Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Dollars Car Rental Studios, it's the Dave Ramsey Show where Ned is dumb. Cash is king and the paid off home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host. You jump in, we'll talk about your life and your money. Chris Hogan is my co-host today. Ramsey personality number one, bestselling author of the book Everyday Millionaires.

And you do need to read that book. It's how people became millionaires. It's not. Mythology, it's the truth based on research. So check it all out, open phones here at eight eight two five five two two five. So Chris handed me an article right as we're going on the air survival mode, over 68 percent of Americans had financial setbacks in 2020. Amid the pandemic, more than two thirds of Americans experienced financial setbacks in 2020 due to job loss, declining household income or drawdown of emergency savings, according to a new Fidelity study.

Job loss, declining household income or drawdown of emergency savings? OK, the report by the financial services company also looked at how Americans plan to handle their finances as they head into 2021 and continue to face challenges brought on by the pandemic. Well, let me correct you on that, USA Today, it's not brought on by the pandemic.

The financial challenges are not brought on by the pandemic or the brought on by the economic shutdown because of as they say, that's what the government says, OK, and the government is brought on by your government. That's where your financial problems are brought on by when you shut down people's ability to make a living, make an income, then they're going to have financial trouble.

That really wouldn't be an insight. USA Today, that would be a fairly obvious conclusion. Cause and effect. But it's not the pandemic. The pandemic didn't cause it because people being sick with covid did not cause the economy to collapse. The shutdowns by the government caused the economy to collapse in fear of people being sick with a pandemic. And you know, lots of things to discuss there, of the people surveyed, over 38 percent said they will spend the year in survival mode.

Now, what I want to talk about, Chris, from this was I get any time I see it's a good survey. Sample size was 3000 people.

So it's a legitimate statistical, statistically significant.

I don't know the wording of the questions that they use to draw their conclusions without having studied statistics. And you and I spent a lot of time on research methodology.

When we were building out, our company was building out with an outside research firm, the study for Millionaire. Right. And we want to be careful to not ask the question in such a way that it's leading up.

And we don't want to say, OK, what's really going on?

We want to get behind what's going on. So, for instance, in this, 38 percent say they're in survival mode in 2021, but the unemployment rate is six percent.

So, you know, we all I mean, if you're to household income, you lost one income, right? And you had bills based on double income, you could be in survival mode and still not be unemployed. One person be unemployed, but the other would not be right.

So that's possible.

But what I would read between the lines into this research and say is that one of the biggest problems with the economic shutdown brought on by the government in an attempt to control the pandemic.

It is that it has affected attitudes more than reality. Depression is up, though, without a doubt. Suicide is up, as Dr. Dallen, he calls them the diseases of despair. Mm hmm. Are up. And so my attitude.

My belief. That things are worse than they really are in my house, because I watch the news so much. My house is actually OK, but I watch the news so much that I think things are bad. So I go into survival mode, OK?

I'm with you. And it's not an actual mathematic thing. Oh, it's a self-fulfilling prophecy.

It's a I'm freaked out because I've watched the news so much. Right. That told me that it was coming to an end. And I listen to the governor of California and I listen to the governor of New York and I said, we're all going to die.

And so it's you know, it's over, we need to stay inside and just wait on death to come and we're locked down again still, except for the people that left those two states, which is half the freakin population there with the last person out of California, please turn out the lights.

Oh, my God. You people are all leaving but the.

And moving here. Why, yes, they leave us alone. We like Tennessee. Anyway, the so so the point is not all of that, but the point is that.

Yes, people are really hurting. Yeah, some are, and we're here to help you. We do that, but some of it is. And this is what I want to warn our listeners about, because if you believe things are going bad and you start taking all your decisions based on things going bad, you're going to cause them to go bad. What you said were a self-fulfilling prophecy, right?

