Quit Letting Broke People Give You Financial Advice!
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Hey guys, Dave Ramsey here. Me and Dr. John Deloney are coming to a city near you on the Money and Relationships Tour. It's happening soon, so don't wait. Get your tickets at ramseysolutions.com slash tour. Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love,

and create actual amazing relationships. Jade Walsh, y'all. Number one best-selling author. Ramsey Personality is my co-host today. As we take your questions about your life and your money, we're going to talk about you right in front of you, honey. That's how we do it. And, hey, the phone number is free, and some say the advice is worth exactly what you pay for it. It's 888-825-5225. Jump in, and we will talk. Laurie is in Salt Lake City today.

Hey, Laurie, welcome to the Ramsey Show. Thank you, Dave. Hey, what's up? Well, my dad is going to leave my brother next to nothing when he dies and he's not telling him. How do you know? What did he tell you? He told me that he set up a trust with a fiduciary.

And that he was going to leave different amounts to us three children in different ways. And then he told me he had set up some other things in the trust to protect it. Okay. So you said that the brothers left out, but you just said he's going to leave something to the three of you. Is it a different amount of money or? Yeah. Tell us more. Yes. He's going to, told me he's going to leave him $10,000. And what did the other kids get?

I'm not sure because he hadn't said, but my sister, he didn't tell me how much. He just told me that he was going to give her a large lump sum because she's the most fiscally prepared for the future, most fiscally responsible, makes the most, handles her money the best. Okay. What about you? Me? Yeah. So he set up monthly payments basically for 25 years. Oh, how much?

$3,500 per month. Okay. How old are you? I'm 58. 58? Yeah. Okay. This sounds like your dad is pretty controlling. It's a little bit gamesmanship manipulative, the way he's handling all this. Does that sound right? Yeah.

No, I would not describe him that way at all. Then why isn't he just telling your brother? I think it's because he has experienced a serious lack of respect, and things have happened in the past that have hurt and already...

struggling relationship um but struggled a lot pretty much from the very beginning and he just doesn't want to do it he's a year older okay all right well i wow

But it's not like a... Okay, number one, no one is entitled to an inheritance. It's your dad's money. He can do with it what he wants to do with it, okay? Right. Even if someone else thinks it's weird, it's his money, and he can do with it what he wants to. He's trying to not stir up a problem with your brother, it sounds like, where there's already problems, and this would just throw gas on the fire is what you're telling me. Right. Okay. Yes. Yes.

So, and he didn't tell you, I think he puts you in an awkward position by you not having the information and not telling the brother, but I don't think he thought about that. No, he knows because I brought it up. I told him that he was putting me in a really awkward position. But you're not asked to administer it. You have a fiduciary, there's a trustee.

So you're not, there's no way you get blamed because you're not in the line of fire. You're not having to administer this to your brother. The trustee will. Does your other sister know that these are the plans as well?

Yes. So maybe the converse, because here's where I'm getting at. I agree with what Dave said, but it's almost like he's not dealing with the problem now, but the problem will be yours when dad passes away because your brother, I don't know what kind of guy your brother is, but I would not want to, if I were you, I would not want to be in this situation where someone could feel resentment towards me for something that someone else didn't deal with. And now you're in the situation to have to say, well, I don't know why he did this.

And that weight can be on you. That's the part of this that I don't like if I were sitting in your shoes. I brought that up to him and he said he was concerned for my safety. So he set up in the trust. As soon as he dies, I can either stay in the house for three months or I can move immediately and his trust will pay to get me out because he was concerned about the repercussions. I'm sorry, whose house are you in?

I live with my father. I had to move in with him five years ago to help him because he needs a living caretaker. I work full time, but I moved across the country to help him five years ago. And I've tried. I did have a place on my own, but I was traveling 30 minutes one way to help him on a daily basis. Would the narrative not be that your brother says, hey, because you were living with dad, you talked him into this?

Yes, that's going to be the narrative. But what about this? What threw me on what you said is the safety. He said if he's afraid for your safety, what kind of guy is your brother?

that he would say that? He, he's never been violent to me or to my dad or to my family members, but he's had violent interactions with other people on the other side of his family. And I have actually had to ask my brother to leave my dad's house at one point because he was verbally abusing him. When I first came,

came down here to help or came up here to help my dad. How old is your dad? You said he's 80? He's 83. Okay. All right. Your dad is not handling this well. He owes you in return for your care of him. Even though it's not going to be pretty, he owes that it lands on him and he needs to tell your brother while he's alive. And if I'm you, I'm going to demand that.

Because this is going to land on you because of proximity. It's going to look like you talked him into doing all this.

Yes. And so your dad is being a coward, and he's letting this land on you. And I know he doesn't want to face it, and he could just send him a letter. He doesn't have to say, here's what I'm doing. I'm giving sister number one lump sum because she's responsible. I'm giving sister number two that takes care of me monthly because she's not as responsible. And since you and I don't have a quality relationship, I'm only leaving you this. And he needs to just send him a note that says that.

And I love you, but you and I, as you know, have struggled for many years, and I don't, and I am not going to bless that with my estate. So you need to know that in the front end. And this is my decision. Your sisters have had no input on this. I decided this with my lawyer, and this is what's happening. And let him take the brunt of it.

so that the narrative is not reset in a vacuum because that's what's going to happen. That piece of you living with him and taking care of him changes the conversation.

Before, I was a little bit like, eh, whatever. But now with you living there, it's going to look like you spent five years manipulating the old man into getting money and cutting a brother out after you had to throw him out for being verbally abusive. It's going to land on you. There's no question about it. And your dad needs to take care of that. That's unfair to you. If I was the old man involved, I'd be stepping up. This is The Ramsey Show.

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Do it with help from BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash Ramsey Radio to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash Ramsey Radio. Jade Walsh, our Ramsey personality is my co-host today. Thank you for joining us. Michael is in Toronto. Hey, Michael, welcome to the Ramsey Show. Hey, thank you. What's up?

So, I'm currently 18, and by the time I graduate, I'm probably looking at a $100,000 to $120,000 loan that I'm sitting at. And my current car is under my mom's name with her interest rates on it, and her credit got ruined by my dad leaving. And I'm looking to switch the car with a way less percentage of interest.

but I have to max out my credit cards for the down payment to put on it. And I don't know what to do, if it's even worth it or not. What's your car? What do you owe on the car? I'm sitting, so I bought the car at $30,000. I'm looking at $41,000 right now. And you're a college student? First year, yes. With a $40,000 freaking car. What are you doing with a $40,000 car? You're a college student.

I had a $70,000 car and another $60,000. I sold it. I made profit. But my mom's credit card ruined, and they gave me a 12% interest on it. And I didn't realize until yesterday when I checked, and I only had it for five months. I don't think this is your mom's fault. You bought a $40,000 car, and you're in college. You get a $4,000 car. Do you make any money? What's your income?

