Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the car rental studio, this is the Dave Ramsey Show, where America hangs out to have a conversation about your life. In your money, I am Dr. John Maloney, joined here by my good friend Anthony O'Neal Ramsey, personality and best selling author, YouTube sensation. And we are taking your calls about your life and your money, anything and everything that's going on in your heart mind. Give us a shout at eight eight two five five 25.

That's triple eight eight five five two two five. Let's go to Joe in Farmington, Minnesota. Joe, how's it going?

I'm doing good, how are you? Outstanding, good man, how can we help? So my wife and I are we just looked over all our financials. We're just wondering how do we get even get started with our emergency fund and moving into baby stuff to. Oh, Marasa, that's a good question. I love these kind of questions, Joe. So talk to me. Why is it difficult for you to get into baby step one, which is a thousand dollar emergency phone?

Oh, it absolutely is. It just seems like. I'm living paycheck to paycheck for sure, I mean, I'm a trucker and my wife is a police officer, so I mean, we make public money. But what's the ordinary Joe? How much money do you make? Together, yes, about one hundred and twenty one hundred and thirty, and you're telling me you can't come up with a thousand dollars, Joe? And the part I'm running into is that where I have about ten thousand dollars in credit card debt together, we're about 17000 in credit card debt.

And we just got new cars. And I'm not making excuses. I've made stupid money decisions this past year for sure. And beyond that as well. OK. It just seems like my debt payments are so. I don't even know where to start saving up that thousand dollars. OK, well, that's a good question. When's the last time you did a budget? OK, yeah, when's the last time you did. What have you done? Why are we.

Well, we just downloaded the every dollar app last night. I haven't looked through it yet, but we just downloaded it. All right. So here's the biggie.

Let me give you some practical things or some practical facts, Joe. Are the average couple. The average household income is right around fifty eight thousand dollars a year. I want you to really understand, fifty eight thousand dollars is the average household income in America. You're making double of that double plus. OK, that's what number two was. The very first thing you have to do when it comes to how do we start getting better with their finances, take debt off of the table.

OK, so this means stop swiping your credit card. Stop financing things. Stop adding things to the debt pile. Take it completely off the table. Here's number three. OK, here's number three. And this has nothing do with money because when they get to the practical money stuff, it's simple, is easy is what we teach the seven baby steps. But what I'm hearing from you is I haven't I haven't heard the conviction from you. Here's something that I want you and your wife to do tonight, OK?

Are you are you can go home tonight with your wife. Are you out there trucking right now? I am going to be home with my wife tonight. Do I have any kids? We do not. OK, cool, great, you love your wife very much, OK? You took Tom on that, OK? She loves you, I'm sure of it. I want you to order some pizza tonight.

I want you to cut off your cell phone, cut off YouTube, and I want you to look your wife in her face and say, why do we want to get out of debt? And before you ask your wife that, I want you to be thinking about that from the time you hang up from us to the time you ask your wife that. I want you to be so convicted yourself, why five times when my good friends, Pastor Brian Bullock says the five wives like when you answer the question of first time, go deeper.

If you say, well, I want to get out, I want to get out of debt, well, why do you want to get a debt? I want to get it so I could purchase a home. Well, why do you want to purchase a home? What? I want to purchase a home so I can have a, you know, a nice home for my kids. Well, why do you want to have a nice home for your kids?

I go deep because here's the thing. Your why in life to change your finances need to make you quit if you're. Why does it make you cry, then a price of commitment will make you cry. So I need you and your wife to have a gut. Why? Oh, why. That gets you too emotional. When you think about why you want to go on this journey, it makes you to get very emotional when you get that gut.

Why? I promise you, finding a thousand dollars for babies that no one will be easy. You'll have it within the next two weeks. But right now there's no real reason why you want to get out of debt. There's no real reason why you want a thousand dollars. So is easy for you be like, I don't know how to do it.

I live paycheck to paycheck. No, let me tell you my Wojo and it makes me cry Nangle Crown today to show because it's different. So now my show I'll cry.

OK, but my why is I watch my mom and dad struggle. We never want disenrolled. I had to put socks on the bottom of my shoes because we couldn't afford to buy new shoes. We never went family vacations. I don't have family pictures of me and my family. I refuse to be that man from my family. I refuse to tell my kids, hey, puss, put tape on the bottom of your shoes because I can't afford to buy new stuff.

No, I refuse to be the guy to tell my wife we can't go on a family vacation because we're living above our means. And when I think about that, that gets me emotional. That's why I'm so passionate about this message. What is that why I get you passionate of getting a thousand dollars getting out of debt? When you do that, the seven baby steps that we teach will become easy. I promise. And Joe, from this point forward, there is no more hers and mine, there is ours.

She doesn't have a credit card and you don't have a credit card and she doesn't have a car payment and you don't have a car payment.

You all have a car payment. You all are in this for the long haul, you're in this together, you're going to rise and fall together. And so I want you to after you have this exercise with Anthony, it's a beautiful moment. It should be hard. It should be uncomfortable, as you probably have conversations at Yale.