No, no, that's absolutely true. And I look at it this it's at 68 percent of people had setbacks, 23 percent lost a job or household income, 20 percent had an unexpected non health emergency, 18 percent had to provide unexpected financial aid to family or friends. And then 16 percent had a health emergency in their family. I mean, what was the unexpected health that down here? The first page, 20 percent had an unexpected non health emergency, non health emergency.

So that's called an emergency. That's one in five, right? Well, OK.

The number we've quoted for a thousand years around here and it stayed true. Was it 78 percent of Americans in any given year? In any given year, right. Will have an emergency. Yeah. And 20. That's about right. Then 20 percent would normally do that without covid without it.

A non health emergency, about 20 percent of people have a non health emergency, though 78 percent, except those in a five year period of time, wasn't it? Yes, that's that old stat we used to quote is an old Money magazine staff. Yeah, it's old, but I mean, it's still accurate because life hasn't changed that much plus or minus pandemic crap, but.

Yeah, so 78 percent of Americans have an emergency in any given year. Oh, no. That's in a given decade. That's what it would be, about 20. Yeah, that's not that's not far off. OK, so what I'm trying to figure out here is this. So if they survey me and they said, did you have a financial setback this year? I could easily say yes. Yes, we lost the entire segment of revenue at Ramsey Solutions of of events, not the entire.

But we lost 90 percent of it. However. Other areas of the business are up to the point that our overall revenues are up right year over year, not down, but I did receive setbacks. Yeah. So it depends on my attitude toward the situation is how to answer that so I could go, oh, God, things are bad and your is my spirit animal. And so it's all bad and it's just not going anywhere. And I've had setbacks this year and we have had setbacks.

Right. And it's been very freaking stressful and it's been hard. It's been really hard for some of you out there. I know that I'm not making fun of you at all. I know some of you have had a year from hell. I understand we're here to help you work through that and be the third pick. The next time in the brick house with the big bad wolf comes by. We don't ever want you to be there again. We want you to be in a reset mode.

We're going to help you. That's what we do.

But your attitude is important is reflected in this survey, I think.

I would think so, Dave. I think you're right. I had a setback, without a doubt. But I'm up. So which will ensure that the White House will ensure that the reason that we answer that question is based on my attitude, not based on the mathematical reality.

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All right. I can't wait to hear Dave's reply to this. We may disagree. Today's question comes from George in Pennsylvania says, My children are six and seven and have accumulated about 5000 in cash and gifts since they were born. My thought is to use the money towards baby step two with the intention of investing heavily in their 529. Once we get to baby steps four or five and six, which we anticipate reaching by the end of the year, my wife, on the other hand, feels guilty about using that money to pay off consumer debt.

Please advise. OK, I'm going first. Absolutely. Don't use the kid's money. That's for the children. You don't crack that piggy bank open, you leave that money alone. You put it in the bank and let it grow. What are you going to do?

Sorry, I'm curious. I agree with you. Really. OK, actually. Yeah, OK.

And the reason is this. It's 5000 dollars. It's not 500000. Right.

Technically speaking, it is not their money. It's your money from a legal perspective. OK, they're minors. They don't have old assets now.

And so you could use it and be legally OK.

The problem is that you're going to feel like a dog for having used your little kids money to clean up your big boy mess. And it's going to be that that feeling is going to cost you more money than 5000 dollars because you're going to be looking over your shoulder thinking God's getting ready to smack you for doing this at all times. I mean, you really feel guilty about it, right? And so your wife is her spirit is right about this and Chris is right.

So I would leave it alone because even though it's technically OK, it's not enough money to take to do the emotional damage to yourself, because unless you're a wacko, you feel weird and bad using your kids money.

Yeah. Yeah. You know, now there's wackos, you know, people doing cocaine and they go steal their kids money to buy cocaine. And that's wacko. All right. Or they steal their kids identity. That's wacko, that kind of stuff. But I'm not talking about wacko. I'm talking about normal people.