So I'm sitting at $1,000 to $1,500 from my work at retail. And I had side businesses before and I had like about $70,000. I blew it all. And now I make maybe $500 to $1,000 from my side businesses a month. Okay. Do you have any money saved? Nothing. I'm in debt with my credit cards. Okay. So the car, you owe $41,000 on it. If you sold it private sale, what's it worth?

Right now, with a trade-in, they're giving me $28,700. Oh, my gosh. That's a trade-in. $12,000 negative equity on it. Okay, but let's look at, that's your homework, is to look at the Kelley Blue Book value if you did private sale, because you're going to get more for it. I did. It's $30,500. $30,500. Okay. If I were in your shoes... I can't. There's a lien on the car that I can't pay. Yeah, I mean, you make $1,000 a month. Your car payment's more than that, isn't it?

My car payments comes exactly to $1,000. Oh, my gosh. So how are you paying it? Credit cards? Basically everything I got. No, no, I can't put on credit. It's debit. Basically everything I got. I mean, if you make $1,000 a month and you spend $1,000 a month on your car, you don't have money to put gas in it and you don't have money to eat.

So I use it out a lot. I don't know how. No, I make like $1,500. On a good month, I make $2,000. On small months in retail, I make $1,500. Okay, so you got $500 to spare. You eat a little bit. You pay your insurance. You get gas. You've got nothing left. Let me stop a second because I did a drop-off on something a minute ago I want to know more about.

You had $70,000 in savings, you said, from a side hustle that you blew. Did I hear you say that? Yes. Tell me about that side hustle. Where did all that wonderful money come from? It came from, I used to sell screen protectors and cases during COVID when I was 14 on Amazon. Yeah. So no COVID, no business. Gotcha. Okay. Yeah. All right. And I gave most of it to my mom after the separation. Mm-hmm.

She's sitting at least at $300,000 to $400,000 herself. Yeah. You're 18. You're 18. Your mother is not your responsibility. Your responsibility is to love her and cheer for her, but she's not your financial responsibility. So this has got to stop. And unless you can create a huge income, you need to get rid of this car and get a $2,000 car.

I tried doing that, but I have to. I would put the $10,000 on a credit card. I'd rather you have $10,000 on a credit card than $41,000 on a card. Amen. I can't. I can't put it on a credit card. Why? I have maybe $3,500 left on a credit that I can spend. Yeah, okay. Who do you owe the $41,000 to? To a bank. Go down and talk to the bank about signing a note for the difference.

Do that, right? And then what about on the new car? So that's the thing that doesn't make sense to me on the new car that I looked at that I'm going to get. I'm seeing monthly payments instead of 96-month loan. I didn't say anything about monthly payments. I said get a $2,000 car. Cash. Because we tried when we went to the bank. I didn't want you to go to the bank. I want you to come up with $2,000 and go buy a car. Buy a car? Yeah. Are you in school full-time?

Yeah. Are you on campus? You're at home or at home? Campus. Oh, like where do I live? At home. Okay. How close are you to campus? What I'm getting at is you might go through two months where you don't have a vehicle and you make it work. And instead of using that thousand dollars a month to pay for a car note, you use it to save up and get yourself a little beater car is what we're saying. I'm an hour away from campus. Okay. All right. Okay. Here's the thing.

We keep throwing suggestions out, and the only answer you've got is it doesn't work. So let me tell you what doesn't work. Your life, the way you have it set up right now, your situation sucks beyond belief. The decisions you have made are beyond suicidal financially. So you've got to throw a stick of dynamite in the middle of this freaking mess you've created, and it's going to be really uncomfortable. But you know what's going to be more uncomfortable? You sit there in this pile of...

and you're going to smell like this stuff as long as you sit there in it, coming up with excuses to sit there in it. So you have got to get rid of this mess. You've got to create a big, you may need to quit school.

You need to go get some dadgum money and start cleaning up this mess. So I want you working like 80, 90 hours a week, going to school on caffeine and doing what normal people do when they get in this instead of telling me, oh, my mom got screwed over by my dad when he left. I'm sorry, but that doesn't mean you buy a $70,000 car while you're in college and downgrade it to a $41,000 car and act like that's smart. Nowhere in this conversation is smart.

smart didn't come up today okay no it didn't it didn't even show up here so dude you've got to get rid of the car and you've got to figure this out some way or another now we're giving you lots of suggestions okay take get a buddy to take that's in the neighborhood to take you to college quit college for a year and take you a gap year and go clean this mess up while you work like a freaking maniac

But you are, man, you cannot, there's nothing in this that the math works. Sixth graders could tell you this math doesn't work. This is a mess.

And so, no, you can't keep this car. And no, you can't keep this life the way it is designed right now. That's why you called. And you can't get another car. And I'm not going to argue with you about it anymore. I'm through talking to you about it. So you go fix this. We gave you some suggestions. But part of fixing it is you've got to decide that where I live, the land I live in right now is the land of stupid and I want to leave.

That's the first decision you've got to make. And we haven't even been able to get that far with you. So that's where you've got to go, man. That's where you've got to go. Open phones here at 888-825-5225. Now, Jade, let's just review the policies on this show. Review it. We love you. All of you.

If you've done something stupid, we love you anyway. We've done something stupid. I have a PhD in DUMB. Jade and Sam cleaned up $465,000 worth of stupid in their life. So no one's sitting here high and mighty talking down to someone. So we love you. We love you so much. We're going to tell you the truth. We're going to start gentle.

And we're going to start by trying to help you move along. But if you want to argue with us while we're trying to help you, it's going to get nasty fast because we love you. I'm going to smack you upside your stupid head until you listen to the stuff that will make your life better.

Now, we'll start with a gentle handshake and say, honey, this is the best way to do it. Well, Dave, I listen to you all the time, but I'm not selling the car. Well, you're an idiot. You got to sell the car. That's how it's going to sound around here, honey. Okay, so we're going to serve you when you call here. You're not entertainment value for us. You're a calling for us. You're a crusade for us. We want you to win, and we're going to do everything in our power, starting at first gently,

and turning up the heat by degrees during the time we're on the phone together until we have contact. This is The Ramsey Show. You know, one of the first things I discovered working in the financial world is how absolutely devastating it is when the breadwinner of a family dies and there's too little life insurance or none at all. Grieving families are suddenly left behind scrambling to pay bills and trying to make ends meet.

I also discovered that there are a lot of ripoffs in the life insurance world like that whole life crap posing as an investment opportunity. What you need is level term life insurance, usually 10 to 12 times your income, which is the smartest, most affordable way to protect yourself.

Thank you.

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It's hard. Part of the problem is you have a jerk for a boss. When you own your own business, your boss will work you into the dirt. They will work you like a rented mule. It's hard, y'all. And it's why most businesses don't make it. It's hard.

And it's really hard when you don't have a clear path and you don't know how to go to the next stage. You don't know what to do. Man, I remember I've been doing this for almost 40 years. This thing called Ramsey. It started on a card table in my living room. And the number of stupid things I have done will fill three buildings. We have survived my stupid. I can bail my stupid. It's everywhere.

