept a good clientele. That could be a reason for that security gland clearing up. Uh-huh, uh-huh.

And listen, put a little sugar on top. Like I'm the type, tell me what I'm going to get in the end. Like if we say, yeah, if we say, Hey, trust me, let's, let's pay this debt off. We'll stack back up the three to six months. And then like, yeah, let's go on a cruise. Like let's do something to celebrate this wonderful thing we did to get our family on good financial footing. Like put a little something on it. So yeah,

That it feels like a reward, not just a financial reward in having paid off the debt, but a reward in that, hey, we now see, you know, the fruit of our labor here and we get to celebrate that in a big way. So make sure it's not just all work and no play is not fun is what I'm saying.

Yeah, I mean, so basically, but taking it back to her, you know, obviously there's no way, you know, in your guys' eyes that, you know, I keep this debt, even though it's interest-free every month for another 36 months. Because it's still, it's not just about the interest, it's still risk. Because remember the picture I painted, Chris, if you lose your job, it doesn't matter that it's interest-free. It's still $20,000 that you owe and have to make a payment on.

It's not about where you're at today. It's what could be. And she knows that very well after getting laid off during COVID.

So the key underneath all of this is get to the emotion underneath and then cast a vision instead of focusing on the transaction. That's not going to get anyone excited. But if you can start casting a vision about where you guys want to be and you leading first, saying, man, I have not done a great job leading our family when it comes to this area. I want to do better. And here's what that looks like. Ooh. Will you go with me? That's great, George. Now this is romantic. Now you're taking her somewhere. ♪♪♪

What's up guys, it's Jade. And let me tell you, when my husband and I had $280,000 of student loan debt, we were not sitting around waiting on the government to bail us out. We did the hard work to pay it off ourselves. So if you're still holding out hope that forgiveness is coming, that's like you waiting for your landlord to start paying your rent. Any

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From the Ramsey Network, it's The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create amazing relationships. I'm George Camel here with Jade Warshaw, and we're taking your calls at 888-825-5225. Clay has decided to join us from Tampa, Florida. What's going on, Clay? Hey, guys. Thanks for taking my call. I appreciate it. Sure.

So I've got a financial, I'm going to call it an opportunity. And I think that the financial advantages are incredible, but there's an emotional aspect to this that I'd love for you guys to weigh in on and kind of give your advice on. Um, so I'll try to be as brief as I can. So I'm 27 years old. I just got engaged this last weekend. So soon to be married next year. So soon to be married next year. And obviously we want to start a family, you know, sooner rather than later. That's in the, that's in the short term plan. Um,

I was gifted my property. It was deeded over to me by my grandfather. So I live in a home on 12 acres. Very blessed to have that.

So when I moved in, the home, it's old, it was in 1953, even with just me living there before I even met my girlfriend and needed work. So I had to take out a mortgage, you know, I cast out the equity. So I do have a mortgage and basically I remodeled, got the entire home, new electric, new plumbing, new septic, new well, I mean everything. So I owe 230 on the property. That's not a problem with my income. The money's not an issue.

Here's my question. With my family coming in and putting them first now, the house is still too small where if we're going to have the size family we want, I would have to take out another mortgage to kind of add on and get it to where it needs to be to suit a family. But...

I could also sell the property in the market right now in Florida. And the home in 12 acres, I think it's worth around 900,000. So I could walk off, I could walk off with, you know, I mean, 600 and, you know, $73,000. And then after taxes, I can go buy a home that's big enough and new in cash, which obviously I think is a great decision for my family. Here's the, here's the caveat in that. This has been in my family for five generations. My,

My family, we all live on the same property. I've got my own 12 acres. My sister and her family live right next to me on their 10 acres. It was up to them. My parents live on three and my grandparents live on three. And then we have like a small cattle operation that runs all across all of our properties. It's more of a hobby. We don't do it to make a lot of money. So by selling, obviously I'd be the first guy in five generations to do that. And you know, it is, it is family land. So I'm sure that there would definitely be some disappointment. Can you sell it to your family?

Do you have to sell it to Joe Blow or can you just sell it to one of your existing family members? Would they be interested? On Ford?

Yeah, unfortunately I can't. So there's a lot going on there. There's so there's, there's, there's more going on. I mean, without diving into it, there's a divorce happening. So there's a bunch of stuff that's kind of led up to this now. And basically in my mind, so I may have an opportunity to sell it to my neighbor. And if I can do that, I think he would allow, cause he's cause he has friends with the family. He'd allow the cattle and everything to kind of stay there. That would be the best case, but you know, that's also not a guarantee that it can happen.

So really in my head, I'm just weighing, do I want to owe $400,000 on this property to get my house to where I need it to be? Or, you know, sell it. We know it's not worth investing into this property. It's not going to ROI for you. So it's a bad financial decision. And at that point, it's just an emotional one to not upset family. Right. Is it, I feel like you're very far in the future as it pertains to what the house will need. How many bedrooms does the house have now?

Well, so technically it's a three one, but really it's a two one. I mean, I put a door on the other one. OK, so you'd be OK with your first kid in there and you'd be OK with the second kid, because when I was a kid, we grew up and we shared bedrooms at least, you know. Right. And you still need to get married and then have the baby. That's another nine months at least, unless you found a hack for that.

And so, you know, we've got a few years to at least make this decision. And if you said the 230 mortgage is not a problem, I mean, you didn't tell us what your income is.

So, I mean, some of it's bonus based. My base is 90, but I can make 75% of that on a bonus. So high end, I make 155. Great. And no other debt? I just owe $30,000 on a truck. That's it. So my goal, if I were in your shoes, if you were like, hey, man, I want to keep this land. It's five generations deep. The house is not perfect, but I could see a path to get it there. My goal would be how quickly can I pay off this $230,000 mortgage so that I

In three years, when we have two kids that are kind of like starting to bust at the seams, we can be saving up for an addition to

And do another add another room to this house. That's what I'd be saying if I wanted to keep the property. Now, you did say, hey, I could sell it and walk away with maybe 600 grand. And I'd say that's great. But Florida markets are wild. So you might want to double check on what you can get that's much bigger than what you have now for 600,000 because it's different out there.

Yeah, I mean, so we have looked into that a little bit. I mean, they're doing a lot of new builds. I mean, obviously, you guys know everyone's moving to Florida, so there's a lot of new construction neighborhoods. Well, yeah, there are, but here's the thing. A lot of people are moving out, too. It's not like it was a couple of years ago. They're actually seeing houses sit on the market longer in Florida, especially South Florida, but you guys, I guess, are North. Sure. But, yeah, it's a little different in South Florida and in the state of Florida right now. But anyway. Yeah.

I mean, the only other things that are kind of weighing into this is that, so, you know, obviously I work a full-time job. My brother-in-law, who married my sister, doesn't come from a cattle family, so, you know, he doesn't know a lot about it. And then you've got my dad, who's got a full-time job, so my granddad, who's 80, he's

It's kind of running everything. You know, we get hurricanes that come through. You got fences down. I mean, it's a lot of upkeep on it's over. It's almost 30 acres. So, you know, that's kind of weighing into the decision to like eventually someone's going to have to do that. And we're all we're all so busy. You know, I'm not saying I don't want to do it. I was raised with, you know, work ethic and I understand all that. But that does. I mean, you're like devoting your life to this at that point.

Well, that's – so that's kind of the conundrum is do I want to be doing that in 20 years, 30 years? And can I just refer you? It's okay to decide that's not what you want to do. It's okay to decide I want to go live in the city. What if you decide you and your spouse get a job across the country and you decide to move? Would your family still be mad? Yeah.