And most people at least, you know, have some love for their children. And we feel weird about using their kids money. And so they would, you know, go along with what you're saying, Chris.

And it really does, because so much of the stuff is about managing attitude and behavior. What we're talking about in the last segment, and this affects attitude. It does. And therefore behavior. Sean is with us in Los Angeles. Hey, Sean, welcome to The Dave Ramsey Show.

Hey, Dave. Sure. What's up?

Hey, so I think I'm on baby set for negative unshaved. Think about proposing next month my girlfriend. Yeah. So so anyway, I was wondering and do I do I take it to be I, I think I can button my emergency fund a little because I have quite a bit saved and I'm just kind of just like I'll have fifteen thousand on Friday.

OK, and what's your income. Seventy thousand. OK, all right, you got some sabiston, I wouldn't call it a bunch, but you're probably about right for for your emergency, you know. Yeah. And so what do you think about spending on the ring?

I don't I know you said one month, so I figured out another 500, I guess, whatever. Mm. And you don't have any money saved towards the ring.

No, I've been just sort of working, so I've been like putting away for like the last six months, so. So, yeah, that's what I was say. There's a significant date next month. That's what I thought would be a nice time to do it. So it was kind of, you know, I mean, know.

So how much of the 3500 can you scrape together between now and then? Probably not related to them so much that, OK, well, if he stole 1500 out of the emergency room, probably wouldn't kill you.

Yes, but you got to put it right back, put it back, yeah, OK. And I might consider going 2500 in just cash flow on it. OK, I've been married 38 years, my wife married me, the ring was point to three. That's less than one fourth of a carrot. That means you cannot see it. It is a speck. It's a little speck. Now, she does not wear that anymore. That's in the safe for nostalgic reasons.

And she wears a headlight on her hand now. But but it started with a speck. And so the the point is there's very little correlation between the size of the diamond and the success of the marriage.

Right. You have none, except there might be an inverse correlation that for some point, if they require a super large diamond, they're probably a bad deal. So, yeah, that could be an inverse correlation after a certain point.

But I mean, it's so hold on. Is the Ramsey rule one month's salary? Yeah. OK, yeah, that's what's in that. But just because the jewelry stores in the mall say three months. Right.

So I just figured a third of them or you're erring on the side of saying, I mean think about though she makes seventy grand that puts them in 2500. All right. That feels right. It does feel right.

And it took 10000 or 12000. A ring does not feel right. That's wrong. That's right. Way out of bounds.

You know, that's more than sufficient to seal the deal assuming this deal is closable. So to me, it boils down to the size of ring and all this, you're in a business negotiation. Well, this isn't a marriage, and so you need to see that red flag for what it is.

So last thing on this is, Aaron, you know, we're our show and we're having fun. Congratulations. This is a wonderful time for you.

But really, if you'll think about how you buy the diamond, 2500 will go almost as far as 3500. It will at a different place. And so if you know someone who knows a little bit about diamonds that can help you and help you appraise it or something like that.

A high end pawn shop is probably 50 percent of the retail jewelry store in the mall. And you can you can really find some deals there from time to time, but you need to know a little bit about damage so you don't buy a piece of glass accidentally.

Right.

OK, and and, you know, understand the you know, just read up, start researching and getting ready to spend three thousand dollars on something. You need to learn a little bit about Carrott, about clarity, about cut, you know, and because here's the thing. The thinking things are not an investment. We got a bunch of. Sharon does. I don't wear jewelry, but she's got a bunch of them and they don't go up in value.

That's mythology, so it's just EWR, Sharon wants it. That's the only reason we bomb.

It's not like diamonds are a girl's best friend now. They're really not. That's just an advertising slogan. OK. And so it's just they're sweet and they're nice. And it's a good thing for you guys to do for your lady. That's a good idea. Do it and spend some money on it. That's fine. But don't do it based on it's a good investment that is going to go up. That's a load of crap. OK, just just do it because it's the right thing to do and it's a gift and something fun.