And I've done enough smart to offset it, and y'all know me for everything that was smart. But I'm telling you, man, I can just tell you, I could write two books on my stupid. Instead, what I did was we wrote a new book called Build a Business You Love instead of one that beats you to death. And the new book, Build a Business You Love, is our entree leadership system that identifies the clear path to growing and getting a business that you love instead of one that beats the snot out of you.

because it'll just beat you to death. And it's wonderful. We love it. Those of us that are entrepreneurs, we like the fight. We're ready to double up our fist and hit something. We get it, but it's tough. And nobody tells you this stuff, man. Well, I can tell you, because I've been there, done that, and we've coached over 10,000 small businesses. There are five distinct stages of business development.

And there are six things that drive the business towards growth and to propel you through those five stages. We're in the final stage of the five stages at Ramsey, the legacy stage where you work on succession and the next generation and so on.

The beginner stage is the treadmill stage where you just run, run, run, run, run, run, run, run, run, run, run, run, run, run, run, run, run, and get nowhere. You just run your dadgum little legs off. And how do you get off that treadmill? Well, there's some specific things you need to do. We're going to show you. This is the baby steps for small business system. It's a clear path and knowing exactly where to go, not based on some research project, but based on 30 years of doing it and on coaching small businesses with this exact system.

10,000 of them.

Build a business you love. It comes out April 15th. It's on presale right now. I'm really excited about this project. It's really good. And, yeah, I mean, it's really good. And you preorder the book for $29.99. We're going to give you $350 worth of stuff if you buy it now to bribe you to get you to buy the book early because it helps our marketing. So shut up. Instant access to the Entree Leadership Hiring Playbook. Yep, that's in there. That's a big video that you're going to get to watch right now. Hiring and Firing, number one pain point.

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ramsaysolutions.com slash store. Click the link in the description if you're a tuber or a podcaster, then we'll try to help you out. Andrew's in Louisville, Kentucky. Hi, Andrew. What's up in your world? Not much. How are you doing? Better than I deserve. How can we help?

I guess so. Um, when I was 18, I'm 20 now, when I was 18, I went to get my first credit card from the bank and they made it aware to me credit cards out in my dad's name. He made me a cosigner and they were destroying my credit. I think my credit card was like 500. Um, so I made that clear to them.

or aware to them. My parents, uh, they apologized. They took them off. And then I've been real busy. I got married, had a baby and just kind of haven't been too worried about my credit. I decided to look at my credit, uh, today and realized that the one card they said they took me off and they did it. It was an Amex Delta card. Um, and, uh, it,

It's maxed out at $1,000. It's maxed out at like $1,300. So they're over their limit on it, and it's been destroying my credit. So I wanted to see if you thought it was wrong of me to market as fraud or what route you would take in this to get it all off my credit history. Well, it is fraud. Let's be clear about that. Yeah, it is. You did not sign it? No. If someone else signs your name, that's called identity theft.

It's criminal fraud. If the criminal happens to be your parents, that's also an issue. But it's criminal fraud. So it is fraud. Jade's right. So mechanically, American Express is probably one of the worst companies on the planet regarding this stuff. They are nasty. So those of you that have an Amex card at work, they will try to hold you liable if your company goes broke.

and you're only a user and you signed nothing obligating you to that debt your company runs up 11 million dollars on an amex card and you are you're an employee user of an amex a company amex card you're gonna get screwed like you've never been screwed in your life this company is horrendous they are nasty can you tell i like them now um the first thing i would do is uh i

I would go ahead and challenge this entry and say this is identity theft. Remove this from my bureau. Now, what happens is the credit card companies download to the credit bureaus in mass, massive computer files once a quarter. They do a dump. Okay? And so the credit card or the –

Number one, if you dispute this based on fraud, they will contact Amex and ask Amex if it is fraud. Amex will not respond because they just don't bother. Okay? Right. And then it will be taken off of your credit bureau report. And then two quarters from now, it will be dumped on there again in the next dump, and you get to do it again and again. Okay?

And again, until you cut this dandelion off at the roots, which is your parents. So you need to get back on the phone with them and say, dad, this is now harming our relationship.

Because I have a baby over here that needs a future, and you all not taking care of this when you fraudulently used my name has to stop, and I'm giving you 48 hours, or I'm filing a police report if you don't get my name off this freaking credit card. Now, you can be nicer than that if you want, but that's the essence of the conversation.

Right. Okay. Because your dad and mom are not only disorganized and sloppy, they're horrible human beings for doing this to their own kid. Right, right. So as far as telling them to get my name off of it and then marking it as fraud, with them taking my name off of it, it's still going to affect my history though, right? Yeah. No, no, it'll all go off. If they remove the entire account and any mention of it because it's not in your name.

Okay. Okay. All right. So, this market was fraud and tell them to get my name off of it? No. This is not my card. I'm challenging this entry on my bureau. Do it with all three bureaus. Okay? Okay.

with Equifax, TransUnion, TRW, all three of them, all right? You've got to go to them individually, and you file. And I recommend sending them a certified letter, return receipt requested, or a FedEx. And in your letter, state, this is fraud, and write this down, the Federal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. Okay.

federal law, I am demanding that you remove this or prove it to be true within 30 days. They will remove it, but it will be put back on, dumped with the next computer dump from Amex, if your mom and dad don't get your name off of it. Right. So you've got to do both. Okay. So one more time, what is the name...

One of those three agencies you said I have to go to? Just pull it up online. It's the three credit bureaus. Equifax, TransUnion. Equifax, TRW. Okay, I got that. Yeah, okay. They just go to them? Okay. Yeah, go to each one of them because they're separate entities, and you pull up all of them. You can pull it up on something like Credit Karma, but you get sucked into a whole bunch of marketing junk you don't want to screw with. So I just go straight to the horse's mouth.

Okay. Sounds good. Yeah. All righty, Dave. Hey, man, get after it. And listen, follow through on this. You've got to put a bow on it because it's going to keep growing and it's going to get harder and harder and harder to get rid of the longer this goes on. So mom and dad need to take this off by Friday. Friday. And any of you that do this to your children, shame on you. You do not have that right to be a criminal with your own children. This is the Ramsey Show.

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There are a few things in my life that I've run into that, other than things from the Bible, that I am 1,000% sure work. Teaching the seven baby steps that we teach here, the first one is save $1,000. The second one is get out of debt, everything but the house, using a debt snowball and gazelle intensity technique.

As if you're running from a cheetah, the gazelle runs for its life. That's the intensity you use to get out of debt. You sell so much stuff, the kids think they're next. You don't see the inside of a restaurant unless you're working there and you're not going on vacation because you're a broke person in debt and you are ears laid back, running headlong straight into this, getting rid of it, baby, and we're going to leave it all on the field. That's baby step number two.

