Stop Ignoring Your Financial Fire Alarms
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Brought to you by the EveryDollar app. Start budgeting for free today. This is the Ramsey Show, where America hangs out to have a conversation about your money, your work, and your relationships. The phone number to jump in is 888-825-5225. 888-825-5225. We'd love to hear from you alongside...

The incomparable George Camel. I am Ken Coleman. We're excited to be with you. George is going to coach you up on how to handle the money. I'm going to coach you up on how to make more of the money. That's a good combo. Winning team. So, great jean jacket today. I feel like you're fresh and ready to go. When I get up on a day with the Ramby Show with Ken, I go, what am I going to wear? Because Ken is going to comment. I need to impress him. Well, you look sharp and you look like you've got a fresh face. Every two weeks, as you may know. This is what America needs to know.

I, on the other hand, found out that I've got a lot of lettuce, according to the young guys I play pickleball with. What does that even mean? It's a name for longer hair. Oh. So there you go. You taught me a new word today. There it is. We all learned something on this show. Let's help Kim out in West Palm Beach. Kim, how can we help today?

Yes. Hi. Thanks for having me on. My question is, I have been helping my mom out monthly with expenses, actually her and her husband, and they have not made changes in their life to try to be able to pay their own expenses anymore.

And I'm just getting to the point of complete frustration and whether I should continue to give her money or, you know, how to handle this without ruining our relationship. How much money you've been giving them?

Well, I'm in a unique position where my mom also works for me. I have a firm and she works part time and I just try to keep her busy. And, you know, and I do give her extra money and bonuses there. How much? Hold on, hold on. You sound like a politician on a Sunday morning show. So I'm going to go back to the question. How much money? I don't care how you're giving it. I don't even care where it's coming from.

I would just like to know, and I think George does too, how much money are you giving them and have you given them? Well, on a monthly basis, I would say it averages around $1,200 to $1,500 a month. And over a period of time, I've kind of lost track, but I would say probably somewhere over $10,000 extra over the last year or so. Okay, one other quick follow-up. If this...

employee was not your mom, would you be bonusing that employee to the level that you're bonusing that employee? No, I probably would have let that employee go already because I had to work. I had a suspicion. Yeah. Yeah. So my short answer is no. Uh, I mean, excuse me. Yes. You should stop giving them money. Sorry. You should stop giving them money.

And you asked about their behavior. Like, well, they're not changing. They have direct access to the bank of Kim. Why would they change? What onus do they have to change their life when they have it good? So part of this, pulling the plug, is to help them. They both get Social Security, and he lost his job in September but isn't very actively looking for a job. Well, guess who needs to get active? Again, why would he when he gets unemployment checks from Kim? So this is – how old are they? Are they able to work?

My mom is 78, so she's older with some health issues, and he is 68. Oh, dude's a spring chicken. He's living off a sugar mama, and that happens to be your mama. You need to remove the sugar, and then mama will push him out the door. He needs to get a job. 68. 68.

He needs to be working. And they're straight broke, it sounds like. This is the reason you're helping them is because you felt bad. It started off as a, hey, I'll help you out this month and then the next month and then nothing's changed. Is this been going on for a year now? How long?

This has been going on and off for several years, depending on their financial situation. They barely make ends meet. They get down to $10 in the bank. She's crying. What is their total income without you involved? Let's see. Without me completely not involved, I would say it was around $2,400 a month. And what are their expenses? Are they living on their own? Do they have debt?

They do live on their own. They rent a home. Their expenses are probably $500 to $800 more than what they make. Okay, so you're telling me $2,900 could solve this and they make $2,400. Right. So you're telling me a 68-year-old can't work and make $500 extra bucks a month?

Evidently not. Well, no. We're going to find out. You know that's not true. We're about to find out. Yeah. You're already borderline resenting your mom, if not full-blown. I am, and I don't want to get to that point. I know you don't. This money situation is getting bad and very frustrating. So the reason I'm bringing that up— I told them to please come up with a plan. They're not going to, and you know why? There's no reason for them to innovate.

So I don't know if you've ever studied innovation. You run a business. You probably have read some books on innovation. You probably talked about innovation and you yourself have probably had to innovate before. But what's so fun about innovation is, is the research shows that innovation is at its most effective when someone has very little resource. It's just amazing how creative we humans can be at problem solving when we don't have much resource and we just have to figure it out. Does that resonate with you, Kim? It does. Yeah. Well, guess what?

They don't have a plan and they're not going to come up with a plan because they're not squeezed into a corner. But you put them in a corner and it's going to be shocking how quickly Sparky will get to work. Yeah. And he needs to get to work. And so the reason I bring up the resentment piece is this. Your mother's 78. Hope she lives 10, 15, 20 years. Okay. But I have aging parents right now. They're in their mid-70s.

And I just think if I were you, I would be more worried about the limited time I have left with my mom being soured by this codependent situation that you've allowed yourself to get into. And you aren't a bad person, Kim. You are a phenomenal person and a phenomenal daughter. Make no mistake about it.

But I'm trying to encourage you to say, the person that I know you to be is going to want to have a nice twilight season of relationship with her mom. And the only chance of that happening is if you go, mom, I can't do this anymore. And lay it out very clearly why. But be okay with her not being okay with it. But the alternative is way worse. Till you get to a point one day where you snap at her, say something that hurts her, or you cut her off altogether and it's ugly. I just think there's pain on both sides of this. One...

is a rip off the band-aid quick sting pain, which is cutting them off now and telling mom why. The other one is that, George, that deep surgery, a lot of therapy afterwards. Oh, yeah. You know? There's a lot here. Has this been going on her whole adult life? There's been a lot of situations in the past that, yeah, she has made very poor decisions and needs to be bailed out here and there. And, yeah, I mean, it's an underlying theme.

Yeah. And it's much harder to turn this around at 78 years old than it is 38 years old. So this is not going to be an easy road, whether it's stopping giving her money or firing her as your employee.

But I want to see if she needs to work, she needs to work. I don't want you to do this out of pity for her to give her a paycheck. I want her to have a sense of independence. I would at least I would at least cut the bonuses. She knows she's being paid for at least subpar work. Your words, not mine. But but I can live with that. And I think that eases us. But the bonuses go away starting today.

And her husband, who I've been affectionately calling Sparky, Sparky McSparkless. That's his new name, Sparky McSparkless. He needs to get out and get a job. He's 10 years younger. Yeah. So he's got 10 years more energy than she does, at least. Yeah. Man, I got no sympathy for him on that deal. So, whew. Sorry about this, Kim, but we're thinking about your long-term situation. I want that relationship to be great in her twilight season. Thank you for calling. Thank you.

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talk it out with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash D'Loni to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash D'Loni. All right, let's go to Eddie, who's joining us in Columbia, South Carolina. Eddie, how can we help? Hey, how are you guys doing? Good, Eddie. What's going on?

So me and my wife, we're both 25. We just found out about a month ago that she's pregnant with our first kid. Way to go, Eddie. Way to go, man. Thank you. All right. And so my question is, I'm currently in baby step two, and we have a couple car loans, and then I have a bunch of student loans. Anyway, I've heard you guys say to kind of stop.

cash for during the pregnancy and just make sure everything goes well. But I have a slight concern is I have a car that is extremely negative with like negative equity. I didn't roll negative equity or anything, but I just bought it. I overpaid for it and it just has gone down in value because I've driven it so much. It's, I owe about 11 and a half on it and it's only worth three. Wow. You didn't overpay. Sounds like you got ripped off.

Yeah. And so I would I'm like one car wreck away from like owing a bunch of money. You know what I'm saying? So I I just I want to, you know, is there it would it be smart to still try to work to pay off that car a little bit while saving or should I just save all for the baby? And then if everything goes well, then just kind of take all that money and throw it at the car. What would be the what's the other car like that?

The other car loan is we owe 11 on it as well. It's my wife's car, but it's worth 11. Okay. And what's your household income? 103. Amazing. And what's the total debt between student loans and car loans? The total debt is around 100. So it's around 100 total for student loans. So yeah, about 80,000 student loans. Okay. And how much could you sock away if you just started making minimum payments on all these debts? How much could you save each month? $2,500. Wow. Wow.

That's impressive. So that's how much margin you can throw with the debt. Yes. Actually, it was funny. We had started Baby Step 2 the month before we found out she was pregnant. I made one $1,900 payment to my car, and then my wife's like, I'm pregnant. Yay! Okay, here's what I would do in your shoes.

I would say yes to the stork mode, which is pausing, making minimum payments. But here's what I would do. I would save up to your out-of-pocket max as aggressively as possible on your health insurance. Then anything beyond that, start throwing at the debt. So do you know what your out-of-pocket max is? So I know my deductible. I'm a teacher, so I have really, really good benefits. But I know that my deductible is like $650, and the out-of-pocket max is a couple thousand. And we already got the plan from the

you know, from the doctor, it shows how much we will come out of pocket. And I think with my health, with my insurance, we're only going to pay out of pocket like two grand total. Amazing. For everything. All right, George, now how does that change your specific? Well, here's what I'm thinking. What if for the next two months you stack up that five grand?

You said you could do that. Okay. Right? Then after that, we start chunking money at the debt, and you'll likely knock out that car payment before the baby's even here. I agree. So now you have $5,000 ready to protect you. I wouldn't wait to the last minute to save for baby. That's just too stressful and puts you in a bind. I would rather see you just stack up that money real quick, let it sit there, and then hit play on the debt snowball until baby and mom are home safe, and then we can deplete the savings back down to $1,000.

Okay. Awesome. Well, I really appreciate it. Yeah. Way to think through this, man. You've done your homework. I wish you the best. Knocking out $100K, that's going to take a while, but you guys have some great margin here and a solid income. So hopefully it doesn't take too long. That's right. Wesley now is joining us in Los Angeles area. Wesley, how can we help? Gentlemen, thank you so much for taking my call. Sure.

I got a silver squatter question problem for you. A what? Silver squatter? Silver squatter. Is that one of the superheroes in this Fantastic Four or is it somebody else? Oh, that's a silver surfer. Very different. See, I got confused for a second. Silver squatter. Okay. Tell us more. Here's my question. Do I kick my mom out of my rental? No.

I know the legal answer is going to be yes, but I'm having trouble with the emotional part of it. Tell me about the legal piece. Well, she hasn't paid rent in five months.

Why is that? Because she birthed him. She's like, I'm not paying you jack squat. Yeah. So the back story is my dad passed away, and she was living with him for the past 12 years, but they weren't married. So they were just cohabitating together. And when my dad passed...