And and later, as your income goes up, if you wanted to upgrade, you can do that. That's what we did. Yeah, but you're not going to get rid of that first one. I can tell you right now from a sentimental standpoint, but it's good to hear. And guys out there be smart, you know, and look at some diamond brokers.

Right. And look at look at some high end pawn shops and shop around because there is a furniture and jewelry, have dramatic markups in them. And so that you can get deals if you just start if you learn about it and you push back and you negotiate and you shop around and you compare and you don't just go just walk into the mall and go, huh.

Yeah. It's like. Yeah. You know.

Yeah, that's it. Open phones at eight eight two five five two two five.

What a wonderful thing. Oh that's literally like right after the first of the year then, huh. Yeah. For him. Yeah. That's good. Absolutely. Very cool stuff. Good, good, good.

All right. Joe is on YouTube. If our phones are included on our monthly phone bill, should the price of phones be included in the debt snowball you pay for your phone period or you don't buy phone?

If it's included in your monthly phone bill, you know what that's called payments, you financed your phone doofus. Don't finance your phone.

Oh, good Lord, pay cash even if you got to go get a flip phone. Right. For those that think, yes, they still make them barnow. Yukari, wash your mouth. But people will be smart. You know, I'm frugal. You're generous. You're just cheap. I can't do this. This is the Dave Ramsey. Free at last, it was one of the best decisions of my life. That's what Neil said about using time-Share exit team to get out of his timeshare after the resort refused to let him out.

Listen, I've said it before. If you've tried selling your timeshare and can't if the resort refuses to take it back, call, share, exit team. The people I trust call eight four four nine nine nine exit or time-Share exit team dot com.

Chris Hogan Ramsey personality is my co-host today here on the air, open phones, a triple eight eight two five five two two five. George and Barkley are with us in Augusta, Georgia. It says on my screen, you're debt free. Way to go, guys.

Hey, thank you much.

Way to go. How much have you guys paid off?

Seventy six thousand five hundred five bucks and ten once in your range of income.

During that time, we started about ninety nine thousand six hundred sixty and we ended with ninety three thousand four hundred and twenty and kind of ebbed and flowed through that through the side hustle gained during those 10 months. But you you know, well done, you guys.

What kind of death was a 77 Graham student debt? Car loans was the biggest part of it, about 50000 dollars worth of car loans and credit cards. On top of that, of course, you got to have credit cards, 50 dollars worth of car loans that you sell some.

We got rid of both of them. We traded them in we saved up money and bought cars in cash. What do you drive online? I told George I'm selling mine.

You're going to sell your truck to Dave. I have connected with these two before. And Barkley is as a reporter and does an amazing job. She's fiery and feisty, but they got they got intentional and extremely serious. Tell Dave kind of what some of your motivation was behind this sudden level of intensity.

So a year ago, we, in our first year of marriage, experienced our first major miscarriage. We had a couple more after that. But really a few months after that, we went just head down and said, what's something that we can control? And also, whoa, if we actually had brought a child into this world, we'd be paycheck to paycheck. Could we have even afforded this? And so we just I got budget heavy with the app.

I checked it just about every day and just started going through the house and just selling stuff. I mean, we just we really and during that time, of course, we had a couple more miscarriages. And it's almost like each time it happened, we got more intentional with our goal. And that was we took a terrible thing and it really turned out to be triumphant at the end. It was a huge blessing for us. I mean, a terrible blessing.

We were lucky to have experience to get us where we are today. Yeah.

Oh, wow. That's a that's a tough road, right? Yes, it is. So well done, you guys. I'm so proud of you. I don't knock it out of you.

How does it feel to be free now? Amazing. Oh, my God. It actually feels like I have my feet underneath me, even though I still know that it's a long ways away. But it's we're a lot closer than we would have been. Yeah. We actually before we started, somebody gave me a few, ten years ago the DVD set. And it was just the one thing that as I moved, I never got rid of. And so I pulled the DVD out a year ago and I realized I don't have a DVD player anymore.