Oh, probably. But I mean, I think we want to stay local. I think we want to stay local for sure. But it's just like this place is, I don't know, like the opportunity that it's presenting with the money and me living debt free and getting in a nice new house for especially for homeowners insurance purposes. I mean, my home's a 53, even though it was remodeled, property insurance still looks at it like it's a 1953. Property insurance is expensive here. So, you know, I'd be solving a lot of problems. I mean, I could even pay off the truck, buy a brand new house. How much money do you have right now in cash?

Well, after post-engagement ring, I've got $10,000 in savings right now. Okay.

And I got about 100K and a 401K. Listen, Clay, I think you're I think you're I like that you're thinking ahead. I think having some foresight is really smart. I almost think you're looking too far ahead. I almost think you have to go, OK, let me look at five years from now. What's the right next step? Yeah. Five years from now, I do see myself married. I see myself with a child or two. And where would I like to see myself living in that five year span?

And then, oh yeah, maybe I'd like to hold onto that property a little longer. Then you look at, okay. And then, then in the next 10 years from that, just what do I think? And you kind of sounded like, Hey, I don't want to be doing this forever. Is this a 10 or 15 year play? Or is this, you know, and really kind of like draw a timeline out that you think you'd be ready to exit this lifestyle. It might not be today or, and just because you don't want to be doing it 30 years from now, doesn't mean you want to stop doing it five years from now. Do you see what I'm saying? So, yeah.

Get that on paper. I think it'll help you to get it on paper. You have a lot of great ideas.

This reminds me of the old quote, the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry. Because I'm a future thinker like him. This is going to happen and this. And life never happens that way. So hold everything loosely. Just take the right next step. And don't get starry-eyed with, quote, opportunities that cause you to go into debt. And get this truck paid off, Clay. What are you doing? You make $155,000, dude. Pay off the truck in the next few months. Get it done. And then focus on that mortgage.

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Cache. 16 billion unique login credentials, usernames and passwords spread across 30 distinct data sets, some holding up to 3.5 billion records each. Hide your kids, hide your wife. That's a lot of lingo to say terrible data breach just happened.

And unlike many big leaks that resurface old info, nearly all of this data is fresh. Like the Krispy Kreme donuts going down the roller, likely pulled directly from infected users via InfoStealer malware. What? Wait, say what? InfoStealer malware. That's what it's called, InfoStealer. Infected users. At least they're very clear with what this is.

If you're going to name something InfoStealer, I know exactly what that does. Yes, this is deep. The exposed credentials cover a vast range of platforms from Apple, Facebook, Google, Instagram, Microsoft, Netflix, PayPal, Telegram, GitHub, gaming, developer tools, even government accounts. Well, I'm in there. You're in there. Pretty much all of our information is probably out there. So what does that mean for you? What can you do about it? Number one, be sure to change your passwords. I know. I

I look like the target demo for a guy who would tell you to change your passwords. But email, banking, social, all of this stuff can put you at risk if you don't do that. And then secondly, turn on two-factor authentication where you can. I know it's annoying. I do have that, yeah. Turn it on. I have to wait for the text message and get the code. But that stuff is what actually protects you.

And the other thing you can do to protect yourself is check out Zander Insurance's ID Theft. They have plans that actually fix the mess if your identity is stolen. I unfortunately had to go through this, Jade, back in, was it 2013 or 14? And Zander ID Theft came in the clutch.

to help me clean up the mess. And their elite bundle includes a password manager, two-factor authentication, and they can protect your entire family. And if you want to learn more about how to protect yourself online, we've got a blog that will do just that. Go to ramsaysolutions.com slash idtheft to learn more and navigate this wild digital journey we find ourselves on. I'm starting to run out of password ideas.

You know what the new ones are? You do a unique phrase that only you would know. Yes, I know, George. You know? So like, what's a Jade catchphrase that nobody would guess? I,

Yeah, I know. Don't say it out loud. It was hard enough to have a word with a symbol, with a dash. It has to be a capital letter. It has to be at least 12. It has to have a symbol. I'm like, oh my gosh, now they want me to remember a whole phrase. So if you're that person that just keeps adding more exclamation points. That's me. It's time for a change. That's me, George. Do better, Jade. Stay safe out there. I'm like, what's my birthday? Okay.

Was it three exclamations or four? I don't remember. Oh, boy. Oh, boy. Yeah. God bless. And we're young. We're hip. That's what I'm saying. I'm saying I'm only on my fourth level and I'm already stumped. Just wait until you're, you know, boomer level. I know. It's going to be bad. All right. Lindsay's up next in Buffalo. Lindsay, how can we help today? Hi, Jayden. Hi, George. Thank you guys for taking my call. Sure.

So today my question is, my husband's current job is not enough to pay our monthly bills and I'm not in a position where I can get a job right now due to health issues. And we, our finances are hot and fast and we have no idea what direction to go right now, what to do. What's he making? So...

He's kind of, in a way, got two jobs. He just got a local job to be home with us, but it's only bringing in $750 a week, and it's the best that he could find. He doesn't have any certifications or anything. What's he doing? He works in a garage. What kind? Just working on vehicles, maintenance, things like that. Okay, so he has mechanic-type skills? Yes.

Yeah, yep, I'm sorry. Okay, that's good. And he's making $3,000 a month from that. Yeah. And how much are your expenses every month? $3,100. Okay, so you're $100 short just to survive. Yeah.

Yeah. Okay. And how much debt do you have? That's actually, that doesn't even include gas and groceries. Oh, well, that's what I meant by expenses. What are your total expenses to run the household between food, utilities, your housing, transportation, and insurance, and then minimum debt payments? What does that add up to? Then that would be about four grand. Okay. And you do have a budget that you're using to understand that?

I have everything written down. It's been really hard to nail in a budget because he was working over the road and our intentions were to sell the truck and trailer and the truck wound up breaking down and we had to get it fixed and now we're still in the green with it. But to answer your question, George, we have $64,000 in debt, but there's like

like other all these little bills piling up and coming in and what can be sold out of the 64 000 are any of them assets that you could get rid of the only thing that we could sell is the truck and the trailer um but he could use that to make money like if he went back over the road he could but he's not yeah what's stopping him from doing that if it makes more money today

So he's actually currently driving right now. As I mentioned, he's kind of got both jobs going on. So I had a major surgery last year and I've been in and out of the hospital multiple times and he came off the road to be home with me and the kids. And we were just hoping that somehow it would work out. And we've just been going backwards the last six months. So

So he's still been signed on with that company, but he's currently working with the truck as we speak. But it's been hard because I'm not in a position where I can work to bring in supplemental income. I've tried doing things at home. So you need him home right now? I do. But he's on the road right now. Is that because he can make more money on the road? What does he make doing that? Yeah, what does he make on the road?

That's the other part of this, too, because it is so inconsistent. What's a good day? Like, what's a good month? It depends. The further he drives, the more he brings in. Last year, I think he brought in like 110, but it was before all of the expenses like fuel and everything. So here's what you guys need to do. You need to sit down and look at last year.

And say, okay, here's what we brought in, but after all the fuel and expenses and actual money we were getting to keep, here's what it was, right? And then let's say you find out, okay, this is $50,000. Then you look and say, okay,

Is there anything else? I mean, you said he's not doing that full time anymore, right? So then you have to look and see, is that $50,000 better than what you're doing now? Or is it worse than what you're doing now? And then you have to decide, is it worth keeping this truck and trailer? Or is there something else he can do to make that amount of money? So you've got to get real numbers and make those comparisons to really see. Otherwise, you're just guessing. Yeah.