And then you go on to building an emergency fund, retirement plan, kids, college, pay off the house and become very wealthy. Those are the seven baby steps. And in essence, and you can find those everywhere. And the total money makeover book is where we outline them. We've sold 12 million copies of that. 10 million people have been through financial peace university where we teach those baby steps and how to implement them. So tens of millions, literally of people. And there's tens of millions of you listening at this moment to this podcast on YouTube and on talk radio, uh,

So we know that easily 100 million people have done some stage or some process of the baby steps and with varying degrees of success because of varying degrees of commitment and sacrifice like you do with anything. So it's a proven thing. It's not a theory that comes out of a test tube.

Debt snowball is probably what we've become best known for. Now, this is where you list all of your debts except your home, smallest to largest. You pay minimum payments on everything but the little one. You attack the little one with a vengeance. You squeeze every dollar, every drop out of your budget, and you throw it at the little one. You work extra. You sell stuff. You clean out a savings account all the way down to $1,000. You stockpile.

Stop putting money in your 401K. You get term insurance and cash in your stupid whole life policy. You sell a car if it's too expensive. You do whatever you got to do, and you throw every dime at that smallest debt until it's gone. When that one's gone, you take the payment you used to pay there, and every dime you can squeeze out of everything else, and you put it on number two. And when number two's gone, the payment from number one and number two are freed up. The snowball rolls over again. It picks up more snow, and it attacks the third one. And you're doing this with just increasing levels of hope

increasing levels of sacrifice, increasing levels of passion. And every time the snowball rolls over and you get rid of another payment, that's that much more money freed up in your monthly budget to attack the next one down. And it's been unbelievably successful. But Dave, I gotta be, I'm the person because I know what they say in the comments. I see what people are asking. And the biggest two questions are this, Dave, I've got my debt listed.

What if I have a debt that the interest rate is just killing me? Why would I put the lower one first? Why would I list them small to largest if it means me, you know, having to pay this high interest loan for much longer? What about the math, Dave? It's brain chemistry. A dopamine is released when you complete a task.

There's a dopamine release. And it's called a feedback loop in psychology. And so when you have success at something, you're more likely to repeat the task. That's right. And the faster you have success and the more often you have success, the more you've got a feedback loop and the more the dopamine release is there. And in a spiritual realm, we would call this hope. You start to believe it's going to work because it's working.

And then you lean in that much more and you lean in that much more and you lean in that much more. And that's why this works, because no one set up, sat down at their kitchen table and said, hey, let's go deeply in debt because that's a good idea. A series of behaviors put you into debt and you don't fix a behavior problem with a math solution. You fix a behavior problem with a behavior solution.

And the feedback loop, this positive feedback, I knocked out one. Yeah. I knocked out another one. Yeah. I knocked out another one. Whoa. And then you're down. You're beating on that student loan. You're beating on that big one. You're beating on that car. And you're, yeah. And now you're starting to yell at your neighbors. Think there's problems over there, you know, because you're getting fired up because it's working. And that's the dopamine release. That's hope that you're starting to believe that.

And when I first started, I paid off the little one. I wasn't so sure. And the next one, well, maybe this will work. And then the next one, yeah, it's going to work. And the third was like, ah, and, and then your broke friends start making fun of you and you want to punch them, you know? And so this is, this is, this is why it works.

And that's why the debt avalanche does not work. That's right. Or consolidation, you know, when people... Exactly, because you don't change your habits. That's right. The debt avalanche is where you list your... It's mathematically correct. Honey, if we were doing math, we wouldn't have credit card debt. It's not a math problem.

It's a stupid problem. That's what we have to fix the stupid, not the math. And so the math is, you know, we're going to list it highest interest rate to smallest interest rate because this interest rate is killing me. And here's the problem. While that sounds like it's mathematically correct, it's not because your math that you're using is very naive and you left variables out of the math formula. Here's a variable you left out of your math formula. Probability of completion.

If your probability of completion is 80% or 90% with a snowball, but the math is running against you,

Net of probability of completion, it's going to beat the avalanche because the probability of completion is close to zero. Almost no one finishes that because there's no feedback loop, no dopamine release, no hope release, no sacrifice increase, no getting the spouse on board because this crap's starting to work. For the first time in my life, I'm telling money what to do instead of it telling me what to do. I am not relinquishing this control ever again. You start getting a little swagger, man. You're ready to go.

That's true. And that's why this thing works and why so many millions of people have gotten out of debt using the Ramsey system, which is just freaking common sense. But, you know, you people that think your debt avalanche is mathematically superior, no, your math is naive and your formula is incomplete because you don't know what the flip you're doing. So Northwestern University did a study of the debt snowball versus the avalanche. And they concluded because of probability of completion,

that the snowball was far superior because if you quit and you don't get out of debt using the mathematically superior, which is not really mathematically superior, it doesn't work. That's right. So you don't get completion. You don't get to the goal. So and then Time Magazine comes out and does a story on the Northwestern study and they go, turns out Dave Ramsey was right. Like we didn't already know that. We've got like millions of proof texts here.

We've got so much social proof on this that's unbelievable. We beat your research project into submission.

So good God, people, this is not that hard. Get your butt out of debt. Your number one wealth building tool is your income. And when you're giving it to stupid Bank of America, Lexus Motor Credit, and MasterCard, who's your master of your life, and you wonder why you work so hard and I make $100,000 a year and I got nothing, it's because you're giving it all to these stupid banks.

And you've got to get back control of your life. You work too hard to be broke, people. You need to retain control of your life. This is so empowering. It is. So, Dave, get a little bit more tactical because we know, okay, we're listening to small to large. Okay, Dave, I will do the debt snowball method, but where do cars fit into that? You're telling people all the time to sell their car. That's not my smallest debt. Do I do it first? Do I wait until I get to that on the debt snowball? When do I sell my car? The rule is if you can pay the car off,

and all the other debt within two years, not counting your house, and you like the car, keep it in the debt snowball and pay it off. But if the car is keeping you from making it out in two years, if it's one of the reasons, okay? But if you've got a $5,000 car and a $200,000 student loan, the car is not your problem. That's right. That's right. But you've got a $70,000 car and a $6,000 student loan. You've got issues. And you can't make it out in two years. Well, it's the car, stupid. Yeah.

Yeah. You know, so get rid of the dumb car. So can you get rid of the thing and do you like it? Well, I hate it. Well, get rid of it anyway then. You get rid of it even if you weren't broke because you don't like the stupid thing. But I love the car and I can pay it off and all of my other debts with the money I have in savings and the money I can earn and using the debt snowball during a two-year period of time, then keep the car. I'm fine with that. Yeah. And the only exception would be the IRS. That's the only thing that jumps to the top of the list. Fair? Child support. Child support.

Anything like that goes to the front of the list because they're going to come get it anyway. That's right. And child support, you take care of babies before you do any of this. Shut up. But the IRS is going to get their pound of flesh, so you need to put them at the front and get rid of them as soon as possible. They have collection abilities nobody else has. This is The Ramsey Show.

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Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create actual amazing relationships. Jade Walshaw, number one best-selling author, Ramsey personality is my co-host today. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Mark is in Orlando. Hey, Mark, welcome to The Ramsey Show.