And so there's still a bit too far. I know.

But during that same time, we were looking at homes and we were trying to scratch together like 2000 bucks. Like we can put a down payment of two thousand dollars. Right. I mean, we just had no idea what we were trying to borrow money from family. Just think about it. Yeah. And then like, we sat down and really kind of hunkered down on our budget. We were like, we were so dumb. We can not accept this money from other people.

This is a bad idea. We're just putting ourselves in a worse situation, higher payments. And technically, we couldn't afford it, which we couldn't afford it.

So what was the car you sold in the truck you sold? What were they?

So mine was a Lexus SUV. I thought it was the it was the mom car that I was eventually going to need but did not need at the time. And that was my 50000, though, a car that had paid off about fifteen grand on it so far. But I thought I was doing well. So I sold that and then and I had a twenty fourteen Silverado that I bought when I worked at the dealership. I had about eighteen thousand left on that one.

We traded that in and I got a forerunner with one hundred seventy five thousand miles on it but in good condition. So and I got a six thousand dollar Volvo that thank goodness taxes kind of got pushed to July because we were able to use some tax money we had set aside to to buy that. And it worked out great. I mean, timing and everything just worked out really, really well for us to go.

You guys you guys have fun. You really worked hard. You sacrificed and was selling the two. Furnished cars, that's emotional for you, but it also it also signals the friends to and they start making fun of you. Oh, it was tough.

I was so excited to have that like this originally. But what we did is we had to immediately change our thought and we said, so we're going to take this and we're going to actually tell everybody how much that we're in and we're going to slaughter this debt. And those who thought we weren't going to be able to do it, we we really thought would be a couple of years. And when I would start looking at the the budget on the everyday app and I'm like, oh, gosh, George, look at this.

If we can put another thousand towards this, I think we can get done. And even a month earlier and a month earlier. And then the funny thing is, like the biggest the biggest thing that we consistently did every month as we tied every single month, every month, the following month, somehow we'd get a reimbursement check or an overpaid medical bill or a refund of some sort. And we just throw it out right to our debt. It was it was awesome.

That was actually the I think the thing that made us the most happy because like, there were times where you look at that money and you're tempted to do something with it. We never did. But it's there and it's forcing in your face like I could put this towards debt and pay out quicker. But we, the Lord, blessed us each time that we kept fighting. So that's amazing. One thing we'll never stop doing. Well, listen to me.

You guys are amazing in the decision you made. You know, the year we've dealt with in 2020, you've got people that are out there that are delaying getting started. What are you going to tell them? What are you going to tell them to motivate them to go ahead and get going on this process?

Well, first of all, you don't owe anything to anybody else. You put your pride aside, because if you can suck it up, listen, we don't know what our neighbors are going through. They don't you don't know how many people are in debt. We had so many people who were friends of ours that were like, wow, you've inspired us. I'm in this amount of money of that, like you can do is, as I say, as long as you have a pulse, you can get out of debt.

You just got to put your pride aside and do it. And I would say this life is yours for the taking know it is what you make it to be. So if you want to keep continuing on the path you're on, keep on doing it. Don't listen to the show if you want to change where you are and try something different. And our church at Stevens Creek here in Augusta just got there, Ramsey plus church subscription. So like we feel like we are completely surrounded.

You know, it's like the extra confirmation that, like, not only that we do it, but we we follow the right program to now, you know, you're going to lead the charge for everybody else. You're walking, breathing testimony. I'm so proud of you guys very, very well. Who were your biggest cheerleaders?

I would say our family, like our direct family, just kept Sheerness on. And we also had to just keep reminding them, like, hey, we have this much left to pay off. We did we did have a number of members of the church that would constantly reach out or when they found out, because there was a few of them that we didn't see often, but they would come in and they would just tell us how proud they were of us, where we were.