So we've done that. We've sat down and really figured out the difference between the two. And what did you find? So he brought home $40,000 last year after all the expenses and everything. And that was with the business paying for the truck. But with him being home, we still have the truck and the trailer payments, and the business no longer pays for those. So it's kind of...

And how long until you're recovered and he would be able to go back out and do that job full time again? And the business would then pay for the truck? That's hard to say. The issues that I've had are complications from a surgery and it's just been one thing after another. What is the truck and trailer payment every month?

So the truck is $478,000 and the trailer is $162,000. And then insurance and fuel, as long as he hauls at least one load a month, it is covered. Like he can fill his truck and it'll last him a month with his regular job. And what's left on the loans for the truck and trailer? What do those add up to as part of the $64,000? The trailer is $7,900. The truck is $19,000. Okay. Okay.

I'm just wondering if we push pause on the truck and trailer deal, if he can't be on the road anyways because it's hard on you, if he at least sells those, we clean up that debt, which saves you $700 or more every single month if you include the insurance, which could give you guys enough breathing room. And then let's find a job locally that can pay better. If he's got mechanic skills, he should be making more than $750 a week. Yeah, the $40,000 wasn't enough to keep that trailer in place.

trucking business in my mind. Yeah, the Jews saying we're at the squeeze as they say. So I wish you guys the best. I hope you continue to heal and recover from this with no complications. And hopefully you guys can see a way out real soon.

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 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 I immediately went and got term life insurance. That's a gut punch. Oh, you're telling me. And 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. Me too. I mean, you're going to have a crisis here. And, 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. And take care of your dadgum family, man. Term life insurance can replace income, pay off debts, cover funeral expenses, so your family can actually...

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easy to understand with clear next steps. So go check it out, ramsaysolutions.com slash checkup and take the coverage checkup or click the link in the description if you're listening on YouTube or podcast. Noah is up next in Rochester, New York. Noah, welcome to The Ramsey Show. Hi, George and Jade. Thank you for taking my call. Sure. How can we help? So I'm calling today because my mom is asking my wife and I to contribute toward a family vacation home purchase.

Uh, it's in a location we've, uh, been spending time in, uh, my whole life growing up that it's always been kind of a dream of in our family. Uh,

to get something permanent there to make new memories in. I think it's something we've always thought we'd really enjoy. We're in baby step seven. My wife and I could afford to help, but we're really worried about being a minority owner in a property we wouldn't control and have no real control over who is living or renting this property when we're not spending time there. And also about future, hopefully,

Far, far down the road, inheritance issues between my siblings and myself. Is this a situation we should want to get ourselves involved in, or should we tell mom if this is something she wants, she has to be on her own? I mean— That was some biblical-level wisdom, Noah. I appreciate that. Your namesake is really coming through today. You are spot on. Thank you. Learned a lot from the show. Think through all these future problems. Yeah, I mean, think of it. Let me ask you this. If you were to structure this thing perfectly, what would it be?

In a way that you would do it. You tell me. Does it even exist? Either we would... I think my wife is nervous, maybe more so than I, that just future problems arise interpersonally between me and my siblings or between my mom and us as she would get older. I think ideally we'd want to be in...

A majority owner or full ownership, though, that's not something we can afford at the moment. So how much money does she have? Could she buy it outright? It's a very attractive alternative. So it sounds like when I rephrase the question and said, you tell me what the perfect scenario is, it sounds like there isn't one. The perfect scenario would be you...

owning it outright. Right. And you can't, then you said, I can't afford to do that. So I think that you understand what this is. And I think in a, in a, you know, perfect picture in your mind, it would be nice to have a family vacation house. It would be nice to go to this place that you guys are always went to when you were kids and,

But, I mean, you laid out all the reasons that that's really not a practical or good realistic solution. And the only realistic solution would be somebody just owns it outright and lets everybody else use it. Right. I think that's what I knew, but maybe you need someone to hear someone else say out loud. Yeah. I mean, it sounds like you really love your family and you love your mom. And you and your wife have said, like, this could cause, like, relational issues. It could cause inheritance issues. It could cause...

A lot. And is this a vacation property or an investment property? It sounds like you're trying to mix the two. It's currently being rented out as an Airbnb. That's not something I had ever really considered before, but my mom is talking about continuing that and then also using it as her family vacations. So you already have it? No, we do not have it. It's for sale.

It's for sale, yes. Got it, got it, got it. And is this exact home really special? Have you guys stayed there a lot? I'm confused. Or is it just the general area? Yes, we have. Interesting. We've stayed in the particular house and in the location and many other places. What's the cost? How much is it? $300,000. And you're in Baby Step 7. How much do you make? My wife and I combined, about $250,000. So, I mean, I just...

With the income that you have, with where you are financially, I'd be more interested in saving up to buy my own vacation home in three years. And it's mine and I can rent it to my family or let my family stay there or I can go there as much as I want. And there's no weird strings attached to it. Maybe it's not that particular one, but it's something like that.

Yes, that's a good option. This one just already has a lot of good memories associated with it. We stayed there before. Yeah, why not just rent it out when you guys want to go visit? With that in our hands. What's wrong with the current plan that you've been doing of just visiting there whenever you feel like it? Oh, yeah.

That's another great point we thought about. We would be looking to contribute $50,000 to $75,000, and that buys a whole lot of vacation rentals as far as staying somewhere a few weeks a year. Yeah, that's like 30 years of vacations there. I think that's always the rub to me with buying these investment properties. And the other piece is you've got random people partying there on the weekends, destroying all your stuff.

That I would not rent it. I could not do that. I'd be like, it's mine. I would try to separate investment property from a actual, you know, vacation home that's yours. And I'll tell you right. If Dave was on the line, he'd say the same thing. Dave doesn't. Dave's got a lot of investment properties. He ain't staying there. No one's staying at Dave's lake house except for Dave.

And so there's something to think about there. And if mom can't afford it, then she just needs to rent it when she wants and will still have all the memories. But I would not go through with this. I think everything you're saying is spot on here. You're noticing all the red flags right in the nick of time. And so I think you politely decline and say, this isn't a priority for us financially. We can't afford to do this. If you choose to do it, good on you, but we're not going to be a part of it. Okay, I think...

I think that's what we were leaning toward, and I'm glad you agree. So thank you. I think I smell a disappointed mom in your future. Is that right? It's going to be hard to break it to her. You just crushed her dreams, Noah. This is all she's ever wanted. Nothing stops you guys from still continuing to go there and have a good time. I mean, that's what you've been doing, and that's worked for everybody. Yeah.

Yes, we will still be going to that area regardless of whether we own something or not. And maybe one day you find a spot you like. And like you said, maybe something comes up in the future. Yeah. And only do this with cash if you ever choose to do it. That's right. And I would not partner with anyone to do it. I would just let you guys be the sole owners and mom can stay when she likes. That's what I would do. Katie's up next in Billings, Montana. What's going on, Katie? Hey, are you with us?

Oh, can you hear me? Yes, sure can. We're tied on time. Get right to the question. That's okay. Okay, wonderful. Yes, so I am...

31 years old. I am not currently in debt, thank the Lord. I have just recently invested in a Roth IRA. I have term life insurance. I max out my HSA, do all the things. And then my husband and I have about $360,000 sitting in the bank. So that...

It's mostly we do have CDs at 4% and everything else isn't savings or checking. And I know nothing about investment opportunities. It just seems like the stock market is kind of in a volatile state. And I'm nervous about what to do to grow. Does that make sense?

It does. And I want to answer your question with some depth here. So would you be willing to hang on the line and we'll get back to you right after this break? Yes, absolutely. I love it. This is a good problem to have, Jade. She's got a whole lot of money and just needs to put it in a specific direction that's going to grow for her. And I want to dig into this stock market volatility. I think a lot of people are feeling that right now. We're going to talk about it. Stick around. We'll be right there.