I had a handshake deal with my brother that said if my mom passed first, my brother would take care of my dad. If my dad passed first, I would take care of my mom because we're a family of dysfunction. Okay, so you lost a bet, essentially, and here we are. Wow. The very setup of that whole thing is, first of all, how long ago did your dad pass away?

Coming up on two years. Okay. Well, sorry for your loss. I didn't want to skate over that deal. So you lost the handshake deal. And have you confronted mom in any time? Many times. Oh, you have? Many times. Over the last five months. And what is her response?

Oh, she, it's, it's just always an excuse with her. And I think I know I'm, I'm an enabler. I can admit it that I just, I can't get myself to finally pull the trigger and kicking her out because. What are you worried about? She's mom. Right. But you already changed that relationship when she became your tenant. Correct. Yeah. And a not good tenant. Is she not yet? Correct. Okay. What is the rent you're charging her?

$1,500, and that literally just pays for HOA, insurance, property taxes, utilities. And so you're losing money on this deal? Oh, of course. Yeah, the average rental in that community is like $3,300. And what are you on the hook for personally on this property?

Every month? Zero. Every month, it's about $1,000 just for the HOA taxes. It's paid off. Okay, okay. Great. So you're not bleeding money from this thing. Well, I mean, $1,000 a month is a little more than a scrape. No, it's a little more than a scrape.

So, okay. However, with that, with my, with the career, I'm also a real estate agent and our area, it's really slowing down right now. And so I have, you know, I have my emergency fund, but my emergency fund is three years just in case something like this were to happen. But I can see that every month,

The account, you know, dropping lower and lower and lower. And we're not in the red zone yet. Like we're not, we're not totally scared, but the reason I have these rentals that are paid off is to be my stable. You don't have to sell us on that. What did you call us for? Cause I think you, you know what we think, what can we do for you today? We have about a minute and a half. Yeah. I just, how can I emotionally get over this?

sending her the notice of 30 days to get out because I'm just, I think I'm at my wit's end here with her. Well, the way you emotionally get over it is you walk through it. And so it's going to suck. I can't sit here and tell you all the different range of emotions. You're probably going to be a little bit angry at her. You already, already are angry at her. You're going to be sad based on what she says and does. Uh, you might feel a little lonely. I mean, I could go through all this long list of emotions. I don't know what you're going to feel, but

But the only way to deal with those emotions is to actually walk through them and you're afraid of them right now. And I understand that, but you're just going to have to deal with it because here's where this is going. Just let your mind wander six months from now.

year from now two years from now what this is gonna feel like just let your mind go there and that's gonna be toxic sewage far worse than any emotion you're gonna face right now so it's time for you to step up and be an adult and your mom's acting like a child come up with a plan you and your brother need to stop doing shake hand bets and figure out how we're gonna take care of mom and in this situation

And then, you know, be good sons. But she doesn't get to rent for free anymore and it's time for her to move on. And you can help her with the root of the problem, which is she can't afford her bills. And what's the cause of that? Is she working full time? She's not working full time. She is working like her monthly income is just around $2,300. Okay. So it's either pay rent or put food on the table and cover my other bills? Yes.

Pretty much. It's not like she's out of control spending. So let's see if we can get her income up. She is out of control spending. She's gone through financial peace and failed miserably because she filed bankruptcy three times. Oh, my goodness. For those reasons, I would not have her as a tenant. She needs to go find rent elsewhere where she's going to get evicted by someone much meaner than you. And you can't help her at this point.

Help her find another place. But until her behavior changes, nobody can do anything. And that's what really stinks. So sorry, Wesley, that you're going through this. 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.

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All right, if you're buying or selling your home, you understand what a big financial transaction that is. And we want to make sure here at Ramsey and the Ramsey Show that you aren't clicking on the social media headlines. It's all clickbait trying to get you to buy a product or scare you half to death into doing something that's really stupid.

We're paying attention to the latest trends. We understand the principles of buying, of selling, and we've really created a great website, ramsaysolutions.com slash market. We're talking about the real estate market, so that's the website, ramsaysolutions.com slash market. And we have tons of news in there about the market trends right now, free tools to help you buy or sell with confidence,

perspective on the rates, the mortgage rates right now versus maybe where they were versus where maybe they're going. All of that stuff. It's a great website to make sure that you're informed so that you make a great decision in buying or selling a house. RamseySolutions.com slash market. Kyle is joining us now in the Big Apple. Kyle, how can we help? Hi, Eric.

Dr. Ken, George, first of all, great to talk to you. Huge fans of both of you. George, I'm a huge fan of your YouTube channel. Oh, thanks. No, in all seriousness, I listen to your podcast on daily walks, and I also do for weekend motivations. When I walk to the park, I do like a daily gratitude. Wow. I listen to that every day. Wow.

Everyday Millionaire Podcast. So you guys- You are plugged in. Way to go, Kyle. No, no, no, no, no, no. Huge fan. Like over COVID, I lost over 100 pounds and you guys helped us. I had financial motivation, physical, mental. Congratulations, man. Different guy. I've been debt-free eight years because-

because of you guys. And I owe you a huge debt of gratitude for my life. Oh, you're very kind. We know you're very serious and you're very kind. Thank you. How can we help you today? So my question is, unfortunately, I moved to New York from Wisconsin for my job. And I've had this job for 10 years. I've done well. Recently, I found out that I had been laid off.

It wasn't performance-related. And right now I'm hunting, looking for a new job. I've updated the resume. I've done a couple interviews. But I am going to receive a, because I did well and I was well-liked at where I work, I'm going to receive a three-month severance package of $40,000. Now, that's pre-tax. I know Uncle Sam's going to want half of that, so we'll say $20,000. And then unused PTOs.

Uh, 20 K. So uncle Sam's going to want, uh, again, 50%. So let's just say I'm going to receive 30,000, uh, probably at the end of the month. Um, if you want high level, uh, currently have two 20 K my 401k, uh,

In the bank, I have, I think, 13K checking, 30 savings, and then a high yield of 7,000. I'm trying to think what else. 27K in HSA, 60K brokerage, 60K in Roth IRA. So you could say whatever, around 420K. I have no debt.

My monthly expenses are around $5,000. My rent's $1,600. My one vice I have, though, being from Milwaukee, I'm a huge baseball and sports fan. I'm not even kidding. Ever since the MLB ballpark app came out in 2019, I've been to 121 MLB games, 26 stadiums. I've seen every team play. Wow. All right. So let me jump in real quick. Appreciate the setup. Yep.

That's your side. That's your one problem. Well, you're aware of it and you've been very disciplined with your money. That all stops right now, obviously. No more ballparks for you. I know, I know. And you get that. Of course. So the question is, how do you use that severance wisely? Have you already received your last check?

Paycheck, not the severance. I did. I did. I'm going to receive the severance at the end of the month. All right. So you're currently on your budget with that last check. And so at the end of this month, you get the 30. So George, I'll just jump in real quick on some income things real quick and then kind of hand him to you on what you would do in this situation. And by the way, I can't think of a better person to give you advice on this than George. George could survive multiple world wars and still have money buried in his backyard. He's just, he's absolutely the best.

Here's what I would say. If I'm in your shoes, when is your last day of work? Is it end of the month?

No, no, no. It already happened. It's effective immediately. And right now I'm getting paid not to work. So I can't complain. Well, I like that. However, if I were you, I'd be doing some type of part time work to part time jobs. If I'm in your shoes while I'm looking for something else, certainly in an expensive place where you are in that area, I would be doing 40 hours a week of work. OK, let's just put it that way.

And George, what would you do then on that severance? I would try to not use it would be my goal. And so if you have to dip into the severance to cover some expenses, that's okay. I would try to avoid using the emergency fund because you are a very able-bodied man who can get to work and no interruption of income is the ideal scenario. I'd rather see you get out of this with a great job and an extra 30 grand to put toward your next goal versus draining it down for the next six months because, well...

I just couldn't get a job. Which is, by the way, Kyle, that's why I said get anything right now. You know what profession you're in. You know what you're looking for. So I'm saying while you're looking for that, if you can work 40 hours a week making $15, $16, $18, $20, $25, I don't care what it is.

That is the idea. So when that severance comes in, hopefully we don't touch it at all and there's really no interruption in income. That's the ideal scenario. The severance should be treated like a parachute, not a hammock. I don't want you using it to lounge for the next six months. Okay.

Of course, of course. My ideal goal, so I've already had a couple interviews. I had a couple in person. So I'm an accountant, but my ideal goal is hopefully finding something by either mid-August or starting to work around Labor Day. That's my goal.

So I'm pushing towards that. Great. Finding the next full time job to get back on my feet. Great. Well, see if you because you're an accountant, see if you can pick up any contract work between now and then. Or again, you're going to work in a big box store. I'm telling you, stacking money right now is such a it's such a good thing for your emotion, you know, in that George in a situation like this.

We know from psychology research that when somebody loses a job, and in this case, this is a great example. Kyle is laid off, not for performance. Companies do this stuff all the time. But still, even though he didn't do anything wrong and they've treated him well with a severance, he seems to feel very good about it. They compare this to the loss of a loved one.

So whether we realize it or not, Kyle seems very upbeat, but it's a real emotional... There's grief. There's no clarity of mind when you're grieving. There's uncertainty. I don't know of a greater fear for anybody than uncertainty. Especially in this economy. I mean, the job market has slowed and it could take longer than it used to to find that great gig. So I don't know how you feel about that, but if I'm in his shoes, and that's what we always try to do, we try to give advice going, okay, if I can, I'm in that dude's shoes. Okay.

Okay, I'm grateful for the 30, but to your point, I don't want to touch it or very little of it. And so if I can go work starting today, and he lands a job, he's like, oh, I'll make it 18 an hour doing this. Great. And just keep some income coming in until we land that next accountant job. Do you agree with that? Yeah. Keeps us busy. Keeps us sharp too. Momentum. I don't think idle hands during a time of grief is a great combination. Yeah. Yeah.

So getting to work, doing anything is going to help him stay sharp and go, I want that next great gig. All right. So what would you change from a budgeting thing if you were in his situation? Would that change how you do your budget? Absolutely. I would go use my every dollar budget tonight and do what I call a budget audit. And so what you do is you go through and you go, is this necessary for survival? If not, we're going to cut it for now. And you realize how little you really need to survive. You need food, utilities, housing, transportation, insurance costs. And

And I would dial down everything else, all the fun money, the luxuries, the subscriptions, even pausing investing right now until he has stable income, because I don't want to see him burn through this because those are the calls we get. This is not us being doomsday. We get those calls and they say, well, I thought I was going to find a job next month and it's been six months now and still nothing. And I've burned my savings down to zero. And I don't want to see that for my friend who's worked so hard to build this wealth. Putting you on the spot here real quick.