And once we finished it, it was like people came out of the woodwork. Yeah, yeah. That's cool. Congratulations, you guys.

We've got a copy of Chris's book for you. If you don't already have one, that is every millionaires. That's the next chapter in your story for sure.

Very well done. You guys are rock stars. Seventy seven. The month we got out of that, we also found out we were pregnant. So it came full circle with the story right there, you know.

Yeah. All right.

That's great news. Thanks for sharing that part. 77000 paid off in ten months, making one hundred thousand a year. Count it down, let's say a debt free scream three to one with great.

So cool. Wow, what a neat couple they really are, powerful stuff. This is The Dave Ramsey Show. Chris Hogan Ramsey personality is my co-host today, open phones, a triple eight eight two five five two two five. Aaron is with us in Illinois. Hi, Aaron. Welcome to The Dave Ramsey Show.

Hey, guys. How you doing? Great. How can I help? Well, so my wife and I have been married five and a half years and we really struggled to get on the same page financially. And I just finally got her to read Total Money Makeover, which she agreed to read like one chapter a week. And then she read it all into like three days before she got into it. But I'm trying to get her to do for you.

I think it would really help us just with, like, understanding budgeting better long term. And I don't really know how to she's not really wanting to pull the trigger on that. She wants to do she just wants to stay the course. Now that we've read one book and I kind of feel like we need a little more. We got any advice for that? How many kids you all have?

For really, what are their ages? We have two 11 year olds, a two year old and a 10 month old girl.

So she's been busy. Oh, yeah.

So I'm confused what your concern is. She's she's really enthusiastic because she read the whole book all at once real fast.

So why not why not just do the book? Well, I just feel like I don't know, I feel like maybe just I struggle with and we kind of struggle with understanding how to actually budget well long term, and that's kind of where I'm at. And so that's why I'm kind of like I feel like that would be good for us to go through.

You know, what I would do is just say, let's get on every dollar and download the app. It's free. Doesn't cost a thing. Yeah. And let's do the book and every dollar. And if you want to investigate it. Ramsey Plus as has a free trial, a 14 day free trial or seven day free trial, whatever it is, jump on there right now, a diver, Agency.com, and you can do that or you can text begin to 33 789 and just tell her, hey, let's look at the free trial together.

Mm hmm. And if you don't wanna do it after a free trial, just cancel it and do the book in the app.

Yeah. And I was asking about the kids day because oftentimes in order to get a spouse on board, every parent wants better for their kids and what they had. Yeah. And so if if you connect and you guys are thinking out loud about what you want your kids to be able to do, the things that you didn't get to and you want them, you start to realize as a parent or grandparent, you're in control of that. You just got to make some better decisions and work together.

Then that could be that step in dreaming in high definition. But no, you're right, the total money-MAKER Rahmati right now it looks a game changer still on the bestseller list and it's still waking people up and showing people what to do. But every dollar as well plug it into the app is know where you got to go. You can do it online, completely free. Yeah. And you can do a free trial and see if Ramsey plushest for you.

Right. You guys could even binge watch the FPU while you're doing that and look at it together and then, you know, it doesn't cost you a thing. Look at it and ask her to do that. And she does that. So she's just worried about spend the money. I don't blame her. Understand? She's all enthusiastic now. That's a good thing. Yeah. I just I would go with it man. But through with it you go with it.

This is like this where the roads are already paved. Just run down it. All right. You want some extra cash this Christmas? This is the final week to enter our Ramsey cash Christmas giveaway.

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Dave Ramsey, I'm just I'm looking at the form. This is the easiest form I've ever seen to enter to win. I keep getting blocked for some reason, any time I try to put my name in here.

But I'm because, Kris, you're a team member and you're not eligible.