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All right, we're going back to Katie in Billings, Montana. She's 31. She's got a Roth IRA. She has term life insurance. She has a health savings account and she has $360,000 in the bank. She's investing in some CDs and she wants to know what is the deal with this investing stuff? How do I get into it? Is that an accurate summary, Katie? I believe so. Yes. OK, so you said you had money in CDs. Yes. How much are we talking?

$232,000. Is that on top of the $360,000 you have in the bank? No, sir. No, that's including. Those are CDs within our bank. Okay. Where's the other $130,000? We have $116,000 in savings, $9,000 in checking, and then about $1,200 in HSA.

Wow. The $9,000 in checking, is that like your month-to-month budgeting money or that's just extra money? No, my goodness. I just need to move that over to savings. Got you. We're very good. My family is very good at living frugally, but where we need to grow is we just don't know what to do next. Are you enjoying your life now?

Yes, absolutely. Okay. You're not just saving every penny and living like a miser. You guys are enjoying it. Are you debt-free? We're debt-free, yes. Good. House and everything, or do you have a mortgage? House and everything, no mortgage. Amazing. At 31 years old? Wow, great. Yeah, it's wonderful. What's the income situation?

I am a public school teacher, and so I make about $55,000 a year. And then my husband is a farmer, rancher. And so that income changes year to year. So we do have some liquid assets on top of that. And my husband is very much a...

Let's invest in cows and things that we can tax and see. That's what he understands. He's like, stock market? Why would I do that? And I'm kind of – I'm afraid of it too because I'm completely comfortable working for the man and knowing –

What I'm going to get as far as month-to-month paycheck in the stock market is scary. It took me forever to get a Roth IRA just because I thought it was a scary opportunity. Tell us what's scary about it. We want to know more about that because you're not the only one probably that feels that way.

Yeah, you don't know for sure what the return is going to be on your investment, right? And I guess you don't know that either with cattle or sheep or whatever you have, but it's a little more concrete than you can see it. The world of the stock market, I don't understand. Does your husband want to understand? Is he also wanting to go, hey, we should probably do this? He follows it, and he's...

I feel like he's way more educated. I know that he's way more educated than I am. And he's brought up the idea of a financial advisor and maybe hiring one of those. And I thought, gosh, do we need to spend the money on hiring a financial advisor if we're not in debt? I don't know. I don't know much about that.

Katie, when you think about investing, the scary part that you were saying you don't know what your return on investment is, when you think of that, do you think of it as something that you invest in and then, you know, a couple years later you get your money out? Or do you look at it as something that's kind of just kind of like you've done with these CDs or these savings where you just put the money in and you let it stay there for a long, long, long time until you need it?

Yeah, I mean, I would be completely comfortable with putting it in there and letting it stay for a long time. I just don't know where to put it. Well, the good news is that's what we're going to tell you. Yay! Okay. Even with a Roth, I just let my job say where that money was going to go. Do you have a Roth 403B? No.

I don't know yet. Okay. I'm guessing if you work for, you know, if you said you're a school teacher, you likely have access to a retirement account through your employer and it's likely a four or three. I do. Yep. Okay. So you guys are in baby step seven, which means the whole 15% in baby step four, that's out the window. Now you can increase your investing as much as you want. And I would encourage you guys to max out all of your tax advantaged retirement accounts first. Okay.

So things like a Roth IRA, you both can open one of those and max it out. That's $7,000 each. That's $14,000 right there invested. And then you can max out your Roth 403B. That's another great option to max out.

And even beyond retirement, you guys could invest in a brokerage account, in a taxable brokerage account, which just means it's not inside of a retirement account. It doesn't have the tax advantages, but you're just investing in the open market, and it's just kind of liquid. You could cash it out at any time without penalties. Okay. So those are a few options. Now, what is your opinion on – oh, I'm sorry. There's a little bit of a lag. What is your opinion on a –

On hiring a financial advisor to help guide us through that. I think it's a great idea. I think your husband thinks, or you may have thought, well, financial advisors are people who are in deep debt who need to help getting out. That's more of a financial coach. A financial advisor is helping people build wealth. That is their A1 goal. And if you want help finding one, you can jump on to RamseySolutions.com and click on SmartVestorPro.com.

And they can walk you through the entire process of here's what you should be investing in here. You know, they can address your kind of risk tolerance that you're talking about. Hey, I'm worried about the market. They can walk you through. And the truth is that the trajectory of the stock market is very comforting to me. It's up and to the right. But if you zoom in on any given day, if, you know, the president burps and the stock market takes a dip, it is scary to look at. Right. Right.

Right. But then you see over a six month, one year, five year period of time, you can see that it's going to come back stronger than ever. Yeah.

Every few years, we're going to see more record highs. And so if you want more on that, I'm going to send you a copy of two books that I think will help you understand all of this. One is Dave's book, Baby Steps Millionaires, that will really give you— I heard that in a commercial. Okay. Perfect. Okay, I'll send that one to you, and I'll also send you my book, Breaking Free from Broke. I have a whole chapter called Wealth is Patience and another chapter on investment traps.

You and your husband read those chapters, and it's going to give you a great primer on exactly what you need to know and nothing else. No jargon, no complicated financial information. Just here's the clear path. Here's when to invest. Here's what to invest in. Here's how to do it right. Here's how to become multimillionaires and build wealth.

And the key principle for you and your husband is that you don't want to put all of your eggs in one basket. So I love that he's a very talented farmer and rancher. That's a great skill to have. He knows it well. He's going to continue to do well there. But it's also wise to have money elsewhere that's growing for you.

Yes. Okay. Okay. That's really helpful. Thank you so much. Absolutely. And then one thing to think about risk, this is interesting, Jade. There is just as much risk in letting your money sit under the mattress at home as there is having it in the stock market, if not more, having it under a mattress. And not to mention, I mean, you're just missing out. You're losing money in many ways because there's an opportunity cost there that people –

fail to consider. Yeah. You know, what she said is so true. You know, I do think a lot of people get weirded out by the stock market because they are looking at it short term, whether it's day to day or week by week. And I just always encourage people to think about the long term, right? We always talk about you should be averaging 10 to 12 percent. And that really is an annualized response

rate of return. Instead of just looking at the year, it's looking at a picture of many years over time. They go, where are they getting 10%? I'm not seeing that in my account. I'm like, listen, it's an average over time. Over time. And that's why I asked her. I said, you know, are you looking at this as a, you know, I keep it in for a month and then I pull it out and see what happens. If it goes down, I get spooked and rip it out. Right. It's like, no, you set it in

forget it. And you're going to look up in 20 or 30 years, depending how old you are, 15 years. And you're going to say, wow, yeah, that annualized rate of return thing really did pull through for me. And that's how this works. It's not, it's not a slot machine, right? It's not a gamble or a bet that you just put the money in and you're just hoping you hit

And that's why we don't recommend single stocks. That's right. We only recommend mutual funds when it comes to investing in the market. And that just means a giant group of stocks. So 90 to 200 or more stocks sitting in this one basket. And even then we diversify across those. We want some that are focused on aggressive growth, some that are more stable. That's growth and income. That's right. And then you get the middle ground, which is growth. And so if you just do that and international as well, because we saw this recently this year.