Hi, Dave. Hi, Jade. Thank you for taking my call. Sure. What's up? So my wife and I have done a wonderful job at saving and investing. You know, depending upon the age that we retire at, I don't think it's unrealistic that we could end up with a nest egg of between $8 and $12 million. Well done, sir. Touchdown. Thank you. Thank you. So my question is...

We're a Christian family. We have four younger, wonderful daughters between the ages of 7 and 13 right now. And I want to know what you feel is appropriate to leave behind as an inheritance, because we're conscious of what the Bible says about money, and we don't want to

spoil our children or teach them to rely on money as opposed to relying on God for their needs, you know, going forward after we pass. Do you not think it's possible to teach them that and with having built that character that they're then able to own this wealth like you are able to own this wealth?

Well, I'm not saying that at all. I just, you know, I never had a nest egg like that passed to me. No, I know. And so, you know. But do you think the only way to learn it is to start out broke? No, I don't think so. And the Bible does not say it's bad to leave an inheritance. As a matter of fact, it says the opposite. A godly man lives in inheritance to his children's children is a Bible verse.

Totally agree with you. I just didn't know if there was maybe a line that maybe, you know, you might cross over like that's too much or something like that. That was my concern. It's not an amount. It's a principle. And so here's the principle. You are not obligated, biblically or otherwise, to leave the money to your children. Okay? But to assume that it's going to damage them,

is not true. Okay? So what wealth does do is it magnifies the character of the person, including you, including me, and including your kids and my kids and Jade's kids. Okay? It magnifies the character of the person. So the problems in my character are magnified when I've got wealth because it gives me power.

Does that make sense? The good parts of my character are also magnified. So someone that has a problem with their temper when they become wealthy becomes a rageaholic, and don't you know who I am?

comes out of their mouth and stupid stuff like that. Right. But someone who's generous when they become wealthy, we call them a philanthropist because they didn't check. They change entire communities with their generosity. So whatever it is, good or bad is magnified. Uh, and so the first thing that we taught the Ramsey kids is you're not entitled to anything just because you hit the gene pool lottery, right? Yep. You're not entitled to anything. Number one, number two, uh,

And in order to qualify to manage the Ramsey wealth, the next generation, you have to have a spiritual understanding of the wealth. And that is that you don't own it. God owns it. You're just managing it. And once you grasp that, you realize wealth is...

You see the reason is that the Bible has warnings about wealth, because it's heavy to carry. It's a lot of responsibility to leave one of your children that becomes an adult $10 or $15 million, probably by then, each. Okay? Yes. And so you leave one of them $10 million. That's a lot of responsibility if their job is to manage it for God, for his glory. Right.

Which includes taking care of your own household. Mark, let me ask a question on your behalf because when I hear your question, I have thoughts of my own because here's the thing. If you live to be 80 and your kids are older when they start receiving this wealth, in some ways that feels a little bit better. It's like, okay, they've

got to experience life. They're not dependent on this money at that point. But what if the worst were to happen and they got this, they got access to this money earlier, right? Maybe when they're in their early 20s. How, Dave, then would you disperse this amount to where it is helpful to them? It's not too heavy at one season. Or would you disperse it? What would you do? Well, ours was set up until they reached 25 to have some kind of different dispersion.

So like when they're minors, it was to be managed. And in order to qualify for a disbursement at 25 in the trust, they would have to have done this, this, and this. Be walking with God actively. In other words, we don't want to fund a cocaine habit on the back of a yacht for a reality star.

That's not what we want this money to go for. And so if you're going to do that, then you don't qualify anymore under the trust, right? But is there a limit that you'd give a 25-year-old as a disbursement? No, I didn't. At 25, we turned it all over to them. Oh, wow. I mean, no, we haven't turned it over because I'm alive. I'm saying you would have. And mine are now, the youngest is 33. But today, if I die, it's just dispersed. But if any one of them decides to live a life that disqualifies them as a manager,

of god's money then they don't they're not going to be able to get any it's take they're taken out of the trust immediately so um and and so because it's not really my money and it's not really their money we are managing it one of the beauties of managing it is you get to enjoy some of it but most of the most of the managing of it is a weight of generosity and a weight of other things so what i want you to avoid mark is this

There is a thread that runs through some of our Christian churches that says that money is bad. Money is not bad. It's not good or bad. It's amoral. It doesn't have morals. What it does is it exposes the morals and character of the people that it touches. Does that make sense? Absolutely. And so our job as parents is to raise children that become qualified stewards. Right.

Meaning they're working on. And then I leave it to them, and I don't think anything about it. Because I am well aware that the temple was built by Solomon atop Mount Moriah in Jerusalem. And in today's dollars, it would be somewhere around between $10 and $20 billion building. It was not built with Solomon's money. It was built with his dad's money. It was inherited money, David's money, Solomon's, David's son.

It was inherited money used to build the temple of God. And so, you know, we're sure that God uses families that have character generationally to manage his people.

So it's not unchristian to do this. What you don't want to do is leave it to someone who it does harm to because they've got a problem in their life and it expands the problem. Well, I think, too, we're used to seeing, it's almost like we're filtering it through. Oh, you see a lottery winner. They win a bunch of money. They have this huge amount of money that comes into their life or an athlete who has this huge amount of money come into their life. And before you know it, they've... And I've sat with those guys in NFL many, many times. And what I'm dealing with is a 21-year-old

who has one skill. In all of his life skill buckets, he has one bucket. He plays football. He doesn't know how to do anything else. And that is exposed when he gets a $10 million signing bonus. And he loses it almost instantaneously. 3.8 years is the average NFL career, and most people leave the NFL broke. The exception would be mainly the offensive line, because generally those are the smartest guys on the team. This is the Ramsey Show.

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Hey guys, our two-night virtual event, Investing Essentials, is almost here. There's a lot of confusion out there about building wealth. So George Campbell and I are breaking it down and teaching you how to invest with confidence. You'll learn how to maximize your 401k and mutual funds. Plus, I'll be sharing my personal playbook for real estate. But hurry, time's running out. Investing Essentials is March 4th.

And fifth, tickets start at $199. Grab yours today at ramseysolutions.com slash events. If you're not a math nerd, if you're a normal person, when you start thinking about investing, investing, sounds intimidating, doesn't it? Hard to figure out. I think I'm going to do this wrong. I'm scared.

Well, you know, the same thing's true when you haven't ever driven a car and you're 12 years old, but they teach you to drive a car a little bit at a time. And as your knowledge increases, your competency increases, and we let you leave the parking lot of the church where you were practicing.

Right? And that's where we taught our kids to drive a car, in the parking lot of the Baptist Church. Right? And even change gears on a straight shift so that they can actually function in this world. You need to be able to drive. Investing. It's the same thing. So George Campbell and I are going to do a two-night event, two hours plus each night. Not the same double. It's

Two full nights of investing essentials. It's a virtual event. It's next week, March 4th and 5th. Tickets start at $199. The first night we're going to cover some basics on investing and then go deep on miscellaneous investing like, for instance, mutual funds and that kind of thing. We're going to lay some principles in place, teach you so that you feel confident and competent when the word comes up, you yawn and go forward, right? Instead of freak out.