What would you say an average person is going to find in savings if you had to pick a number out of the air, if they did a true budget audit? What do you think? Well, we found if they use the new EveryDollar, $9,500 is the number. A yearly number? Over a few months. Oh, a few months. Yes.

Wow, that's a lot higher than I would have thought. So think about that. I mean, you could shave off. In most people's budgets, they're blowing $1,000 just on overpaying for insurance, little luxuries here and there. You can shave off $1,000 easily. So over a year, that's $12,000. The budget audit. George says so. Try it. You should do it. ♪

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All right, let's go to Jerry in Chicago. Jerry, how can we help today? Yes, yes. Hey, thanks for taking my call. Sure. I have an 18-year-old son. He's just about ready to turn 18, and I have been able to scratch and save $6,800 today.

for him that I would like to give him on his, whenever he turns 18, but not just give him, I want to set him up with good investment and good savings for retirement. And I'm curious what you guys would recommend on that. I'm thinking maybe brokerage or maybe like a Roth, something we could like put 100, maybe $200 a month in and just always do that.

to help him get started, you know, get good, stable, get a better start than I did. So he's 17 years old now. What's his next move? Is he in high school? Is he going to college? He turns 18 in a few months, and he has one more year left of high school, and his plans after that is probably not college, possibly like a trade school. Love it. Okay. And we're going to need to cash flow trade school.

Yeah. And that could be, you know, 10 or 15 grand? Yeah, I already have, they do it in a notebook, but I already have them somewhat budgeting their paychecks whenever they do work. They kind of balance it every week like a checkbook, but between giving and spending and a goal and saving and investing,

I'm just wondering what to do with this $6,800. Well, my question is, I think he's going to be fine in retirement. The bigger concern is the next five years of his life could get very expensive very quickly as he enters adulthood. You know, does he need...

to upgrade a car? Does he need to cover trade school? Does he need to cover deposit for an apartment? So all of these things come into play. So I like to think about this in short-term goals versus long-term goals. And I think the power of compound interest is great. We should definitely teach him that. You put $100 in now, it's going to turn into $2,000 when you're retired. But there's also a piece of this where I go, I don't want him to shove this away in retirement and have no money for trade school.

Well, right, which is part of my concern, too. So that's where I'm going. I'm focusing on short term. I'm not concerned. If he starts investing even at 22, by 62, he's going to be a multimillionaire. Okay, okay. That is reassuring. I would help him figure out what his next priorities are. That's something you can do as dad. And then help him figure out how to map out a plan to get there.

So instead of funding it, help them figure out, hey, where would you allocate $7,000 knowing these are your next three goals coming up over the next four years? Because that's real life as an adult. Right.

Right. Right. Okay. Yeah. So I think about the bigger plan, I guess, is what George is saying, you know, and then what does that then mean over the short term? So big plan, big direction. He may not know yet, but if he does know it's trades, I would, before I gave him any money like this, I would be letting him kick the tires on those trades, letting him, you know, interview some people, sit with them, encourage him to really do some research. And if he goes, okay, I know I want to do trade X, I'm going to do trade Y.

And then you can go, okay, let's look at the trade schools or the training required for this. What's it going to cost?

And now everything comes into focus if you come about it that way, as opposed to just going, well, I'm going to give him 6,800, which, by the way, is very generous, very kind, great dad, and putting that in a retirement account for him. And maybe you decide to do that. But that's what George is challenging you to do, and I think that's a good move. So tactically, this would look like a high-yield savings account where we park this money for now until we know the next step. And I like the idea of teaching him –

of how to budget each paycheck going, hey, we're going to put 15% away versus a lump sum from dad and investment account. It doesn't really teach him how to put money away first and pay himself first. So I like to see that happen from his future income and not from this lump sum from dad.

Right, right. And I really, really appreciate that. In fact, he does not even know about this. So I could just put it in a high-yield savings account until he gets a bit of a pass. Yeah. And here's one other idea. I'm going to throw this one at George. George may not like this. Uh-oh. I don't know if you're going to like this one. What if he says to the son, all right, tell you what, between now and the time you get out of high school—

as you're working odd jobs, summer jobs, whatever, I'll match up to $7,000 of whatever you make. Now he doesn't know that you've got essentially the 7,000 saved. You're 200 bucks from that. But what do you think about that? I love that. Well, it's a secret way to force him to have some work ethic, have some skin in the game and get a very nice, generous bonus from dad for his efforts. Yeah. Just another idea. You're going to put it in high yield savings as you do all the stuff George told you to do.

But I thought that was an interesting way of doing it. And let's say the kid comes, let's say the kid makes five and you go, all right, I told you I'd match it up to seven. So here's another five. And he's got 10, you know, that kind of thing that may have real impact on him, you know, and to George's point, if he gets started in the trades really young and you've taught him how to save and invest, he's going to be fine. And he remains debt free with money in the bank. He's already so far ahead of most American adults.

Yeah.

you won't need to worry about him in retirement. Yeah, I agree. All right, let's go to Ann real quick here in Columbia, South Carolina. Ann, how can we help today?

Hi, thank you so much for taking my call today because I have just no idea of what to do. But I'm calling about my mom who's 91 years old. She's a widow. She owns no property, but she has over $18,000 in credit card debt. And we don't know what to do with that. Wow. How did she get into this debt? Okay.

It's just been accumulated over the years. After my dad died, she had a lot of expenses that she had to take care of. And so the easiest thing for her was to put it on her credit card. I'm confused what credit card company thought giving a 91-year-old broke woman access to $20,000 was going to pan out for them. I don't know. And so now we're stuck because she just lives off her social security. And...

How much does she make from that? Her Social Security. She has a small retirement. So together, that's about $2,000 a month. And what are her expenses each month? It's quite a bit. She has to rent a home because the home that she had was falling apart, and she had to get out of it. Well, she doesn't have to rent that home. Could she rent an apartment that's cheaper?

Is there income-based housing that she could get into? This was the only thing that we could find at the time because she had to move quickly. Well, how much is it? Actually, it's about $2,000 a month. Oh, well, there you go. There's our problem. Of course she has to go into debt. So there's only one solution here, and it's to get her out of this housing situation that's costing her every penny of her paycheck. This is all hands on deck. You seem to be befuddled by this.

Well, the thing about it is, you know, my siblings and I have been trying to help her out a little bit, trying to, you know, help get her through. But we're just not able to do that on a regular basis. You mean financially? Financially. But I'm not talking about that. I'm saying, Ann, between the siblings and you and family and friends, we can't find your mom a much cheaper living situation? No.

At the time we had to get her into a home, we did not have that. I'm not talking about that. I'm telling you, you called us and your mom's in a financial crisis. What I'm trying to help you out in this limited amount of time we have with you is that's the big problem. She has a fixed income. We can't even think about the credit card debt because there's no margin.

And that credit card debt is unsecured. So if she dies with that debt, the credit card company writes it off. We're not worried about that. It's not in your name. You're not going to have to pay it. It'll get paid out of her estate if she even has any money.

This is a four alarm fire, Ann. Like, this is a conference call with your siblings. Like, as soon as you hang up. 100% of her income is going to rent. That is a major problem. And she needs to pay rent first, put food on the table first, pay utilities first before a credit card company gets paid. But I would cut her off of this credit card.

It's only going to make the problem worse. We need to find a new housing situation, whether that's her moving in with one of you guys or finding her cheaper housing. But you turn a temporary solution into a permanent one and decided there's no other way. That's the problem.

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This is the Ramsey Show, where America hangs out to have a conversation about their money, their profession, and their relationships. Excited to have you with us, 888-825-5225 is the phone number alongside George Campbell. I'm Ken Coleman, and we're going to go to Lily, who is into Big Apple. Lily, how can we help today? Hi, thanks so much for taking my call.

So basically, I dated a guy for a little under three years, and we just broke up. I took out a debt consolidation loan for him, and I want to know what's the most ethical way to get him to pay me back faster than we originally planned. It was originally a $35,000 loan. I have really good credit, so the

The interest rate was, it said 11.49%. It was much lower than his credit cards, his high interest credit cards. So let me make sure I understand this. You took this out in your name. Correct. And you guys just broke up.

Yeah. And this isn't the first time I did this for him. It's the second. Both times I offered because I thought we were going to get married. We were talking about rings and everything. So like emotions aside, like I just want to know how to move forward. How much does he owe you? On the loan that's left, it's about $30,000. And I took that loan in October. So with interest, it's about $30,000. How has he been paying it before you broke up?

Is he just sending the money to you? Yeah, yeah. Minimums every month. What's the minimum? $9.51, $12. Oh my gosh.

Yeah. And has there been any conversation about this? Yes. He told me he's willing to sign a contract saying that he'll send me about $2,000 a month, like somewhere around there. He only makes after taxes about $1,000 a week. But he moves back home, so he doesn't really technically have any expenses. And you think he's going to commit to coughing up 50% of his income for the next two years? Yeah.

I mean, I need it done in a year. I need it less than a year. That's kind of the issue. Well, I need it, but I need a Lamborghini. That's not happening tomorrow. Two grand for 12 months is 24 grand. So it doesn't even get you to the balance. But I mean, it's close. I would love if he commits to this, but legally, you took on the debts. You signed up for this deal.

awful ride. And so legally, I don't know you have any recourse. Now, you said, what are the ethical ways? I want to know what the unethical ways are. They would be hiring the Gambino family or somebody like that. You know what I mean? Get Donald Downey Hunter to show up at his door? Make an offer he can't refuse. Well, I figured that I would either maybe talk to one of his family members or...

Uh, and, and to say like, can one of you guys take out a loan firm or tell him to do it himself? Because I am going to be going back to school next year. And while my credit is great, I'm at a seven 50, I should be at an eight 50. So I only have family member, which family member you got in mind?

This is clearly. I mean, somebody should know someone should hold him accountable to at least, you know, get his own. So you're going to go to his brother and his brother's probably going to laugh at you and go, well, you should have said the same thing to him. You know, I just I don't like that move at all. I still see that going anywhere. You can try it, George. Do you have any written evidence that he acknowledged that this is his debt that he agrees to pay back?

100%. Yes, we have lots of text messages. I'm going to draft up a contract soon. That's not an issue. We're just kind of agreeing on a number of what he'll give me. The time to draft it was before you signed up for this, so I don't know. I mean, I hope he signs it. You could take him to, like, small claims court and try to deal with this if it gets to that point. That's the only way if he doesn't pay. No, yeah, we have text messages talking about the loan and that he's –

and what he's willing to do. There's not much you can do here is what we're getting at. And I would work on paying this off yourself, and maybe you'll get reimbursed, but I wouldn't let this just hang over your head for the next several years hoping that he pays this back. Right, I understand. So are you working full-time right now?