The U.S. market took a huge dip and international climbed way up. That's right. That's right. And so that's been Dave's whole thing is, hey, I know it's been underperforming the U.S. stock market, but we do this to hedge our bets against something happening with the U.S. stock market. So a lot of nerdery to say if you just invest over a long period of time, you're going to be okay. That's right. And our millionaire study proved that out. Eight out of ten said, hey, the key vehicle to me becoming a millionaire was just investing in my company retirement plan. Yeah. So...

Emily, as a teacher, is spot on. That's right. That was the number three career of all millionaires out of 10,000. And it's because teachers go, yeah, I'll follow a proven plan. I follow my syllabus, the curriculums. I can follow Dave Ramsey stuff too. So great question, Emily. Hang on the line. We'll send you those two books. For the rest of you, check out our investing guide. Go to ramsaysolutions.com slash guide. Completely free. They give you all the tools and info you need.

From the Ramsey Network, this is The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create amazing relationships. I'm George Campbell, joined by Jade Warshaw, and we're taking your calls at 888-825-5225. Beth is going to kick us off this hour in South Bend, Indiana. What's going on, Beth? Hey, thank you for taking my call. Sure. How can we help? Hey, my question for you, my family's kind of living through a crisis right now. Oh, no. Oh, boy.

Well, trying to hold it together. So last summer, my son was supposed to get married. And the week before he was supposed to get married, he found out his fiancee was cheating on him with a married man twice her age with grown kids. Oh, yikes. And my son is a huge fan of Dave Ramsey, and he is fantastic with his money.

Well, so she lived with him beforehand, which we weren't, you know, in favor of. She moved out for about a week and then came back in and has continued to live in his home. They're still in a relationship? They're still in a relationship. Wow. They've gotten very involved in our church. Wow.

They're going to individual counseling, but my husband and I, we don't feel on board with this. I spoke to her a couple weeks after this happened, and I told her it was a co-worker at her work. I told her she needed to get a different job, which she did. I told her she needed to move out of his home, which, like I said, she did for one week.

Anyway, what I'm concerned about, my husband and I and the rest of my family, we're just so hurt by this. And like I said, we don't agree with it. I started some counseling of my own today. Good. But in the next couple of years, we're going to be inheriting from property and things that are worth some money that have been in our families for generations. And my concern is now, how do I protect myself?

family assets when I don't agree with what my husband, my son's possible choices, his life choice with his partner. And I know this is a wave down the line that things can change, but it seems to be moving in that direction. How old is he? How old are you? I'm 54. He's 27. So can I just, you said a lot. I just want to make sure I get the gist of it. The son's, your son's girlfriend at the time

cheated yes fiance fiance but okay fiance and she cheated they have since sounds like worked through it or are working through it he still wants to marry her or did they pull back the engagement um they're not engaged anymore but they're they're back in a relationship and cohabitating living together okay so no longer engaged but you don't you you think he should have just cut her loose and that should have been that on that

I mean, I wish he would have ultimately, but because I just, I don't know how we rebuild trust after this has happened. And now you've got this land coming. How much is this land and this property worth?

Well, I mean, one of the properties is over a million dollars. Okay. That's just one. And when you say trust, are you saying his ability to make wise decisions, his judgment? Because this has nothing to do with money. Right. He is good with his money, but I'm just worried. I don't trust the relationship anymore.

And I'm just worried about losing, you know, eventually, like if it, I'm worried about the estate moving forward after I'm gone. And this property. Does he misbehave with money? No. Okay. I'm just trying to parse out, is this like a punishment to him to say, well, because I don't like this relationship, I'm not going to put you in the estate. Is that kind of part of it? Because it doesn't sound like they're connected closely. Yeah.

Yeah. I just, you know, I just worry because I just, I don't trust this relationship. And I, like I said, I just, I worry about it not making it and then my, and what to do with, I don't know. I just, I guess he didn't. I mean, I think you're jumping forward quite a bit. You haven't inherited the land yet. You said it's coming. So that hasn't even happened yet. Until you and your husband pass? No, it...

It will be within the next couple of years. But I'm saying the inheritance is not to your son. It's to you. No. Yes. Correct. And then you would have it and whoever else is involved. Who else is involved with the inheritance? I have a daughter. So your daughter is getting part of this inheritance? Yes.

She will eventually. After you pass. And I know I'm jumping. But it's after you pass. So you haven't received it yet. We have decades before this decision is finalized. But you can do what you want with the estate now. And once you get it, let's say you set up and say, hey, if I pass, it goes all to my daughter. And you can change that later on down the road and say, you know what? The relationship has changed. I feel differently. So this is not a one and done.

Yeah. And that's what I was kind of thinking, like whatever I do now, I mean, eventually I just, I, I can't help but kind of think ahead and I know I shouldn't, I just need to take baby steps through this. Well, let me also ask you this. So I asked you the question, has your son misbehaved with money? You said no. So is your concern that

Tell me where your beef is. Is it if I pass away and my son gets this money, now this hussy is going to get her hands on it as well? Like, is this what you're thinking to yourself? It's not really your son. It's her. I mean, yeah, that's I would say that's pretty accurate. Yeah. OK, that and fair enough. Like, I'm a mom. So let me tell you, if this happened with my son. Have you shared any of this with your son, your concerns?

Oh, yes. Yep. What does he say? Is he defensive? Yes, he gets defensive. Okay. So is he sort of choosing this woman over the relationship with you at this point where he's like, hey, I'm with her. You can do what you want? Yeah, it's starting to head that way. Okay. Well, what happens to... I don't know. I sympathize with you. I think George and I both do. What happens if they...

Yeah, and I would maybe feel differently then. I know time will tell.

But I just, I probably am just thinking too far down the line and there's a chance that they may not end up together, but it just seems like the direction it's going. And it's just, I guess it just kind of blows my mind. Listen, I'm with you. I don't know that this is your cutoff from the estate decision.

He didn't make the mistake necessarily. She did. And I suppose it's his choice if he'd like to forgive her for that. But they're not even married yet. And you don't even have this money yet. And you haven't passed away yet. I just feel like we're very, very ahead of ourselves. Call back in three years when you get the inheritance and we can talk about it. Yes. By then she might be long gone.

I just don't want you tortured about a thing that is not going to happen for a long time. It's living rent-free in your head, Beth, and you just deserve to be free of that in the present, right now. And we'll see what happens in the future, but it's out of your control, and that's a hard thing, becoming a parent, realizing I don't control a 27-year-old grown man's decisions. And then you're in control of what happens with this inheritance. It's up to you. If you don't want to give it to him, that's also your prerogative. This is The Ramsey Show. ♪

Hey guys, I love summer, but do you ever notice how fast money can get out of hand this time of year? You know how it is. You want to make all these great memories. It's so easy to just put your brain in beach mode and swipe that credit card. But then you end the summer saying, where the heck did all this debt come from?

Look, I want you to have some fun. I just want you to plan for it with a budget. The EveryDollar Budget app is the easiest way to make a plan for your money. And I'm telling you right now, when you do that, you'll see that a budget doesn't confine your money. It defines it. It puts you in control of where your money's going. So you can enjoy your summer without overspending or going into credit card debt. So go download EveryDollar for free in the App Store or Google Play right now.

Buying or selling your home is a big deal. And between clickbait headlines and confusing data, it's tough to know what's actually going on in the housing market. So we're here to make the latest trends easy to understand. Median home prices went up slightly last month to about $440,000. And we just hit 1 million homes for sale, which is the most we've seen since 2019. So a lot of supply out there. But even then, in some areas, it's still not enough to meet buyer demand.

The average 15-year fixed rate rose to 5.95% last month, still under 6%. And if you're financially ready, a small rate increase shouldn't hold you back from buying a home you love. Don't go chasing rates if you're ready to jump into this. So learn more about the housing market trends. Get free tools to help you buy or sell with confidence at ramsaysolutions.com slash market, or click the link in the show notes if you're on YouTube or podcast. Kelly's up next in St. Louis. What's going on, Kelly?