And the second night, I'm going to unpack my personal real estate playbook, stuff I've never taught but one other time, and that was at this same event this time last year. And I'm going to spend about two hours on real estate.

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Have at it. You can join us. So it's March 4th and 5th. You'll want to be through both nights because they tie together, but it is standalone, complete information, and it's the only place you're ever going to get it. So we'd love to have you. George Camel has really got some amazing stuff he's put together for this. I'm so excited. Get your tickets at ramsaysolutions.com slash events or click the link in the show notes on the podcast and the YouTube. Bye.

Raleigh's with us in Seattle, Washington. Hi, Raleigh. How are you? I'm doing well, Dave. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? Good, good. I am so, so excited to talk to you guys. I recently got married three months ago to my beautiful, beautiful wife, and we found out, what, four days ago now that we're expecting our first child. That is awesomeness. Way cool. Yeah.

We're super excited. And scared to death, too. That's great. Oh, yeah. It's both crazy emotions right now. Anyway, and my mother-in-law loves to listen to your show, and I've listened to your show for a couple years now. So that's how she's going to find out. We're going to listen to the show together, and it'll be awesome. We just did an on-air baby announcement to mother-in-law.

That's so cool. Yep. Thank you for that honor. Thank you for that honor. Yeah. Yeah. Thanks for letting me, um, my question involves, uh, health insurance. I want to get my wife health insurance as soon as I can. Um, and I just don't know anything about it. So I wanted to know what you think. Is it through your employer? Does your employer offer it? Does hers offer it? Or is this, you guys just out in the market on your own? Yep. We're kind of on our own looking for options. Okay. Okay. Well, um,

We have an endorsement on Health Trust Financial.

And they will help you find a person in your area that will sit down with you and go over the options that are available on the marketplace from Blue Cross Blue Shield to all kinds of other things. And they're going to help you shop around and, you know, customize and build a thing just for you. But in the process of that, Raleigh, it's just like anything else we teach here. You don't do what someone says to do. You learn from them and you make the decision.

So their job, as the health trust rep sits down with you, is to teach you and say, okay, here's three options. We think option number three is the best one, better than one and two, and here's why. And they teach you, and you understand that, and based on that, you pick it. You don't pick it because Dave Ramsey said or somebody Dave Ramsey sent says. You understand it, okay? I do, yes. Now, do you all have any money saved? Yes, we do, yep. How much?

We have an emergency fund, and we have about $6,000 in house savings. How much is in your emergency fund? $10,000. Okay. Is everyone in the home healthy? Yes, we are, yep. Is anyone overweight or smoke? Nope. Okay. You're probably going to want to look at an HSA, a health savings account program.

Okay. Okay. It's a very high deductible, but a much lower premium. Okay. Pay very little monthly, but when you do have an event, it's a lot more out of pocket. Okay. Okay. But if you're not using medical care, that's the reason I ask about health. If you're not using medical care very often, okay.

the HSA is the least expensive way to keep good coverage in place because you're not blowing through the deductible and you're getting the benefit of the lower premium. That's probably what you're going to find out when they sit down with you, okay? Now, I do not know she's pregnant. That's a, quote, pre-existing condition, and I do not know what you're going to be able to do on labor and delivery for sure.

If you can find coverage for normal labor and delivery, it might be expensive since it's after the fact. Okay? Right. Yeah. And now a lot of policies will cover a complication in the birth of a child, but not the actual normal labor and delivery cost.

Okay. And so if the child had, God forbid, something like a heart issue or something, and they did heart surgery or something like that, a policy might cover that, but it wouldn't cover the normal labor and delivery. So you need to learn about what it does cover and doesn't cover for the infant as you're looking at this stuff. Okay? Now, if it does not cover normal labor and delivery, here's a technique for you, and you're going to – this is going to be awesome. Okay.

When you go to the hospital to have a baby is the only time people want to go to a hospital.

It's good PR for hospitals to deliver babies. They like it because it's the only time. Now, every other time you're there, you're sick, right? And so it's a positive experience. So hospitals love labor and delivery. And so what you can do is schedule an appointment with the hospital administrator that your OB is planning to use. Go sit down with them and say, our OB is suggesting this hospital. We'd like to use it, but it's depending on this conversation.

Normal labor and delivery here is $15,000 or whatever your OB tells you. Okay? And we are willing to prepay in cash for the labor and delivery. This is if your insurance does not cover it. Okay? Gotcha. Okay. But we want a discount if we prepay in cash. Okay.

Okay, so A, they get cash, they don't have to collect from you. B, it's a positive experience and they want you there. C, you're going to go to a different hospital if they don't make a deal with you, okay? You don't reserve your walkway power. And you will probably get your labor and delivery 25% to 50% of face value, meaning they're going to discount it 75%.

Okay. If you do what I just told you to do. But because they don't, they never get this request because almost all labor and delivery is covered by policy and people do, they just get full vote from the insurance company. But if you go in there with cash and say, I don't have insurance coverage for this. Now, you may be able to get insurance coverage. If you do, just forget this whole conversation, okay? Yeah. But if you don't, that's how you handle this and you can get a serious bargain on labor and delivery. That's good.

There's hardly anything else you can do that on, but this is a positive experience. They want you there. They want you to come have a positive experience at their hospital so you remember them for later things. It's a PR move, basically. When I was shopping for insurance back in the day when I was pregnant, I was looking at, like Dave said, I was looking at high deductible plans so I could have the HSA, and I cared about with out-of-pocket maxes. Because when you are having a kid, you don't know all that may happen.

And so just knowing and having that piece of saying, okay, I know that no matter what, when the rubber meets the road, this is my out-of-pocket max, my stop loss. That also helped me have some peace about it. Make a choice. Most of your HSAs are going to be in the $10,000 to $20,000 range. That's right. Out-of-pocket max.

And so that's going to, again, that's your deductible plus. That's right. But yeah. And but your premiums could be as much as 50% off doing that. So anyway, go to Health Trust Financial. You can find them on our website and sit down with the guys and they'll help you out with this. This is The Ramsey Show.

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Jade Walsh, our Ramsey personality, is my co-host today. The Ramsey Show question of the day is brought to you by Y-Refi. When the payment on your defaulted private student loan is as much as some mortgages, it's hard to get ahead. That's when Y-Refi can help. Refinancing to a low fixed rate loan built just for you.

Find out more at YRefi.com. That's the letter Y, W-R-Y-R-E-F-Y.com slash Ramsey. Might not be in all states. Okay. Today's question comes from Ethan in South Carolina. He says, my wife and I are both 28 and just got married. I am an employee benefits consultant and she's a trauma nurse. Together we make about $200,000 before any commissions that I receive. We

We also are debt-free. We have about $150,000 in investments, $30,000 in a money market account, and are investing our 15% towards retirement. Very good. If I were your son...