Yeah, I may have a good income. It's just now that I'm left alone in my apartment, I focus on investing my money. But I do understand what you're saying. You shouldn't. You have $35,000 in debt. You don't need to be investing at all until you clean this mess up. Can we run through your numbers, Lily? Let's pretend like he never pays us back and Lily has to clean all this up. All right, so what is your take home every month? Well, yearly, I make about $120 post-tax.

Post tax. So that's your take home pay. So 10 grand a month. It's about 11, 12, 10 a month. It depends how much I work. And if you pause investing, probably more. Well, that's how much I take before I invest and spend money. But I want to make sure you hear what George is saying. We want you to pause investing for a very short amount of time. Right. So you got more income because we want you paying this down yourself. And then anything that the ex gives you is gravy. Right.

Because in the eyes of the law, I don't care if you got text messages or not. This is your debt. Right. And we're not piling on here with you, but George is right. Like you have got to fix this situation. You trying to go to his brother or his parents or signing a contract with him and all that stuff. That's not the solution. Hopefully this kid's got some character.

And he does what he says he's going to do. He could easily block your number and you spend the rest of your life trying to chase him around the country, too. And so we just don't know what's going to happen in the future. So you've got to control the controllables. And that means paying off your debt that's in your name. Is this all of the debt or do you have any other debt out there? No, that's all of the debt. Okay. I don't have any debt of my own. What are your monthly expenses?

Bare bones. About $3,000. I guess now maybe like $4,500 just because my rent just technically doubled. George, tell her what she needs to do. Okay, well, here's the good news. If you have $5,500 left over, that means in, let's say, you got $30 left on it? Yeah. Okay, so here's the good news. In about five or six months, this debt is gone.

Right. And I'd get a roommate, wouldn't you, George? Yeah, that sounds like if your rent doubled, you got to find another situation or get a roommate. How much is your rent? $2,500. Okay, so it's still a quarter of your take-home pay. Yeah. Okay, but he was paying some rent, wasn't he? So my rent was $1,237, but it is now double that. I'd get a roommate. Yeah. You know, you don't need to be...

living with some other dude on the end of this breakup anyway. So, you know, lick your wounds, get healthy, heal, all that jazz. Get this debt out of your life. And then again, hopefully he pays you back.

Yeah, I know what you mean. I'm sorry. He's a man of character, but I do understand. I just didn't know ethically I should demand or I should say you have to do this now and you have to go by my timeline. But I understand what you're saying. I think ethics are out the window. This is not an ethic issue. You're not a bad person for wanting this money back. But the truth is, there's not a lot of legal recourse here because the debt is not in his name.

And so there's a stupid tax that you're going to have to own up to and go, I cannot believe I was so blinded by love that I took on 35 grand for a guy that I'm not even with anymore. There's the lesson. That's the hard pill to swallow. And we're distracting it by this whole, like, I got to get a contract and talk to his brother and see if he can get in touch with him to convince him. Because if he was a man of character, you wouldn't need to go through his family to keep him accountable to pay this debt back, would you?

No. Yeah. It's just me being like a little. Well, you're freaking out. You're freaking out. And by the way, I get it. And I feel so bad for you. Oh, man. I just I feel like your dad right now. I just please don't ever do something like this again. OK, you're so, so smart. You don't need to do this for some dude. OK, there's never a scenario by which you need to give somebody take a loan out for somebody. They're just not.

There's always a better answer. So please tell me you're not going to do this again, correct? Absolutely not. You got this. All right. Good luck with the debt payoff. It's not going to be fun, but hey, five months from now, you're back to square one, living your best life.

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All right, back to the Big Apple we go. Nicole is joining us there. How can we help today? Hi, I'm so excited that I got through. I've just discovered you guys in March, and on my ride to my mother's house, I listened to you guys for about 16 hours in the car. Wow, bless your heart. Thank you. I'm sorry. I hope your ears are bleeding from hearing us all the time. So my question is, I recently started working. I'm a registered nurse. I've been a nurse now for two years.

And I really didn't have any credit card debt. And then as soon as I started working, I started spending. And now we're about $55,000 in credit card debt. And I don't know how to get out of it. Both my husband and I make a decent amount of money. And we just need to figure out the right way to go about it. Do you still have the credit card?

Yes, I still have them. I lock them all and I'm trying to pay them all off every month, but it just doesn't seem to be going very far. What's your household income? I make about $100,000 and my husband makes about $250,000.

$30,000 to $50,000, it ranges with his overtime. Okay, so you're making $350,000 household. What caused you to go, we don't have enough money? Out of $350,000, I need to go $55,000 in credit card debt. What caused that? Well, I guess every month we're down to like 50 cents left in our account, and we're trying, you know, we don't... Where is $30,000 going every month, even in New York City?

I mean, even Congress would have a hard time spending all of this money. We own our home, I guess, you know, mortgage, and then just paying off the credit card debt. We don't really spend any money otherwise. You just told me you dropped $55K on a credit card. So if I looked at your bank statement over the last two years, where would you say are the top two or three things where you're blowing money?

Food. Are you eating out every night? DoorDash? What is it? Get specific. No, it's our grocery bills. And then I guess we do order out like once a week, which we stop. Let's start with the big things. Because you know what's funny to me is that you literally have no idea what you spend the $30,000 on. You couldn't even pull it. We're not making $30,000 a month. It usually comes to...

Closer to 20? Yeah, closer to 20. It depends on overtime. Sometimes it's less, sometimes it's 10, sometimes it's 20. It all depends on how much overtime. But what are your actual hard expenses? Start with your mortgage. What's that? Our mortgage is $3,012. That's not the problem. We pay...

Like all our household bills and everything like that are about $7,000. And then our credit card payments each month minimum are about $2,000. Okay. We still have $9,000 to go. Yeah, and then my husband has to take a lot of money to get to work. Usually it's about $1,000 or so to get to work.

What does that mean to get to where is he flying on a private jet? No. So the fire, he's a fireman. The firehouse has like house taxes and they have to pay for meals every day. And that's usually, you know, every shift he goes in, they have to bring in a meal. They have to, everyone has to contribute to the house basically. So it's usually about a thousand months plus gas. And then we have, you know, gas bills, everything like that. Okay. Okay.

I'm confused where the other $7,000, you said there's household expenses of $7,000 outside of the mortgage. I mean, I guess it depends on the overtime, but I mean, I have everything written down, everything that we spend. Do you have any other debt outside of the $55,000 in credit cards? Yes, yes. I have a school loan and I have a car loan. Okay. How much is the car loan and how much is the school loan?

School loan is $30,000 and the car loan is about $27,000. Okay. So you've got well over $100,000 in consumer debt. You have a great income. And I think the solution here is to get on a very strict written budget with your husband starting tonight. Okay. Now, is he willing or is he like, whatever, we're doing fine?

No, he's willing. He's willing. And both of us, we don't shop. We just do basics. We're just living basically. I don't know anyone who lives basically making $350,000 who still goes $60,000 into credit card debt. I just don't believe that.

It was the first year that I started working. It was just my mistake, and I was spending on them when I shouldn't have because I didn't have any. Sorry. Okay. Well, your new life starts today. I'm going to gift you every dollar premium. It's our budgeting app, and here's what you're going to do. There's an onboarding process. It's quick, and then you're going to list out your income for the month, whatever you think it will be, based on, you know, you said it's irregular. There's going to be some commissions and some balances there, but then you're going to list all of your expenses beneath that.

And that's going to show you how much margin you should have or that you don't have. It'll show you, hey, you have $3,000 left to budget. Every single extra dollar is going to be going toward your smallest debt. Make minimum payments on the rest. You can keep up with the minimum payments, correct?

Good. Good for you. That debt snowball method is your ticket out of this thing. And making $350,000, you can knock out $120,000 in debt really quickly. Yeah. Because I think there's a lot of room in this budget, and your income, this shovel, is going to save you guys if you can get a handle on it.

But the good news is, Nicole, this is not the first we've heard of this. We get calls all the time, people making insane money, and they're going, we're paycheck to paycheck. We got bills up to our eyeballs. And it's because of lifestyle creep. The more you make, the more you're going to spend, the more you can stomach that next payment. So what you and your husband have to get really good at is saying no. No to more debt. No to eating out. No to the luxuries that you're used to. You're going to feel like you're living in college again.

Mm-hmm. And, you know, maybe Hub starts taking casseroles to the firehouse, you know? They're not really allowed. That's a fight that we have pretty often. I thought it was a funny little idea, and it got shot down. Casseroles not allowed. It's unconstitutional. That feels un-American to me, but I digress. They have to make the meals together. They eat together, you know. I'm confused. What kind of job costs you $1,000 a month?

to work there. Well, it's, you know, they have the house tax. They have to pay house tax every month. What does that mean? It's not a fraternity that he signed up for. It's a job. House tax. Yeah, well, they pay...

you know, pay for the food in the house, grocery bills. And you're telling me. Like shampoo. They live there basically. You know, a lot of times they live there for, you know, a day or so. Well, here's the deal. We digress on that. Here's what I want you to understand. You get in your budget. And by the way, we're so glad you called. We're glad you're jumping on board. You've made some great progress. But I'm going to tell you something. It will set you and your husband free when you truly get every budget item in that every dollar budget and begin to look at it. Because when you can see it,

And we weren't trying to grill you or put you on the spot. We're having some fun. We're having a little bit of fun. But it's obvious that there's a lot of spending that you still don't have your hands on. And so by knowing where every dollar is going, what a game changer. You would be surprised. I promise you right now, and George, I'm going to put you on the spot here. But if you and I went to their house tonight and we brought a casserole with us, because I think maybe we would.

And we had dinner with you, and then afterwards we got it all out on the table, and we got the legal pads or the whiteboard or whatever. I bet you we could find a lot of money in your budget. George, you agree? I could find probably $12,000 in the past month that could have gone towards debt payoff.

That's my best guess. Now, that's not to scold you, Nicole. That's to encourage you. And once again, his pay is variable, as is mine, because of overtime. Yeah, but on a bad month, you're still making $10,000 or $12,000.

Yeah, so sometimes a paycheck for him might be $3,000, sometimes it's $7,000, sometimes mine's $1,700, sometimes mine's $3,500, you know. And that's even more reason for you guys to get really serious and go, we have to live like we don't know what's going to happen tomorrow. And that means not borrowing money, having money in the bank. Do you guys have anything in savings right now? Yeah, we have, like, you know, retirement funds and everything like that. Liquid cash. Do you have, like, a savings account?