Hi, thank you for taking my call. Sure. I have a family issue.

I need advice on what's fair and right. My father built a house in the 60s with acreage that each of his three daughters could build on it, and two of them did. I did not. They're very emotionally invested in the homes because they've been there for many years. My parents have passed, and we've got this inheritance now.

And we're trying to decide what to do because now I'm ready to sell my third. They want to stay there. So they have to buy you out. Well, they're wanting a family member to buy me out. And that's okay with me. I'm willing to take less money for a family member to stay there. But then they're also wanting to subdivide and only have the family buy an acre and whatever.

How much is legally yours? One-third. And how many acres is that? There's about nine acres, and there was 14 initially, and then two of the sisters built, and different things happened where there's nine remaining. Okay, so you have three of those nine?

No, I have a third of all nine and there was actually 14. So what they built on was deeded off already. Okay. So is yours deeded off? Like how does this work if you went to sell it today? Is it already, is there a separate parcel there for you?

No, that's the crazy thing. It was just divided by three, and it worked for a while. But at this point that we're looking at selling it, we can't agree on how to do that. And I don't want to have permanent damage done to the family. You know, my family is more important to me than making the money, but I also want to be treated fairly.

And we're willing to sell it to another family member, but it just gets so complicated. I think we need to agree on exactly where this land is physically. Have the actual boundary lines drawn up of what is yours, and that's what you're able to sell. And I don't know that it's up to them of who gets to buy it. That's a nice to have, isn't it? So should we put it up for sale? You're saying you want to sell it, right?

Yeah, but they're talking about keeping portions of it. Why? But they would have to buy that from you. And if they can't afford to buy you out, then they can't afford to buy you out. And it's yours to do with what you want. Okay. I don't think they have any legal – you know what I mean? I don't think they have any legal grounds to say, no, you can't sell this. Mm-hmm.

And so you probably need to get a real estate attorney. You know, we're just two knuckleheads on a radio show. But I would get in touch with a real estate attorney, not because you're trying to be cruel, but because you actually want to be kind and do this the right way and have it be less messy. Okay. That is really what I was thinking you would probably say. It's really the only solution. But I could work with them. It's just...

What does that mean to work with them? Well, like, let them...

split part of it off to go with a house and sell the house and then split part of it off and sell that portion to them. So get everything resurveyed, basically. Exactly. Exactly. That's what that's what George was saying, because I was going to ask what's on the land. And if you don't know who's entitled to what one piece of one piece of land could have property on it, one or, you know, could have a house on it, one piece of property could have something else on it. What's on the land?

It has two barns and it has one house and it's all divided by three. Okay. Even the house. Right. Wow. Okay. And the house is going to be available for someone to move into it. So it needs to be sold. And so we're just saying we all three see what should be done differently. So of the three of you, you're the only one who wants to sell. Yeah.

Well, there's one that wants to keep, and there's one that wants to sell, which is me, and then there's one that is wanting parts of it. Okay. Wow. Yeah. I know. I would start with the surveyor. Maybe two.

I would at least map out this property and figure out how we can split it into equal value parts. And then we can decide from there. But right now there's so much gray area, so many feelings involved. Let's get some facts on paper of exactly what part of the land is yours. Then we can decide what to do with that portion of the land. If we're going to split it up further, if we're going to sell it as a whole, who is it going to go to? All of that will come later.

Okay. But I think we need to come to an agreement here, and there might not be full agreement, and you might just have to do what you feel is best for you. I think that's where we're at. And that could damage the relationship. So just know there's feelings involved. This is what happens with inheritance that's split a bunch of ways, and you might not be on the favorable side in their eyes. And that's what I was calling in for is to see if there's a way to avoid the –

emotional aspect of it. Well, they've already brought that into it. I think it's too late to avoid emotions. They're already feeling like, I can't believe she would ditch this. This was given to our family. They already feel a certain way about it. You know what I mean? Yeah, I don't think you can avoid that.

Okay, well...

They might lash out a little bit. Oh, Kelly, I'm so sorry. But you got your homework. I would be contacting a real estate attorney and a licensed land surveyor to take the next steps to figure all of this out. This is all part of it when you inherit physical land. Man.

That's a tough one. I don't know what I would do in that. I mean, I would want to do the kind thing, but I also would probably, if I wanted to get rid of the land, I'm going to go tough cookies. Yeah, that's true. The buyer is the next owner, whether it's the next door neighbor or sibling or a stranger. You and I talked about this. Land is a tough thing because it's got to be something that you feel good about keeping and managing. And it's almost like it can feel like a great inheritance depending on the personality type or to another person, it could feel like such a burden that they have to

figure out all the time or be a part of that they don't really want to be a part of. Yeah. I don't know. It feels very American. I don't know. It's because we have a lot of land, you know, but like Europe, there's not a lot to go around. But in America, it feels so precious. You know, they're not making more of it. That's what they always say. That's land. So I get it. But also to act like you're a terrible person for wanting to sell some dirt. Yeah. I think is also outrageous.

Yeah, on the one hand, I get it, though. You know, if I... Let's pretend I left my wedding ring to my daughter, which I will, and she left it to her daughter and her daughter, and by the time we look up, it's five generations, and then some knucklehead sells it. It's like, you know, how could you? So I can get it. I can dig it. I just feel like it feels wild for you to force sentiment to someone else. Like, just because I care about it, you should, too. And the same goes for land. Yeah, exactly.

You know what I mean? You're not wrong. It's just dirt. I know it's been in the family for generations and there's something special about that. And you breaking that, it means you're terrible. I just don't subscribe to that level. I'm with you, George. If I had land, I'd probably sell it too. Just live your life. You know, we're all going to go back into the land from whence we came. Dust to dust. So just don't hold it all loosely, guys. Thank you.

Hey guys, George here. Listen, if you're determined to get out of debt and build wealth, then don't leave out an important step, having the right insurance. Don't make the mistake of thinking you can get by with minimal coverage or worse, none at all. Because when Murphy comes knocking, and he will come knocking, you'll start backsliding further into debt if you don't have the money to pay for it. So take our insurance coverage checkup and get a personalized action plan that tells you exactly what you need,

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Our question of the day is brought to you by YRefi. YRefi works with borrowers who have defaulted private student loans, even when other lenders have said no. With a lower payment and a low fixed rate, you could have a clear path forward. So visit YRefi.com slash Ramsey to learn more. That's the letter Y, R-E-F-Y dot com slash Ramsey. May not be available in all states. Okay, today's question comes from Sam in Arkansas.

He says, when it comes to types of debt, are some worse than other types? For instance, are credit cards worse than a HELOC?

I have a high credit card debt, so I thought about taking out a HELOC to pay them off, but I wasn't sure if this would make me worse off than I already am. So let's talk about, there's a couple of different levels to this question. First off, debt is debt, right? Anytime you owe somebody money, you're a slave to the lender. So if

for the purposes of this, just think of it that way. Like I want to avoid debt. And if you're looking for a solution from your debt, in this case, you're looking for a solution from your credit card debt. Yeah. Moving it over. That's not a solution. You could possibly save a little bit on interest, but don't think of that as the solution. The solution is you got to pay it off because if you just move it to a HELOC,

you've just moved it. It's not gone. You've just rolled it into an asset and you still have to pay it. So while putting your home at risk, right. And moving to likely a variable interest rate on these HELOCs. Exactly. Oh yeah. That's very true, George. It's a terrible solution for a lot of

Yeah. But and it doesn't attack the behavior that got us there. And we know personal finance is 80 percent behavior, 20 percent head knowledge. So you could mathematically go, well, this is a better debt to get into. And you're going to be a rat in the maze. Yeah. And we do find that a lot of times when folks consolidate debt, whether it's into a HELOC or another type of personal loan,

it's kind of like, oh, great. They feel like they've solved it. And then they keep piling up debt because they went from paying, I don't know, seven different bills to one bill. And somehow that made them feel like they had less debt. And so now that frees me up to just go into more debt, right? So it's not...