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Don't let him register. It's rude. But listen to me, people. This is the easiest form. You put your first name, last name, email, phone number, zip code to win potentially popular dogs. Check it out. Yeah, five times are the 500 are all gone. Oh, we're down to the ground. This is the big one. The big bull won't do it. The big dog is on the porch. Frank is in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Hey, Frank, what's up?

Hey, guys. Good to talk to you guys. You're too short term listener, but a long time follower of your program, 35 years, even though he's had to do it that long.

You had common sense before it was cool.

How can we.

Yeah, so I've got to shovel the whole problem. I've got a large shovel and no how good I need some investment help. So I have a a set IRA that I contribute the max to every year, but I don't have very much money in my Roth IRA. Can I open a simple IRA? I'm a one man business and contribute to a Roth IRA. Simple. Yep. Yep.

Simples can be Roth. I think SEPs can be Roth. Can they. I think so though. My tax guy and my broker guy says that I can't do a Roth in my house.

OK then I'm wrong. OK, I'll go. I'll defer to them. I just, I assumed you could because you can't with everything else. Definitely you can do as simple as Roth and you can. The other thing you can do is you can roll out of a SEP every year and just pay the taxes and you're and it becomes a it becomes a Roth.

OK, can I convert some of the other traditional IRA money that I've got to do?

Yep. You can roll them out. You can roll it all to Roth. How old are you? Fifty eight, OK, if you're going to leave it alone 10 plus years and it sounds like you got pretty good nest egg, don't you?

That's pretty good. How much? Two point seven million. Yeah, good for you. Yes. Touchdown! Well done. Yeah. So, yeah.

So you don't you don't have to do it all at once, but whatever you roll to Roth, if you leave it, you need to live alone 10 years or it's not going to make sense and you're not going to use an all this money in 10 years. So you are going to have to leave it alone unless you just plan on giving it all away or spending like a wild man.

But that would be a change.

A big change, wasn't it? Yeah. You've done so well. Congratulations anyway.

Living and giving like no one else. Yeah.

So, yeah, whatever you were older was just going to be taxed at your tax rate. What's your income.

350 to 450. So you got a you got a 35 to 40 percent hit on every dollar you roll and for it to recover with tax free growth and for it to make sense you got to have a decade or so.

Well, let's have the last couple of years like we've had. Well, that would be true. Yes, that would be true. So you got no penalties on it, but you do. But you are taxed on it.

And I don't suspect your tax rate is going to go down under this administration because you are an evil, rich person.

Yeah, well, that's OK. Yeah, I'm still a supporter.

Frank, do you have any old 401k from previous jobs? No, sir. I converted all. Converted it all. Well, you left.

Well, I'm proud of you, man. Great job. And for people that are out there, we're talking about converting. What we're meaning is, is that you are going ahead and paying taxes on your situation in your current state, having the money not taken from your emergency fund, but being able to cash flow the taxes.

Yeah, if you cash flow the taxes, then you effectively have invested more from a math standpoint, Frank.

You got that? Yeah.

So like you take you take 100 grand and you got a thirty thousand lower tax bill and you pay the tax bill, but you leave the whole hundred grand in there. It's as if mathematically you've invested an additional 30 grand and it's all growing from this point on tax free. So you'll come out day one. But for it to really make sense, it takes about a decade to roll around.

So how much of this did you inherit? I inherited maybe well, I inherited one hundred and seventy five thousand, but I passed it directly through to my kids, I didn't keep any of it. So. So that is not why you have 2.5. Oh, no. How did you get to that point? How did you get two point seven million dollars?

I went to work every day and I saved about 40 percent of the income.

Whoa. Hey, you killed it. Simple formula. How are you going? Effort and sacrifice. Another ETM every day. Millionaire, without a doubt.

Nine out of 10 of them did not inherit their money. Don't believe what you heard. It was a lie. Way to go, Frank. I'm so proud of you. You are your stunt man. That's amazing. Thanks to James Childs, our producer, Kelly Daniel, our associate producer and phone screener. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host. We will be back.

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