No. Okay. I think you guys are going to... You guys are about to experience something called financial peace.

where you're not stressed about money. I'm going to gift you that on top of every dollar premium. There's nine lessons in there. Watch every single lesson with your husband. Have a hard conversation. Do that budget. Have a weekly budget meeting. Make a new budget before every month begins. And you're going to feel so much more in control. Yes. Because you guys work too hard. You're too successful to be living this paycheck to paycheck life. And Nicole, when you have one of those big months, you get ahead.

And then pretty soon you're out of debt and now you're really making progress. Hang in there. You'll get it. We're going to walk with you. There's a time in your life and the baby steps for renting, but you don't want to do it forever because when you rent, you're still paying for a mortgage, just somebody else's. Plus rent means instability in your budget because it always goes up, never down.

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All right, George. So when people are tackling debt or building wealth, one of the things that is kind of a human thing is to forget about one important step in each of those goals. Whether you're trying to get rid of debt or build your wealth, it's insurance. And I know you like to talk nerdy about insurance. It's a big thing for you. You love insurance. But having the right coverage as opposed to too little insurance.

Or this is one you talk about a lot, too much insurance. Either way can really hamper the journey. And so you probably beg the question, you're going, all right, Ken, you make a good point. How do I know if I have the right coverage? Good question. If you go to ramseysolutions.com slash checkup, this is a short quiz question.

And it's going to tell you what you need or what you don't need when it comes to insurance coverage. So it could save you a lot of money or it could really protect you from financial harm. Again, it takes just about five minutes. RamseySolutions.com slash checkup. RamseySolutions.com slash checkup.

And, George, you do this on a regular basis yourself. It's probably the number one place I send people to because it's such a great, quick resource to go, I don't want to have too much. I don't want to overspend. I don't want to be unprotected here when it comes to building wealth. This is a big part. It's not a baby step for a reason. It's a part of the entire Ramsey plan. So get this stuff done today. Make sure you're protected. All right. Adam is up next in San Diego. Adam, how can we help today?

Hi, guys. Trying to finalize a divorce, and then I've been dating another woman for a while, and we live in different cities, and both have young children and 50-50 custody. So trying to figure out how we navigate living in two cities. Okay.

Yeah. Man, I don't know that either one of us know how to handle that deal. That sounds like a lot of complexity, but I mean, for sake of giving you an answer, I

You live where you live and she lives where she lives. You guys are not a joint household. You haven't even finalized a divorce. She's got her kids in another city. You got your kids in your city. We got custody issues, a lot of complexity. And the solution to complexity, George, is usually simplicity. So you do your life. And when you guys get together, it's date night. You got a budget for that, I hope. But other than that, you're doing your thing. She's doing her thing.

Well, for now. So we're trying to kind of navigate that. She is fully divorced, and mine's been kind of a three-year process that's ending. We see each other almost probably half the month at this point. She's in Phoenix, so it's a cheap flight usually, $75 round-trip flight back and forth between us. So...

Let me flip this back to you. I gave you my opinion and again, the opinion didn't cost you anything and you quickly went into explain mode, but you called us. What are you struggling with and how do you want us to help you?

You got it. So my big question, I guess, I've got a house here with my ex that's going to sell. And as we navigate getting married, she has a mortgage there. What I'm trying to decide is post-marriage, right, combined households, even though we're living in two separate places, how should we pay down the debt on her mortgage or should I look to –

buy a house and try to grow equity here and so we would have two we would end up with two mortgages and that why would you keep the other house if she's not living there well she would continue to live in phoenix and i would continue to live here and you'd not be married no that's after we're married why would you live in two different cities when you're married

Because we, I mean, like I said, we have 50-50 custody of children and both of us. So you're both tied to those places. We're both tied to those places. Then let me ask a really dumb question. Why get married?

Well, we fell in love and we love each other. We spent a lot of time working through that and figuring it out. But what makes this a marriage if you're not together? I mean, we see each other half of the month, so probably half the days in the month, something like that. And because we're both Christians and believers, our divorces did

didn't come through desires of our own. They came through actions of our partners. And as we kind of came together and met and talked, we found that there was a lot of connection and similarity and that marriage is the next step for us. Okay. I'm starting to understand now. I appreciate that conviction. I get it. But again, back to George's question then,

I get why you want to be married and you are locked in because of the custody deal. I get it. But I wouldn't have two houses that we have mortgages on. Yeah, so... Am I right, George? Yeah, is she visiting you half the month and then the next month you're visiting her half the month? It's kind of back and forth. So, you know, one week, our custody schedules align. So I go there when I don't have my kids and she comes here every...

when she doesn't have the kids. So it's, I'm there once a month almost, and she's here once a month. Okay. And how, how much longer do we have of this kind of,

issue where we're stuck where we are because of that. Is this 10 years? 15 years? Probably about 10 years. It's probably about 10 years. Okay. That is just too long of a time for me to do this long-distance marriage relationship. So I don't know if there's a magic solution to this. I just know I wouldn't be comfortable paying these two mortgages for 10 years while living there half the time.

for each of you. I would rather just be a little more flexible, maybe rent somewhere and use the funds to either stockpile savings, invest, but it just feels like a big waste. How much will you walk away with, Adam, when you sell this house post-divorce? How much will you walk away with? My portion of it will be about $300,000. Okay. And you said that the girlfriend, she has a mortgage on her house? She has a mortgage of about $500,000 on her home. Is it pretty big?

Yeah, it's a four bedroom, three bath house. Can either one of you downsize or both? How many kids are you talking about? Let's talk about you first. How many kids you have? I have two kids. How old are they?

They are a nine-year-old son and a six-year-old, almost seven-year-old daughter. Okay. So you don't need a big place for when you have time with them. You don't need a big place with them, correct? No. I'm currently in a two-bedroom apartment here. I moved out about a year ago. Okay. Well, and then if you're going to marry this woman, I would have the same conversation with her. You guys are in a very transient relationship, the two of you, okay? Yeah.

And then you got the kids coming back and forth. So if she doesn't need that big old house, I would have her downsize as well. Eliminate the debt. If you guys are going to get married, I feel like this is happening. Whether George and I like it or not, it's not up to us. The key is you're going to have to learn how to budget for all this. If this is a non-negotiable, we're keeping these houses. We have to have the income to support all of this and more. So can you guys do that currently with no issue?

Yeah, I mean, it's currently happening. She's paying hers and covering the mortgage fine, and I'm fine in my situation here. We've got emergency funds and are continuing to hit our investments, no debt.

Okay, other than these mortgages. And you have a mortgage on your apartment? Other than the one mortgage there and then, yeah, the mortgage that will end here, yeah. If she could downsize, I feel like that would be great and get close to paying it off through that process. At least to limit your expenses as a married couple. But I'm not sure why you called now that we've actually talked because it sounds like you've got on – like you're on top of this. Were you looking for like another thing you were thinking of?

I guess the question that I'm thinking of is, the real question was, should we pay down her mortgage there or me look to buy here after we're married? I think we already answered that. We don't think you should. You don't need two homes that you have a mortgage on. So, yeah, if you guys get married, if and when you get married, then you start paying her down. And I'm saying one of the strategies ought to be to downsize. If she can sell that $500,000 house in Phoenix...

and make a good chunk of money and downsize because this is a season for you guys. This is about a 10 year season, you said. So I would actually reduce expenses by reducing space. Sounds like you've done that. Good on you.

But I think this other lady and your girlfriend needs to do this in Phoenix. And then we kind of just, we regroup after the kiddos have left the nest. Yeah, you guys are in baby steps four, five, six, if you have no consumer debt. So invest that 15%, put some money away for the kids' college, however you guys decide to do that. And then anything left over, let's chunk it at the next smallest mortgage, get it knocked out. ♪♪♪

All right. Today's Ramsey Show question of the day is sponsored by WhyRefi. When you're tired of making no progress on your defaulted private student loans, WhyRefi can help you explore a fresh start with low fixed rate financing, refinancing rather. So, why do you want to start a new business?

If you want to stop spinning your wheels and go to YRefi.com slash Ramsey and learn more, I highly recommend it. That's Y-R-E-F-Y dot com slash Ramsey. It may not be available in all states. Today's question comes from Jared in Nevada. How do you feel about businesses that prefer to be paid in cash? We are doing some home upgrades and following the baby steps has allowed us to pay in cash.

A friend recommended asking our vendor if he would prefer cash payments, and I was shocked when they jumped at the notion and offered a better price for cash payments. Is this ethical? As a Christian, I feel conflicted. I'm not opposed to paying my fair share of taxes, but this feels like a win-win for everyone except perhaps Uncle Sam.

Wow. Okay. See, Jared is assuming that this is now tax evasion, which I think is a far cry. Yeah, I was going to say, unless I'm missing something here, asking someone to pay in cash doesn't mean that they're evading taxes. Number one, it helps the business owner avoid the 3% credit card processing fees, which saves them big money. Ask any small business owner how much they pay in these stupid fees that just make

credit card companies richer and they'll tell you. So I don't think this is as big of an issue as you think it is, unless you have clear indication that this is a front and they're running some kind of shady business, in which case I just wouldn't do business with them. But you're not morally responsible for what a business does with their money. Yes. And yes. And and here's what I would say to that. If they ask you to pay for it with a debit card or a check, OK, you still don't know what they're going to do with that money.

It doesn't mean they're reporting their taxes properly. They're paying taxes. So you've built this up in your mind. Somehow it feels really, really skeezy or something. And it's not. It's just cash. And by the way, just because you're a Christian doesn't mean we really need to be worried about the federal government. I mean, I think they're going to take care of themselves. It's not your job. Think about it. We pay taxes on our income. And then with our post-tax income, we pay sales tax.

With the post-tax income. That's right. Pay in cash. It's just a never-ending loop. Cash is king. Yeah, I pay my fair share to Uncle Sam and more, but nothing wrong with paying cash. In fact, I always ask if they have a cash discount, and I would say seven out of ten times I get a discount. Yeah.

It's happened this week. You know what I think I might do this weekend? I think I might go to a restaurant and literally pay cash just to freak out the waiter. They wouldn't know what to do with that. They wouldn't know what to do. Although wait, I just lay it all out. You know, what's the bill? Okay. Hold on a second. I'm licking my finger like my grandfather counting out the bills. I don't want to touch a bill that has been licked. I agree. It's just, I said that I knew that that would bother you. But back in the day,

A distinguished gentleman would lick a bill to try to get it, you know, out of the... He's got the whole thing going on. He's like, counting it. Okay, let me get... That's if the bills are real crispy, fresh out of the bank vault. And usually the guys that are... Yeah. You nailed it. You got to watch that in slow motion. You nailed it. For a guy who would never do it, that was well done. I've seen it done. I knew it. But I don't have enough hand sanitizer in the world after touching that bill. No, that's the truth. You're probably nervous about licking your own thumb right now. Yeah, I'm actually thinking about it right now. Yeah. Mm.