You know, there's moments in time here on the show where you might hear us say something like, you know, a guy's upside down in a car payment. And we'd say, yeah, you know, get a loan for the difference. Or we'd convince them to do something that would get them out of...

higher amount of debt to get into a lower amount of debt, right? But in that case, that's only really the only time you'd hear a say to move something. And it's really just in the car payment situation to get you from a $50,000 car payment to a, you know. Yeah. And sometimes refinancing, you know, like a mortgage or student loans. But even then, we're not saying go take out other debt to pay off this debt. That's right. It's simply to get better terms, not extend the timeline. But just for fun,

Yes. He asks, are there some types of debt that are worse than others? Let's talk about that. Would you do a ranking for us, Jade, of what you think? This is just Jade's personal opinion. Jade's personal opinion. Okay, number one, if we have a spectrum here, I think the worst is payday loans. Would you agree? Yes, because in my head, you can go, well, highest interest rate, hardest to get rid of. And in my mind, I go most predatory. It's all of the above.

I feel. And payday loans, the effective interest rate can be like 300 or 400%. Yes. All of the above. Yeah. Terrible. And it keeps people in a terrible cycle of debt. Yeah. Even if it's just a few hundred bucks. It's not the amount with payday loans that makes them the worst. It's the predatory nature and the insane fine print terms that people don't understand. Which is also very similar to like a buy now, pay later. I find that to be predatory. It just preys on low pay.

income, middle income. I can't have what I want. Find me a way to get what I want. Buy now, pay later is so terrible. It's like on the habit side of what you're saying. Probably habit forming is the worst thing. I mean, it really does speak to the fact that you can buy now, pay later. A stake is ridiculous. You know, you can buy now, pay later, anything. It's bad. So I'd say that probably after that, again, predatory high interest rates. I'm going to go with credit cards. That'd be third on my list.

And very, too easy of access. I mean, these credit card companies will give anybody a giant line of credit to go, yeah, go max it out at 10 grand at 29% interest. See what we care. And a lot of these, Jade, they're secured debts and there's unsecured debts. And that's an important distinction. Unsecured debts, like credit cards, are not attached to an asset. That's right. Like a car loan is a secured debt because your car is attached to it. That's right. So if something went down, they could repo the car. There's something on the other end of it. But unsecured debt's going to have way higher interest rates.

And so those to me are some of the worst ones out there. Well, that leads me to my fourth on my list. I'm going to go with the car payment. I think, A, it's an asset, but it's going down in value. So-

It stops being an asset the moment you buy it, basically, because the value starts to deplete. And then, I mean, George, I've said it. You've said it. Dave said it. The car payment is what keeps you average. It's what keeps you broke. It's what keeps you from- For the middle class, the car payment, I think, is one of the worst types of debt because it's been so normalized. Yeah. And most people have one their entire working career, their entire life. So you just swap one for another for another. And at today's cost, it's $500 to $700 a month.

a month that you're never going to invest. And so it's just keeping you from building wealth. After that, I'd probably go to, it's a toss up between maybe the 401k loan or the student loan. But I think I'm going to go student loan next, specifically Parent PLUS loans.

Yeah, those are brutal. They're brutal. Because there's a relational element there that we take those calls. And it's not about the money as much as it is a broken relationship and a lack of communication and the parents on the hook at a crazy high interest rate. Now, they can't retire. Yes. They want Junior to pay the bill, but Junior never agreed to pay the bill. It's just a nightmare. Yeah.

Yeah, it's tough. We get those calls all the time. And then there's the 401k loan, which you go, I've worked so hard to put this money aside. And now it's my money, but I don't get to just have it. I have to borrow it at an interest rate. Unplug the growth, pay interest back to myself. Yes. And penalties. And penalties. It's just probably one of the most painful types of debt that you could take out. So I'd say that...

Up higher on the list, I'd probably go with medical debt. Usually that's the harmless option.

I'm just trying to live. I was trying to take care of my child. Yeah, people aren't choosing to go into medical debt. Now, they sometimes didn't prepare. They didn't have the right insurance, all that. And it's easier to settle than other types of debt. Yes. It's not ill-intentioned, right? It's like, I wasn't trying to live this lifestyle or do this thing. Like, life just happens. And we haven't even mentioned HELOCs, home equity loans, all of that. Goodness gracious, Jade. The list goes on and on.

where would you throw those that's definitely a middle class trap as far as worst uh

I wouldn't trade places with people with a HELOC. I would not. It's not a fun life. They're way over leveraged and they think, well, I got my home as a piggy bank. Why not take a bunch of cash out to- Well, they're stealing from themselves. Fund a renovation or a pool or to pay off other debt, like our friend here is asking, Sam. And it also puts your home at risk. You miss that HELOC payment, guess what? They can take your house. Well, it's just, when you really think about it, I'm like, okay, I buy a house, I'm going

I gain equity in it over time. That's my money. And if I were to sell my house, I'd get my money. But if I borrow it, now I have to borrow. Again, I'm borrowing my own money because now I have to get my money, but I have to pay interest on it. It just makes me be like, well, why don't I just wait until I'm ready to sell this house and then I can just have my money? Right.

There's even a newer one, Jay, that's very frightening. I've seen this pitched online. People have sent this to me. What happens is these companies will say, hey, here's a loan for $100,000. You don't need to pay us back until your home sells. And how much do you owe us? Well, it'll be a percentage of the home sale.

Oh, man. And so you could be giving away 30, 40% of your home sale to this company for the pleasure of this loan. That feels like it should be illegal. Yep. And even there's another company that will give you a credit card tied to your home equity. I've seen that. I've seen that. Oh, man.

They're just making it easier and easier. And their marketing is so good. They spend millions and millions of dollars a year to market these products to people on social media. And they know their target demo and people fall for it thinking it was going to be easy money. They don't read the fine print. And so if it looks like debt and it smells like debt, it's debt. Just run away. Just run away. Gosh. Yeah.

Yeah. No matter how you slice it, if it's stealing your income, if it's causing you to make a payment every month, it's not good. I feel like ranking dead is like ranking gas station bathrooms. It's like, this is not a fun thing to do. Although I'll give a shout out to Bucky's. Their bathroom is, I mean, you could eat off the floors at Bucky's, I think. No, don't try it. I wouldn't, but I'm just saying, I feel like they're taking care of business over there. You know what I, where I think always surprisingly has bad bathrooms is

Like the bookstore, like Barnes & Noble. Oh, yeah. You go in there and you're like, what's happened here? There's a theory here. This is not for the Ramsey show, but let me tell you, there's a theory that when you enter Barnes & Noble's, it causes you...

to have a bowel movement. There's science behind it. I don't know. Is it because you went in with coffee? You're like, I'm going to get a coffee. I'm going to have a book. Is the smell of books? I don't know. Just listen. Don't bring your book in there with you because somebody is going to have to buy that later. We need answers and we also need to rank gas station bathrooms. I'll work on that for my next YouTube video. Dave will love that one. ... ... ...