How would you recommend buying a house? We have been waiting for interest rates and housing prices to drop, but I always hear there's never a perfect time to buy. Is now the time for us to jump in? Yeah, Ethan, I think you're feeling the way a lot of people are feeling that are in your shoes, right? They're saying, okay, these interest rates are high. Should I wait? Like, truthfully, I have the money or I could start to save up more money, but I don't know is now the right time. And I think it's a good time to jump in.

And I would say the right time to buy a house is when you can afford it. Like not based on the market, not based on interest rates. Otherwise, you're trying to like play a timing game. But if you can afford to save the down payment and you can afford to get a mortgage where the payment is no more than 25% of your take home pay all in.

then get the house. And later on, if mortgage rates go down, you can always refinance, right? Like there's, you have options. You don't have to stay in that high interest rate. So for you guys, I think this is great. You have a great income. It sounds like you've got your three to six months of expenses. You are investing, um,

Yeah, you're doing really, really well. At this point, I would start saving up because it sounds like the $30,000 you have in the money market is your emergency fund, and you should not use your emergency fund as a down payment. So I just want to make that clear. $150,000 in investments, unless that's returnment, you can use that. Yeah, that's a good point, Dave. It doesn't say, but if that $150,000 is in like stocks or just kind of like a brokerage sitting there, you could definitely use that, and I would. Yeah. Okay. Interest rates are going to do what they're going to do. We don't know.

House prices are not coming down. We do know that. There's a serious shortage of housing. There are more buyers than sellers, and there's no fix on the horizon for that. That's called a supply-demand pressure. It's seventh-grade economics. When there is a shortage of anything, the price holds steady or goes up. It does not go down, and interest rates don't cause it to go down. So interest rates have been up for about 18 months now,

House prices have not gone down. Okay, so simple the median house price is exactly what it was 12 months ago It's 400,000 nationally and it's not going anywhere. So that's what you're seeing So don't wait on house prices to come down. So marry the house and date the rate You can refinance your interest rates if they go down or pay them off and have a zero interest rate. That'd be cool. I

And if you want to get a pulse on what's going on in the market and you want to start learning more and leaning into that process and learning, you should visit our real estate home base because you can go on there. And I mean, it's just chock full of all the information that you're going to need to kind of see what's going on, learn about areas that you don't feel as confident in, and ultimately get set up with one of our Ramsey trusted real estate agents that can help you through the entire process. Yeah.

So that's what I would do if I were in your shoes or if you were my son, which is. Yeah. Perspective is the thing. So I'm old. So I've been walking around in the middle of the stock market thing for 40 plus years. I've been walking around this real estate thing for 40 plus years. And let me tell you, every year I've been on the air for over 30 years talking about this.

Every year someone says, oh, the stock market's artificially high. It has to come down. What goes up must come down. Hadn't done it. Went down a little bit here and there, but came back up more than it went down. And can you imagine if you had invested 32 years ago in a growth stock mutual fund, how much that would have gone up?

Oh, man. Oh, and let me help you with this. 1978, I sold my first house for $42,500 as a real estate broker. I was 18 years old. Can you imagine if you owned that house from 1978 that that guy paid $42,500 for? Man. You understand that's an $800,000 house now. But they have to come down. No, they don't.

Nope. They don't. And they never have. Yeah. There's no historic data that indicates that. So date the rate, marry the house, get a house bought when you have the money. And if rates come down and you can get a cheaper rate than 5%, which is so freaking high. I don't know how you people are surviving. I love when you talk about the 80s. It's whining about 5%. But anyway, yeah, it's,

because it's compared to three instead of compared to 12.

If it was 12 and it went down to 5, everybody would be celebrating. There would be Mardi Gras on the streets. But instead, it went from 3 to 6 and down to 5, and everybody's, oh, God, we're dying. Yeah, okay, so you better get a house because the next round of real estate prospering, these houses are going to shoot up again. So if you're ready to get a house, go get one. Guido's with us in Albany, New York. Hey, Guido, what's up? Pleasure to speak with you. My situation is...

Wife and I have no debt. I'm retired. I'm 65. She will be 69 next month. She still works in a scientific position. She makes 72K. She gets her full Social Security, which is about 18.5 banks. We don't have car payments. She bought a car April of last year.

I financed it briefly at one point. I paid it off last month. Okay. Cool. What's your question, Gregor? All right. I am constantly barraged by family members trying to find out what my retirement income is. Why? Why? Why is it they think they're business?

That's what I don't know. Is it your kids? No, we have no kids. We have no kids. Brothers, cousins. Are they vultures? I guess they are. Neighbors across the street, friends. It's nobody's business. You know, it's strange. I never have anybody ask my income.

Is there a way to put this to bed? I mean, I keep hearing, I have several cars, some from the 70s, 80s. I'm like you. I like old cars. I like to work on my cars. Some are pretty. Some are not. I hear, you ought to get rid of all those old cars. Go out and lease them.

Never going to happen. I don't need to impress anyone. The only person I need to impress, I see every time I shave. There you go. I worked in Europe for a while. I think that's just what you say. I mean, I just think you say, hey, I appreciate the advice and all, but what I'm doing seems to be working for me. And if that works for you, you can do that for you. And if they ask about your income, I just say, you know, that's personal business. I don't disclose that.

The only debt we have, okay, is the mortgage, which is about 93. We have 10 years to go on a 50 at 2.8%. For somebody that doesn't like to talk about your income, you give out your information a lot. Yeah.

Maybe you're talking about it with them too much. Guido is an alias. I'm suspected. Yes, yes. And by the way, I did not spend my formative years in this country, neither did my wife. That's okay.

I think the thing is this. I think you've got a wonderful story and a wonderful situation, and people wish they were you. They want to know how you did it. They want to know how you did it. And I would just say we don't disclose our personal details. I will tell you that we live on less than we make, and we're very frugal and very careful, and it has paid off for us over the years. And God has blessed us, and we've been able to get some nice things.

It's a blessing to not depend on Social Security. I don't disclose my personal income. I don't think to anyone. My wife knows and my tax guy knows. Our CFO here knows. And if anybody asked, I would just gently say, oh, you're kidding. I don't talk about that kind of stuff. Would you say it gently, Dave? I would. And then the third time, I'd say, none ya. None ya. None ya, dadgum business. This is The Ramsey Show.

People ask me all the time, George, what's your number one money-saving hack? I'm glad you asked. Nothing makes me happier than helping another frugal friend. So here's the hack. Get on a budget.

Seriously, how are you supposed to save money if you don't know how much you're spending in the first place? And that's what makes the EveryDollar budgeting app a game changer. With EveryDollar, you'll get a clear picture of your spending. And from there, it's easy to see where you can get more intentional, cut back, and save more money. So how much money are we talking here? Well, the average EveryDollar budgeter frees up $395 in their first budget. That's

That's the hack. And if you ask me, I think you're way above average and you'll save even more. So what are you doing still listening to me? Go download the EveryDollar app for free and start saving more money right now. Well, this is the last segment that is on podcast and YouTube. You can get the rest of this show on the Ramsey Network app.