Let's move on. Donna in Seattle, how can we help?

Hi, thanks for having me. You bet. So my question is related to investment properties. So me and my significant other, we both live in Seattle, Washington, but his family lives in Syracuse, New York. We were looking at homes around there, mainly for his parents, just because the house that they bought there, and we weren't super happy with what they bought, and

His siblings could have done a better job as kind of focusing more on what to buy. Besides that, so we looked around, and so we found an open lot. They're asking for $60,000. A lot of the utilities are already done. Electrical sewer is done. The lot's actually cleared. It's been on the market for over 200 days.

And, you know, my thinking is, okay, in this area, there's a big chip manufacturer that's going in there. They're expanding their health care. And houses are actually going in pending within two weeks to less than 30 days. So are there any other aspects I should look at for –

you know, to purchase this investment. He's more conservative than I am. And, you know, we already looked at what the voters, what do we call it? I'm confused. I feel like we're conflating to either mom and dad need a place to live and they're unable to figure it out because they're incapacitated health-wise and you're the financial power of attorney, or we're buying an investment property across the country for no reason under the guise of helping in-laws. Yeah. Which one is it? I'm confused as well.

It's both, right? Who's paying for this? We can afford it. But why? Why can't the parents afford it? They haven't made the best financial decisions. The great people that they have, I think they make emotional financial decisions. So let's label it what it is. It's not an investment. It's you sinking your hard-earned money into people who have been financially irresponsible their whole lives.

But we would own the property. Yeah, but wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. So quick question. All right. Just want to make sure we got the details. They're currently in a situation they cannot afford. Did I get that correct? They can afford where they live right now. Yes. But OK, I thought they made a bad purchase decision and this was all about getting them out of it.

So they can afford to live, but they are spending money on a place, fixing, remodeling things that should be more on the list. Who's paying for all this remodeling?

They are, but they're putting themselves in the debt doing that. Okay. And is this your parents or your husband's parents? His parents. Okay. It's his parents. And I heard the part about the other siblings, let them make a bad decision. I'm not sure I buy into that. These are grown, these are grown people. But what I don't understand, I'm with George on this one is, are they actively trying to get out of their current house? Meaning they're going to now sell it and then, and then jump into the house that, that you buy and they're going to pay you rent. Is that the solution?

Yes. Okay, what happens when they can't afford the rent paying you? Well, they're both retired, so they're able to pay. So the mortgage that they pay now would be the same. But you just told me they're going into debt because they can't even afford the renovations. What makes you think as they get older, they're going to be more financially stable? I don't.

So do you see what we're saying? You're buying, you're taking on debt, which is a risk for people that you can't get away from without a lot of pain. If they start messing up their financial life just because they are in your house and now they don't, they can't do renovations, they may find ways to spend money on other stuff. And all of a sudden they can't pay rent. And now they're in your house. Do you see why we're concerned or does it seem like we're being a little bit too uptight?

No, no, I see your concern. But the point is, it would still be under our name. It doesn't matter. And it would accumulate in value. It doesn't matter. We're talking about the part where you've got to kick them out because they can't pay the rent. During this show, Donna, we took a call earlier, like an hour ago, where someone said, I have to evict my mom because she hasn't paid the rent on my rental property. What do I do? Exactly.

And so I don't think you should ever intermingle your finances with family. It's going to sever the relationship. You're going to become resentful. You're going to be on the hook for all the finances under the guise of, well, this was supposed to be an investment property that panned out. We would never tell someone to buy investment property across the country and especially not for their in-laws to live in and hopefully pay them rent for the rest of their lives. So truthfully, I would just not get involved in this. What is forcing you guys to be involved?

Just to have something better for his parents. But they have chosen this and they've made peace with it, it sounds like. Regardless of if it's good for them or not. That's not the point. But it's not, they're not asking for your input. And one other quick thing. I thought I heard you say that you are more aggressive or a little bit more risk taker than your husband, correct? Correct.

I'm more of a risk taker in coming to investments. I've always been very financially down. So here's my follow-up question. Does your husband, he's got some holdups on this himself doing this, correct? Yes. Then back off. These are his parents.

If you want to be an investment property mogul, you go for it in your own area with tenants that you select. I would not intermingle the in-laws in all this. It's a recipe for disaster. And if your husband, who's their son, is nervous about this, I'd hold off on this. Stay out of it.

This is the Ramsey Show, where America hangs out to have a conversation about their money, their profession, and their relationships. 888-825-5225 is the phone number to jump in. We'd love to hear from you. Alongside George Campbell, I'm Ken Coleman, and we're going to get to Ryan in Houston, Texas. Ryan, how can we help today? Hey, this is Ryan. I own an outdoor landscape and construction company, and I've been doing it for the past...

10 years probably. And since COVID, I have found myself, I guess, deeper in debt than I ever have. And then in 2024, my line of work slowed down to the point that I actually went backwards in sales versus the other years where I was all

always increasing our numbers. And so I had financed a bunch of stuff based off of what we had done in sales over the last couple of years, thinking that we would only continue to produce more and more. And when that wasn't the case and the bottom kind of fell out of our market of our economy for what we do in 2024, we started tanking and even considering bankruptcy and other options.

How much debt are you in total? I would guess somewhere close to half a million. And what does that make up? What are the debts? Yeah. We got one of those COVID loans for about $100,000 to the SBA. And between a couple of trucks and a tractor, another $150,000 to $200,000. I don't have the exact figures sitting in front of me. Okay. Do you have equity in any of those pieces of equipment?

No, no, I don't. How's business now? Business is still kind of slower because I also moved at the beginning of this summer to another city. So I relocated. So I'm having to restart from almost, you know, no clientele. No one knows who we are. And just bought a new house over here, too. Why'd you move?

I didn't like the area that we were in. Are you married? No, no. Single? Yep. Okay. And what's your mortgage? What's left on that? Well, it's brand new, right at $300,000. About $290,000. Okay. How much could you sell all the equipment for if you had to? The stuff that's got loans on it, I would be negative on those. And so...

I would have to come up with the difference to get the banks paid off. Yeah, what would that – I think you need to do some homework and figure out exactly how much you owe. I would go pull your credit report from all three bureaus at annualcreditreport.com and pull all of that, get some real facts and figures on your numbers because right now it's all just a guess, and you're overwhelmed and scared. So we need some facts on paper to understand what we're actually dealing with. We've got to see what this boogeyman looks like.

Yes, sir. Once you have all that, now we can figure out what everything's actually worth. Then we can figure out how much we're underwater. And that becomes our gap we need to save up. Yes, yes. But it feels to me that you've got to do what George says and go, okay, let me just see what I can do here and how much we can knock this thing down. You know, filing for bankruptcy is the last option here. And I almost wonder if you don't try to go work for somebody else for a season.

You know, you just moved to a new area, but you've got skill and you've got experience. True or false? Yeah, both. True. And the other thing, I was actually trying to get out of what I do because of the labor field, the employees and the damages and the bad choices that they bring and they cause. Okay. What would you do?

I've got some other options. I could start a hotshot company where I go around hauling loads for people at various prices by myself. Is that going to pay you the most amount of money?

You get my point here? Let me reframe you for just a minute. We'll get back to your bigger debt issue. George, you know where I'm going with this. I want to know what you can make the most amount of money doing right now. What can you do? What skill set and experience? Hauling people's junk. I can do that. And I have very little skills, as George knows. Mm-hmm.

But Ken and I can go get a pickup and just pick up trash. And George and I could start a trash hauling company today. But, I mean, that's not a premium service. What do you get paid the highest dollar to do? Where is the most margin for you? What kind of jobs? Well, selling the outdoor landscape construction is probably the highest, but it seems to be such a roller coaster in terms.

And that's kind of the first thing to go in people's budget. Why is it a roller coaster? What happened in 2024 where it's like, well, the market in Houston, just nobody wants landscaping anymore. I just don't buy that. You keep blaming people. People quit spending money on services like that. Let's say that you're right and we're wrong. Although I have some questions, which we're not going to solve in our limited time. Let's go back to the question real quickly. I want you to answer it. What is the best skill and experience that you have?

Outside of what you've been doing and hauling trash, give me something. Where can you make the most money right now? Doing what? I've bought and sold real estate and I've bought and sold heavy equipment, trailers and trucks. Okay, but again, bought and sold, that's not a skill. You're telling me a business idea. You don't have any money.

And so you getting into some type of business right now is very risky. You're looking for the next scheme to shortcut your way out of this, and there is no shortcut out of a half million dollars in debt when you're underwater on all this equipment. The next scheme is going to put you further into debt. So one last shot. What's a trade skill that you have, their best trade skill? Like I said, driving trucks. I could get a job with driving semis, making $150,000 a year. All right. What did you pay yourself last year?

I didn't pay myself anything because the business I get it is a trap question. Go start driving a truck today, George. Now, what does he do if he starts making one hundred fifty thousand? You're going to live on as little of it as possible and make minimum payments on your debts to keep them current. And you're going to have to debt snowball your way out of this attack. The smallest debt first with all the margin you can and then work your way out of this. And if you can get a loan for the difference from a credit union on some of this equipment and sell it and get rid of it, that's your best bet.

Yeah. If you can do that with all of the equipment, it'll really bring your debt way down. I could go into the trucking deal two ways. I could go in it driving someone else's semi, or I could go into it with my truck and trailer that I currently have and make about the same amount of money. Do you have all the correct licensing? You don't need to get any further experience or tests? No. Yeah, I've got all that. Well, then that's what I would do. And you don't have a team right now for your business? No.

Is there anyone that's on your payroll? Yeah, I've got three employees on the landscape company right now. Well, you can tell them they've got to go find other work. Yeah, what are they doing if there's no business to be had? Well, I'm finding and selling some jobs, but I'm not finding the bigger jobs that I'm used to selling that put money in the bank. It still seems like the area of Texas that I'm in is...

Ryan, you got to stop blaming everything. It's the location. Nobody wants to work. It's the labor. You signed up for half a million dollars in debt. So let's start with the bad choices there before we go pointing fingers and let's clean this up. Income is going to be the solution here while bringing your expenses as low as possible. So everything that you don't have to drive in this new trucking job.

You sell. And yes, you'll have to pay the difference off. But that, again, is going to give you some breathing room. But you got to get after this. Go make some money and don't try to start another business. Not now.