Buying and selling a home is a big deal, and you want an expert in your corner fighting for you to get the right deal at the right price. That's why we only recommend Ramsey Trusted Real Estate Agents. They're hand-picked pros who know their stuff, listen to your needs, and have your

back from the first call all the way to closing day. To find a Ramsey trusted agent near you, visit ramseysolutions.com slash agent, ramseysolutions.com slash agent.

Welcome back to The Ramsey Show. I'm George Camel here with Jade Warshaw. The phone number to call is 888-825-5225. Let's see if I can find our scripture and quote of the day. Here it is, Philippians 1.9. And this is my prayer, that your love may overflow more and more with knowledge and full insight.

Isaac Asimov said, those people who think they know everything are a great annoyance to those of us who do. LOL. I'm not smart enough to feel that way. But once I know everything, I'll let you know, Jay. Yes, please tell me when you hit that moment. I feel like the older I get, the less I know. Oh. You know, there's just so much to know. When you're a little kid, you think, and teenager. Yes. Think you know it all. Yeah, that's true. I know how to Google it. That's about it. I'm resourceful in that way.

All right, Allie is in Raleigh up next. What's going on, Allie? Hi, guys. So I recently found out that my boyfriend of a decade is in $80,000 of secret credit card debt. I knew he had $40,000 in student loans that he was slowly paying off.

And he recently asked me to co-sign on a $100,000 HELOC on his home that he owns. My name is not on it, but I do live there. I've only lived there about the last two years. Oh, my gosh. So then he can pay off that credit card debt because he has maxed out every card and is pretty much at the end of his rope. How did you find out about this? He hit the end of the rope. Oh, man. What is his addiction?

Cars. He runs his own classic car restoration shop, and I thought he was making more money than he was. Apparently he wasn't. He was leveraging most of it on credit cards. He is excellent at what he does, but he is not good at the business side of things. He sees a car he wants, he gets it. He cycles through like three or four sports cars a year. Hmm.

Interesting. Yeah, he sees a build, he buys it, he builds it, he gets bored with it, he sells it, repeat, repeat, repeat. So you definitely told him you're not co-signing the $100,000 HELOC, right? Because if he takes one of those pushcars and wraps around his telephone pole, I'm stuck with his debt for the rest of my life. Yeah, that's one way to put it. For context, I did not live with him for...

For the majority of our relationship, I was on baby step six. I got in a nearly fatal car accident and my health insurance sued me personally to take back the half a million they spent on me. Mm hmm.

I lost my car, my house, my job, my life savings. The only thing I was left with was my kids' college savings because they legally could not touch that. And I moved in with him. He took care of me after the accident. It took me like two years to learn to walk, get out of a wheelchair, come out of a walker, and get a job again. We lived on my life savings. That's where they all went.

And then the health insurance took everything else. So I did consider the HELOC for a second because I felt like I owed him, but I cannot, I'm, I'm debt free. Yeah. Yes. No, I, let me, let me affirm that in you. You don't, if someone takes care of you, it's out of the goodness of their heart and it's an act of generosity. And I am a firm believer that if somebody does something out of an act of generosity, they're not looking to be paid back. And again,

Even if they were, this is not apples to apples, okay? I'm sure that if something happened to him... We don't enable financial misbehavior because of that. That being said...

I'm trying to say this delicately. I don't know if there is a way to put it delicately. You don't have to be delicate. What's it matter to you? You're not married. You've kept your financial life separated. He does this. You do this. You know, he has his house. So what's it to you? I live in his house. I've lived in his house for the last two years because I'm

The health insurance company sued me and took mine. Right. I was 40 grand, you know, 47 and a half away from paying off my own house. Gotcha. Are you working full time now? I live there.

I am working full-time, but my earning capacity is greatly reduced because I had spinal injuries. I have a TBI, and I cannot work at the same capacity that I used to. So what do you make? I make about $35,000 a year dropping from the $70,000 I used to make. Okay. Right. But again, he has $80,000 in debt. Are you worried that he's going to lose his house? No, he hasn't. And if he loses his house...

You lose your house? He has 80 just in credit card debt, 40 in student loans. Got you. Are you sure this is all of the debt? Yes. We sat down and I made him show me. We pulled everything. We pulled a credit report. I said, I have to see everything because I'm currently paying all of our bills. Why are you paying the bills? Because he has nothing to pay them with. That was the end of the rope. Okay. So here, okay. Again, because again, I asked the question, how can I put this?

There's no real lines around this relationship.

So it's very hard for me to say, here's how you get involved financially in someone with that you're not married to. And a has really lied for the course of a decade. And the hard part is you're feeling like this person took care of me. There's two, there's two really emotional lines here that are hard for you. They took care of you when you needed it. And you're kind of, if this goes South, you've kind of feel like you're up a Creek without a paddle because this is where you're living. I'm,

I'm completely up a creek without a paddle because I don't have any family members that I can rely on. I don't have any friends anymore. A lot of them, unfortunately, turned out to be fair weather friends, and that came out during my accident. I'm sorry.

But and I do not. I'm sorry, but not make the minimum to get a house where I can. Yes, but you can't. I'm like, if this is a dysfunctional relationship, you can't allow yourself to stay in a dysfunctional relationship for the financial benefit. And now that there's not one. Right. I would rather you. There's definitely not one. You feel like you're against a corner and I can see that and I can hear that. But I want to encourage you to look and say you might there might be other windows that

that allow you to get out of this. If you made more money, would you leave this relationship today? Knowing what I did about hiding 80 grand in debt? Yes. Yes. Okay. So if that's the case...

then why don't we go rent somewhere, find a roommate or two if we have to, and get to some stable ground where you're not attached to this anchor that's going to continually drag you down because you're paying his bills and you're broke. Yeah, you can't afford that. So you're not really gaining as much as you think. I'd rather you go pay $1,000 in rent and have two or three roommates. The mortgage is $1,100. I've currently been doing that, looking around, looking at...

trying to find somewhere that's affordable. Most places, you know, I have an excellent credit score. I have an 18 credit score, but that's not the issue. So you could go rent anywhere right now. The problem is the three times the monthly rent and the average rent in my area is $2,500 a month. Okay, but George is also saying, is there a way that we can get a roommate situation? Yeah, I've been looking.

Okay. Keep the hunt up for... It's a lot of hunting. There's Facebook groups. There's all kinds of resources. You know, there's a bunch of great gals out there who would love a great roommate like Allie who can pay her fair share and more. And I think that's your situation to get out of this, not staying in it because of desperation. He's made it clear. I mean, it's been a decade of this. He hasn't committed to you. There's been no ring, no engagement, just secret. Lies. Yeah.

I don't know that this ship's going to turn around magically the next year. It sounds like he has chosen his obsession over you. Yeah. Yeah. Tell us a little bit more about your work situation again. So I was an emergency room nurse. I worked like 70 hours a week. But what you're doing now, I mean. And I now work doing...

maintenance surveying for my county. Okay. And your health is what's keeping you from doing more hours? I work full-time 40 hours a week. It's the physical aspect of it. So then let's hook you up with some other prospects. We're going to make sure you have a proximity principal. We're going to have you find the work you're wired to do because I think there's probably other jobs out there that are less physical that you can make more money doing for 40 hours a week.

And so maybe getting you a fit. Are there more administrative roles in a medical setting that you could do? I looked at it, but because of the TBI, sometimes I have issues with...

short-term memory. I have to write everything down. I have vertigo attacks. So sometimes anything that's a lot of like... But you're working 40 hours a week now, which means there are things that you can do for 40 hours a week. Yeah. So I just want to do something that maybe is not as taxing on you physically, but still gets you the hours and still gets you the money. We'll hook you up with the things that you need. Hang on the line, Allie. ♪

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