And that gives you video, audio, and all kinds of searchable stuff so you do not have to listen through 15 hours to get the call you want. If you want to call on a certain subject, you can just put it in the Ramsey Network app. You can email us in the Ramsey Network app. It's all completely free. So download and use the Ramsey Network app and we'll get you all of this show every day. Madeline is with us in Indianapolis. Hi, Madeline. Welcome to the Ramsey Show.

Hi, thank you so much. I was actually just calling because I currently live with my boyfriend at his parents' house. We've lived here for about two years, and we are getting engaged this year, and we're running out. Obviously, we don't want to be engaged or even married living here. We've been doing the snowball effect for a little bit, but it's still in the process. How old are you?

I am 23. Okay. All right. Because your sweet little voice, you sound like you're 12. I wasn't sure. Okay. Well, thank you. Okay. So we don't have debt because we aren't married. Who has debt? You or him?

I have just debt from my car. It's about, for me to completely pay it off, it's about $27,000. He has debt from his vehicle and debt from credit card bills from starting his business. And are you both working? We are, yes. How much do you make? Yeah, what do you all make? I make $30,000. I work at a bank that I'm interviewing to move up, so hopefully making more soon. And he...

It fluctuates with him just because he owns a contracting business, but it's normally, I would say, a year like $60,000 to $70,000. So why are you guys living? Why aren't you married making $100,000 a year at 23 and pay these debts off? We haven't gotten married yet just because everybody around us have told us that we're kind of young, so to wait. Well, you're acting like you're married, so what are we waiting on? What's the difference in your mind? Yeah.

Because your actions aren't showing difference. Yeah, because your actions aren't showing difference. Everybody around you includes his parents who don't want you all to get married, huh? They've kind of told us to wait a little bit. Just his brother got married last year, so we were kind of trying to give him his moment and waiting. But he doesn't want to wait any longer, and neither do I. I would suggest you all get married this weekend and move out next weekend.

We actually have an opportunity to move into a cabin on his grandpa's land when we... It is $15,000 that we have calculated to renovate it. No, you're broke. You don't need to be renovating someone else's cabin. Why can't you just get an apartment like everybody else? You don't have any money, and you're broke. We actually have donkeys, so...

We are not able to move into an apartment because we have donkeys that we have in our backyard. Why? Where did those come from and what are you using them for? We actually breed them to sell the baby donkeys, but we had to get rid of a lot of them because we couldn't afford it. I can't believe I'm asking this question. How many donkeys do you have? We only have two right now. And what are they worth? We have a male and a female. And what are they worth?

The female is probably worth $1,000 and the male is probably close to $1,100. Perfect. Okay. So I'm going to tell you what I would tell my daughter if she was 23 and she called up and was in this situation. I can't imagine that happening, but let's say she did. Okay.

I would say sell two donkeys, get married, and move out within the next three weeks into an inexpensive apartment. You have $100,000 a year income. Clean up this mess of debt that you have and then start saving to buy a nice property and a piece of ground later and restart your donkey business later if that's your dream. I suspect your dream's going to change about the time children start coming. Yeah, 100%.

Yes, we don't revolve our major life decisions around donkeys in the backyard. That is a good principle of life, Dave. Yes.

Oh, boy. Oh, this is great. This is so fabulous. Madeline, you're a sweet girl. But I think you're listening to everybody else except the two of you. And I think you and your husband need to move out and get you an apartment and get married right now. And then you need to clean up your debt mess. And if the donkeys are keeping you from doing that, then we need to get rid of the donkeys.

um and that's not a metaphor that's an actual fact william is in harrisburg hey william what's up in pennsylvania hi everything's doing very well thank you i'm glad how can i help mr ramsey first thank you i hooked into you about 15 years ago and you've changed my life oh i didn't change it you did i'm proud of you well well because of your input well thank you sir um

I have about $100,000 that I need to put into my house because of water abatement and mold. Ooh. It's been going on a while. We've been in the house for 30 years, and I've just been putting it off and putting it off. Yeah, that's what I mean. It's been going on a while. Okay. So I have about $800,000 in retirement, a mixture of Roth IRAs and traditional IRAs. How old are you? My...

I am 67 years old. Okay. Retired. How many bids have you gotten on the work? Say again? How many bids have you gotten on this work? About three or four of them. Okay. So you got a good average. You know that 100,000 is an accurate number. It's not one guy sticking you. Correct. Oh, good. Good for you. Not your first ride on the cabbage truck. Okay. Good. Okay. Yep. So my answer is... Simple answer, dude. Take 100 of your 800 and fix your house. Mm-hmm.

Okay, not through a home equity loan. No, we're not borrowing money when we have $800,000 in the bank. Okay, and here's the reason I ask. I have a pension and Social Security that puts me at about $85,000. Yeah. So if I take $100,000 out of my retirement, I'm going to have to pay 30% tax on much of that. Yeah, yeah, that's right. Still pay the 30% tax. Absolutely, I'm not going in debt. Not when you're a millionaire.

And you're a millionaire. No, no. I appreciate it. Easy enough. That's easy, man. That's a good question. Well done. Good question, sir, and good answer. Open phones, 888-825-5225. Another way of asking yourself these questions like William's asking is always reverse engineer it, folks. That's true. And say, if I had $700,000 in my retirement account, would I go borrow $100,000?

to have 800 in. No, I wouldn't. Same thing. The thing that's throwing him is he doesn't want to pay the tax. Well, why do people feel? And if he has traditional, he has required minimum distributions coming up at 72 and a half anyway. That's right. That's right. Right around the corner. So he's going to have to begin to pull this money down anyway. I think people think when they roll money into their house, they won't feel it as debt. Like it's almost like in their mind, it doesn't count as debt. Take a HELOC and do this 100,000.

So, yeah, you're, Williams, he's a saver. He is. Another way of saying it is he's a cheapskate. He didn't fix a mold issue that got worse while he's sitting on 800 grand. Yeah, yeah. Dude, go fix your house. Type 1 syndrome. This is really what you've, you've been saving too harshly here, brother. Yeah, that's good. Very, very good. So, Jade? Do you want to talk about the donkeys? I'm still trying to get my emotions around that one.

I didn't completely lose it on the air. That's pretty good. Laughing. I was close. I thought you were going to have to phone a friend and see if George would say to sell the donkeys. Oh, George! I forgot. We should have brought in, channeled our inner George. I know. Where is he? So the horse people were after George. Now the donkey people will be after me. How do you get

For making fun of the donkeys and saying sell the donkey. Yeah. I don't even know how you get into how that becomes your dream in life. What set of parents lets the girlfriend move in with their son and bring the donkeys? That's over the top. It's over the top. Mom, I'm bringing a girl home and a couple of donkeys. Great.

Here's the room upstairs. I'm thinking my mom would have said, you're not my child. Oh, man. I wouldn't have survived. I'm bringing the donkeys. Yeah. If we could make up these calls that were this good, we'd make them up. But instead, we just take calls from normal people. This is The Ramsey Show.