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You can connect with a Ramsey-trusted insurance pro who will only get you what you need at the best price. Go to ramseysolutions.com slash insurance, ramseysolutions.com slash insurance. All right, question for you. Have you ever found yourself trying to explain the baby steps to somebody? Yes. Struggling with money. You have? It's difficult sometimes. Yeah, yeah. Words are hard for you at times. Exactly. Well, if that's you, you're going, I love this stuff. I can understand it, but...

I'm trying to talk to my family about it or friends or whatever. We put together, I say we, there's no we. I didn't do anything.

But our amazing production team, probably led by our fearless leader, James Childs, for all we know, have put together the Ramsey 101 playlist. You're asking, well, what's a Ramsey 101 playlist? What that means is the basics, the fundamentals. In a free, easy-to-share playlist, it covers what are the baby steps, how to pay off debt with a debt snowball, or maybe how to build an emergency fund, just to give you some basic examples of

And you can get this by clicking on the link at the top of our show notes to open the Ramsey 101 playlist on YouTube. So you can see it. By the way, this link is easy because it's on YouTube. You can text it, DM it, send it in a group chat. Can you snap it? I don't know. Is that a thing? I think kids are doing that. I'm not on Snapchat. I don't know if they're doing links in there. I don't know. But the point is, if you can send a link...

It's there, the Ramsey 101 playlist. Check it out in the show notes. Andrew's up in Austin, Texas. Andrew, how can we help? Hello. I just wanted to ask some advice on what you would do in my situation. And my current situation is that I'm currently a university student in Austin. And I fortunately got a full ride

And I'm thinking about going into graduate school. However, that would have to come out of pocket. And the reason why I'm kind of like not wanting to do that is because, of course, it would have to like I would have to get a loan. And that means going to debt after I just got a free college education. So smart man. I don't really know what to do. OK, let's just walk through the details, OK?

Because I think your instincts are right. Let's walk through it. See if George and I agree with you. Okay. So how much would it cost you out of pocket to get this graduate degree?

I'm thinking it's going to be around, well, it's in-state, so it would probably be less than $200,000, but I'm thinking somewhere around there, maybe like $150,000. What kind of program is this? Hold on, you're getting ahead of me, George. I had some sticker shock, understandably. So are we saying $150,000 or $200,000? What are we saying, Andrew? $150,000. Let's say $150,000. All right, now let's answer George's question. What is this degree?

Aerospace engineering. A doctorate? Ph.D.? What? Master's? Yes. Yes, Ph.D. So a Ph.D. in what? Aerospace engineering. Oh, you're one of those smart people. Okay. All right. Very nice. That's impressive. Okay. So when they say it's not rocket science, this one actually is rocket science. Got it. Okay. That's right. Ph.D. Okay. All right. So now the next question. If the Ph.D. program were not on the table,

There was no way you could do it. What would your next steps be? Where would you be headed? I would probably just get a job and start working from there and start building wealth. Well, I want to work for SpaceX. That's the goal. Or NASA. I want to

spacecraft or airplanes. I'm still kind of like in the middle of choosing between that. Great. I'm barely turning into a junior. So I'm barely becoming a junior. Gotcha. Okay. All right. So the point of my question was,

Your instincts were, "I don't want to go into debt." That's going to add a lot of pressure. All the things that you said, and by the way, George and I completely agree, those things are real and you don't need the PhD right now. You already know the direction you want to go. You may not know the destination, but you know the direction. You understand the difference? Exactly.

So if it were me, I would not get the Ph.D. right now because I believe that if the Ph.D. is something that is needed or wanted down the line after you've gotten into your field and you've crushed it and you have no debt. And so you've been able to stack up cash. You're investing all the things that George will walk you through. I want George to kind of walk you through your steps coming out of college here, assuming no debt.

But at that point, there's a good chance that there might be a company who would reimburse you or pay for your PhD program down the line. You following me? Yes. So that's a best case scenario. And then worst case, you have a great income doing aerospace engineering with undergrad and you put away 50 grand a year for three years and you cash flow the program. So that's option B. But I like this plan of you finishing undergrad, getting some work experience, getting a great income. I assume you're going to make six figures. Yeah.

Out the gate. I hope so. I'm actually not even sure. I see online it's like 80 to like 120. Okay. So let's call it six figures and let's say you keep living like a broke college student and you're able to put away 50K a year or so.

Now you can cash flow this thing without having a mountain of debt to stare at while being stressed about trying to step into this new field. And you may find out once you get in the field, and this is my number one reason for putting off a graduate degree, because you may find out you don't need it.

Yeah, that's honestly the whole reason why I even thought about it was because my father wants me to go into graduate school. There we go. See, that's a terrible. Can I just say, as a father, there are times where I project things on my kids. That's something that I think is a good idea.

And it's not the right idea. It may be a good idea, but it may not be the right idea. And in this case, sometimes your dad wants you to do this.

And there could be a variety of reasons why. I'm sure his heart's in the right place. But I would not do this if I were you. You could always come back. You understand what I'm saying? Like, you could get out in there and go, you know what? I wish I had gone and gotten the PhD into George's Point. Now you're in a place where you can cash flow it and there's no stress. And if dad wants you to go to grad school that badly, he can pay for it. How about that? Hey, now, there's a solution. Go, dad, I don't have 200 grand, so I'm not going to do this because you taught me to be a responsible adult.

So like I had told them like, so like, how am I going to pay for this? And he said, oh, I mean, like, don't even worry about it. It's going to pay itself off after you get out and you already have a PhD and you get a job. And I'm like, yikes. I don't think that's how that works. Good for you, young man. Good for you. It's like, wait a second, dad. How's that work? You know, and oh, by the way, does it come with stress relief pills?

you know, because all that debt hanging over your head. Cause see, you've really figured that out. Like George, one of the things I noticed right out of the gate with Andrew was he had already weighed the cost, the emotional and mental cost that a lot of people don't weigh the whole idea. Well, it'll pay for itself. Theoretically over time, if it does help you get a job, it can make money, blah, blah, blah, blah. But what nobody ever takes into account is the emotional and

And the mental anguish. That's true. And the fact that you're realizing that there's a lot of zeros on the end of this decision and you should not just jump into it because somebody said you can make a lot of money in aerospace. There's a lot of wisdom coming from you, especially at a young age. So I would listen to that small voice. Yeah. We're with you. Team Andrew right here.

Thank you. All it takes is, you know, Trump and Elon having one more fight and another government contract gets cut. All of a sudden SpaceX isn't hiring and now you're stuck because you thought, I have a PhD. Hire me, SpaceX. My dream. That's a very good point. So I would hold it all very loosely while working your tail off and living on less than you make, saving up as much as you can in order to fund this dream in the future if it's necessary. Yeah, I'm glad you said that because –

For those of you that can hear what George said and not think that he was taking a shot at either one of those men. It's just the truth. The fact of the matter is that could very well happen. It did. Contracts were threatened. You can say whatever you want to, but there were young people, what, 20 years ago, 25 years ago? Yeah.

that had just come out of school and they were like, I want to go work for Enron. This is going to be great. It's a great company. And I just got my MBA. I'm 150,000 in debt, but I just got an office on the sixth floor of Enron. Wow.

That was on a Monday afternoon. On Tuesday morning, the place was locked up. For some of you who are too young to know what I'm talking about, go Google it so you don't think I'm pulling a boomer move right here, which, by the way, I'm an Xer, not a boomer. Yeah, give him some credit. Give me a little bit of credit here. But, you know, the point is they thought they had it. They thought they had it made.

He had no idea that that company was a shell of itself and everything evaporated, George, just like that. So that's a very key point. Is it an extreme example? Yes. But if you add debt on top of all of that, you've got a recipe for disaster. And that's the calls we take on the show is when you thought something was going to work out and it didn't. And so being debt free is the way to be.

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Let's go to Gene in Vancouver. Gene, how can we help? Yeah, I was just, I wanted to ask the question if my girlfriend and I should get married right now, given all the circumstances and all the factors. Well, what are your circumstances and factors?

So, uh, we've been together for five years, right? Um, just like a lot of relationships and we've had our ups and downs. Uh, we're both believers, both trying to grow in our faith. Uh, I, like I, I've been technically married before, which pretty much means, uh, 12 years ago, I made a dumb decision of just going to a courthouse with a girl like a month after meeting her. Um, and I

And I've just kind of had some like relationship stuff in my past. Like I was engaged another time to a girl I was with for a year and she just wasn't ready. Her parents are going through a divorce, couldn't make it work. But recently, I guess you could say I hit like a kind of a weird, like I was getting ready for engagement and,

Um, and then I kind of hit a weird patch where I kind of ran into burnout at work and just kind of fell into like a little bit of anxiety, uh, and just trying to like rebuild my internal world and, um, taking some time off work. Like I've been off work for almost a couple of weeks, uh, which she's okay with. Like she says, she's willing to work with me through everything. And, um, and I'm just working on kind of, I'm sorry, hold on. When you say she, you mean your girlfriend is okay with this?

Yeah, like she said, she's willing to like work with me through things and rebuild things. And obviously she wants to get engaged. Like we're both in our high 30s, right? What's your work saying about this? Is your work giving you this time off or is this time you've taken off like paid medical leave?

What's causing the burnout?

I think a lot of it was when I had a whole bunch on the go leading up to when it happened. Like, I was selling, like, three properties on the side. I was in my busy time at work. I was kind of overthinking a bunch of things. And I think all of it just kind of came to a point where my body was like, okay, like, let's just chill. Okay. Do you love this girl? Yeah.

I really love this girl, yeah. Is this very different than any previous relationship that you've had? Yeah, it feels like it's a lot deeper. Okay. And is she ready to get married?

She's like fully ready to get married to me, yeah, like in spite of everything I'm going through. For me, I just kind of feel like I'm wondering if I should have it more together and figure out more of my stuff first. Well, you keep saying all this stuff. Is there something you're not telling us? And I'm not trying to get you to bury your soul, but I want to make sure that – George and I have been doing this a long time. Sometimes people will bury the lead, George calls it.

And so you go all this stuff I'm going through because, listen, I don't want to minimize burnout. OK, burnout. I get it. It happens. I think you're a classic overthinker because I'm an overthinker and I think I hear the signs. And so I'm not judging you. I'm calling myself. I'm an overthinker if I stay in my head. But is there anything else going on? Any past major trauma or is it just you are a classic overthinker and you've had some ups and downs and you just don't want to make the wrong decision?

What's going on? It's that too. And also like, I've just been healing a little bit from like, like, I think, I don't know why, but a lot of things kind of surfaced in the season. Like I was kind of healing a little bit and just renewing my brain from some like verbal abuse and stuff from my dad. Right. And at some point here, him and I are going to go to counseling. Like he got saved maybe two years ago. Okay. Are you going to counseling on your own right now?

I am. Yeah. And, and like, it's, um, um, what is the feedback from that? What are, what are they saying is going on or what are the, what's the solution? What kind of tools would you need to live a full stable life?

With them, she honestly hasn't really been talking to me that much about that. She's just been more so like giving me assessments and stuff. But I've been in counseling a little bit with like my pastor and her pastor. Okay, great. So premarital counseling, essentially. Yeah.

Kind of, yeah. So pretty much like the response I'm getting from my pastor and her pastor is like, do it, do it, like quit overthinking it, do it. Well, there's a notion. I see that's where I'm at. I felt like I heard that. I mean, all the things that you're dealing with right now are going to be helped by being in a healthy, stable marriage. A marriage, unless there's something going on that I'm unaware of,

And it doesn't sound like this is the case. You actually stop thinking and start serving because that's what marriage is. You stop thinking and start sacrificing because that's what marriage is. Like, dude, move forward. This is a very different relationship. Feels like you've learned from the past. You're going to think your way into being single in your 50s if you're not careful.

Yeah, no, I, I, I appreciate that. Um, if she's the one and decide, then do it and then keep getting healthy.

You know? Yeah. She's an amazing girl. Yeah. I just, like I said, I just feel like a bunch, a whole bunch of things happened at once. And then I kind of crashed and I feel like I'm in the process of like God restoring my, my internal world. And then it got a little more complex than that too. Like it was even like, like, uh, like she, she, she's just getting her citizenship in our country. Yeah.

after like eight years of fighting for it she's amazing that way and then for me like I like it was kind of weird but leading up to the time where I was getting close to engagement like I actually randomly got my citizenship in Europe through dissent like I just hired a lawyer I didn't really think it was possible and it kind of all came true and I started overthinking things I'm like well what if I'm called to Europe and she's called to here and then maybe a lot of that kind of you don't have to explain it to us

I get it. I am an overthinker. Hear me say, and I've learned how to stop that mess. And here's how you stop doing it. You start focusing on what you're excited about in the future that you want. And you stop focusing on all the fears that could actually hurt the future because there is no future without some type of risk and putting yourself in a marriage. And the point is you have been scared enough.

And over-analytical on this entire call, except for one moment. George, you remember what it was? Did you hear it in his voice? When he said he loves this girl? Yeah. Yep. I didn't, I didn't, George didn't know where I was going. That was an open-ended question. That was a wild guess. Well, you heard it.

I did. I felt it. Your voice. I could feel your blood pressure just go, whew. Yeah. It was like, you're this cat on a top 10 roof until you talk about this girl. And your voice dropped. I'll bet you your shoulders dropped. So I got to tell you, this is all weekend. We have a few minutes with you. But hearing that over the phone, hearing what your pastor said,

George, here's my take, Gene. I think you have been overthinking and looking for all these distractions because you're scared of doing the hard thing, which is dealing with what's going on inside, dealing with this impending engagement. And so you're scheming for the next thing and I'm going to become a European citizen. I'm going to flip another property. You're just looking for all these ways out. And the only way through it is through it. And so that's what I would tell you to do is just...

Simplify your life. Focus on one thing at a time. Focus on stable income. Focus on the relationship that is right in front of you and ignore everything else. Yeah. No more distractions. No more hustles. No more schemes. No more European citizenship. Yeah. And stop focusing on all the stuff that happened to you in the past. It happened. Yeah. It shaped you. So you're

Yeah. Okay. All right, but listen, you don't have to get married tomorrow. You don't have to rush the engagement, but I would move forward, my man, or else this gal's going to move on, and you don't want that to happen. Mm-mm. Mm-mm.

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Our scripture of the day is Proverbs 2, verses 6 through 7. For the Lord grants wisdom from his mouth come knowledge and understanding. He grants a treasure of common sense to the honest. He is a shield to those who walk with integrity. Our quote of the day from Elon Musk. Well, right out of the old headlines here. Old move. When something is important, you do it even if the odds are not in your favor.

Okay. Very underdog. All right. Kind of low-key Elon there. The odds, may the odds... Be ever in your favor? Be ever in your favor. Thank you, George. Wait a... Nice. It's like we can finish each other's sentences. That's amazing right there. James is in shock back there. I love how impressed Ken was with himself for getting that one right. I'm really thrilled. Oh, me, me, hold on. I know this one. I can do it. Sentences.

Wow. David in Dallas, Texas is where we're going next. David, how can we help? Hey, I really appreciate you taking my call. I figured I would start with the numbers, if that's okay with y'all. Yes, sir. I have about $246K in debt. $29K is in credit card debt. $9K is in personal loan debt.

and $200K is in a mortgage. I have a two-part question. My take-home recently just increased from about $6,500 to $8,800 a month, and I'm about to start up school in the fall. I was wondering if I should take these subsidized loans to pay the high-interest debt off and decrease that interest from about 23% to 7%.

And just continue making the same payments plus the amount my income just recently increased. That's my first question. So let's separate the mortgage from the consumer debt because you're in baby step two and the mortgage comes into play in baby step six, paying that off early. So that makes this mountain more like a hill. You have a great income and you have less than 40K in debt, right, between the credit cards and the personal loan.

Just under. Just – yeah. So what I wouldn't do is think, well, I can get rid of my debt by taking out another debt to pay off the other debt. That's as crazy as it sounds. And I know you're looking at the math going, well, it's a lower interest rate. It will help me get out of debt faster. But that is a trap that actually keeps people in debt longer. And it feels real icky to go, I'm going to take out a student loan under the guise of getting an education but really I'm paying off credit card debt.

So I would encourage you to look, peel back, go 30,000 feet up and go, what is the best solution to my current problem? Which is I need to go to school for, to get a degree. Is that the purpose? Yeah. Why now? I just want more.

It's my current job. Half of my, speaking candidly, half of my income is from VA disability, and the other half is from my W-2 job. And I just, I want to have a higher income on my W-2. I want to get a degree that gets me somewhere in business. Okay, but let's just challenge that just for a minute. I'm all for it. Okay. If that degree will actually get you where you want to go. Okay.

I've got a two-part question I always ask people. Is a degree the only way to get the job you want or the career path, or is it the best way? And I'm just curious if you've mapped out a very specific, let's call it job, or more of a direction professionally. Have you done that? Yeah.

Yes, it's currently like in the field I'm in, in medical staffing, and I have applied within the industry and within my own company. And unfortunately, one of the things or the only thing that seems to be holding me back is I don't have the stupid degree. Okay, so in your particular industry to move up the ladder in medical staffing, which is where you want to climb, they are requiring a degree.

Yes. Okay. What is that? What's the absolute cheapest you can get that degree for? And I mean cheapest because they really don't care what I'm doing now. When I got it accepted ASU online. Okay. And how much is that? Eight months left on the VA VA loan. I mean, GI bill. So they're going to pay for eight months of that.

and I'll have to pay out of pocket for the next. Okay, great. So we can avoid student loan debt completely then. We're going to cash flow this out of pocket instead of scheming to try to pay off our credit card debt. Okay, great. So here's the deal. You make $8,800 a month. What are your actual expenses every month you have to pay?

I have to pay around $4,500 a month. To add to this, I was around $52K in debt a year and a half ago, down to $29K now. Amazing. Great job. Door dashing after work, I door dashed for four to six hours. Good. That leads into my second part question after this. I'm just showing you the math on it. You just told me that you should have $4,300 extra to throw at your debt every month.

Yes, sir. Which means this thing's gone in less than nine months. Yes, sir. And at the same time, we need to cash flow school. I want to save an interest. But yes, correct. Okay. So now we have a new plan. I just want to get clear on the goals here. The goal is to get out of debt, and the goal is to get a degree. I don't want to combine the two into this weird, like, I'm going to take out this debt to pay off another debt. Let's work on cash flowing school while attacking this debt with our current income.

Okay.

Yes. So that – I think once you start thinking longer term, you'll make different decisions versus the kind of out of desperation, which is where you're at now going, well, I'm going to try to take out this debt to pay off another debt because the interest is high. Just do the debt snowball, knock out the smallest debt with all the muster you can find in that budget, which is thousands and thousands of dollars, and you'll be out of debt in no time and cash flow is cool. Okay. Yeah.

That's the only way I would do it. I got one more, the second part to my question. Okay. Of that income, about $1,200 to $1,500 of it is from door dashing around 30 to 40 hours a week after I work my full-time job. I have a firstborn baby due in about a month from now. Wow. And I was wondering...

Should I continue to tough it out and dash these 30, 40 hours a week to knock out this debt? Or because my income just increased quite a bit, should I take that time back now that I have this baby on the way? Do you have any savings? I have very little savings. I have...

Maybe $5,000 roughly in savings. Okay. What is your wife's plan to work through this after? No, she's stay at home. She's been stay at home for the past year. And that's the way we would both like it when the baby comes. Okay. Well, in this case, we would tell you to pause the debt snowball and just stack up cash. So you said it's a month from now?

Yes. Okay. So just save up as much as possible. That might be another five grand in savings that gives you 10 grand. Once mommy and baby are home safe, we can push play on the debt snowball and continue on. So you're just going to temporary pause in the plan for 30 days. Then we'll move on from there and follow the plan we just told you. Do that debt snowball, knock out the debt, and then make sure that we're able to cash flow the rest of school once the GI bill runs out.

Gotcha. So some proper planning here will get you out of this whole mess instead of keeping you in it by just taking on new debt to cover other debts instead of the shell game. Yeah. You're in a great path. I was really struggling with it, and I had a feeling I was going to get that, but I needed to hear it. We're pretty boring that way. We're consistent. Yeah. No real curveballs coming from us. But, you know, back to this issue here of how he can go about getting where he wants to get to.

I know so many people that still fall into this trap. And I know you talk a lot about traps and trends, but I wanted you to weigh in. A trap that still exists is that I'm not happy where I am financially or professionally, and I need to get a degree. And I just always want to challenge that statement. Is it need or is it I believe I need?

Or I want to because of a perception. And, you know, every field is different. We're increasingly seeing companies drop that degree requirement. But, George, I just I want to make sure that people just don't get sucked into that because you can really talk yourself into debt. In this case, we weren't looking at that. Sure. No, we're on the same page all the time. I always have a huge pause when I hear someone go, well, I want to go back to school. For what? To get a degree. For what? Well, I just think it'll be better for me.

We need a very clear goal and a clear why. And like you say, is it the only way and is it the best way? Yeah. That's an automatic question. If you look into it, it takes the emotion out of what you think. And then if the answer, by the way, is no to either one of those great news, there's another one. Pause. George, good show today. Always fun being with you, pal. Thank you, James Childs and our fearless crew. This is The Ramsey Show. ♪

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