You have had a long time ago that you have never had before. I want you to start thinking about what the budget's going to look like when you go to Dave Ramsey Dotcom. You can download the budget worksheet and you can begin to start to put some some meat and flesh around the bones of why are we doing this?

Who are we going to be, what we're going to be. Yeah.

Yeah. And if you haven't taken Financial Peace University yet, I want you to go to Dave Ramsey Dotcom, and I want you to take Ramsey up for Ramsey. Plus, I did look, it's a fourteen day free trial right now. So that's Dave Ramsey, dotcom forgood reset. And after you have the talk tonight, I want you to spend the next nine days watching those videos with your wife, OK? And together, you all are going to change.

You're going to reset. As a matter of fact, you need to watch the event with Dave, with Hogan, with Rachel and with Craig will show you need to spend these next seven days resetting your thought process coming up, which are why. And emotional. And you should be crying with your wife tonight telling her baby, we don't change today.

You make one hundred and twenty one hundred and thirty thousand dollars.

Imagine you don't owe anybody anything at the end of every month. You're trying to figure out who to give to who you can bless. Your kid's going to walk into a debt free life. Yeah, but only you can turn that around.

Brother who. This is the Dave Ramsey Show. Hey, folks, it's Ken Coleman. I love my burst sonic toothbrush. Studies show that smiling improves your physical and emotional health and makes you more likable. The soft charcoal bristles powerfully remove plaque and we'll make your teeth whiter, your smile brighter, and your impressions better and better. Smart and affordable replacement head subscription is just six dollars every 90 days. Visit burst oral care dotcom and use the code can to grab a burst brush for as low as forty nine ninety nine.

That's burst oral care dotcom.

It's here, it's here, Rachel Cruz's brand new book, Know Yourself, Know Your Money is out now, and this book is a game changer in this book. Our good friend Rachel Cruz will walk you through the seven money tendencies we all have and how understanding yours can help you reset your priorities and win with money in 2021. Join Rachel Cruz at her virtual launch party. I'm sure she had that one, but we're going to join her at the live stream reset event next Tuesday night.

January 12th at seven p.m. is going to be with Chris Hogan, Rachel Cruz, Craig Michelle and Dave Ramsey. They're going to give you the motivation and guidance you need to hit the reset button and say goodbye. Say goodbye to the money, stress for good text reset to three three seven, eight, nine. That's reset three three seven, eight, nine. Or go to the online store today. Dave Ramsey, dot com and get your copy of yourself.

Know your money. Text reset three three seven eight nine. Grab the book. Get ready to rock and roll. It's twenty twenty one. Start with a new book. A new event. Get your head right. It's your family. Right. Let's get this thing going. You know what, Rachel?

Ask a good question in a book that convicted me very well, OK? And her and I talked about that on my show that she said, do you make a purchase? She said if no one saw the purchase, would you still want it? Do you buy something out of status or out of safety? Hmm. And when she asks me that question, I was convicted because I answered the question honestly, saying there are 50 percent of my purchases that if no one ever saw them, I would have never bought it.

Really? Honestly. Wow.

And so I wanted to have half. I'm just being raped. Yeah, no, I'm just being transparent. Yeah. People can like how can Anthony. What, not being real. Well, absolutely. You know, and so I want to encourage you to get Rachel's book because she she's going to set you up and she's very raw and authentic in this book to date. I think this is Rachel's best book. I'm going to be real. I love all of her other books.

I read all of them. But I think this one right here, she gets to the gut of why we make decisions with our purchases.

And when she when I read that in her book, I told you I need you on my show because you hit my gut.

And I love how she breaks it down, saying, hey, if you're buying out of status, that's OK, but at least you know it and make sure you had the budget for it. But if you're purchasing things and not purchasing purchasing things because of safety, well, hey, that's OK, too. But wait a minute. There are some flaws in this side, too. That's right. And so I love how Rachel just really breaks down this book.

And this book is for someone all the way down to 15, all the way up to 99.

Like, she's really, really, really teaching some very solid substance stuff in there.

So I just want to say that because. Well, and I want to follow up. Yeah. After talking with couples and couples and couples and family members.

She does a great job of drilling down. How come I get so fired up in my day, my heart starts racing, I get Ragia when my wife asks about money or how come every time my husband rolls his eyes at a budget, I just get real quiet or I go off the handle and she walks you all the way back to where some of these seeds were planted about money in your childhood.

And then you get married, you start dating, whatever, and you play these scripts over and over and over again.

And she helps you go, Oh, man, I'm just playing a record that got a CD that got, you know, plugged in to me when I was a child. I don't have to keep living like this, but I got acknowledge that I'm on a track. Right. And she does a great job of helping people unwind.

Why they do what they do when it comes to money like you and I talked about in a call earlier, I have more of a scarcity mindset. You've got more of a planning mindset, right. Or more future oriented that comes from my childhood. You're going through your childhood and they literally come from there. Right. And there's nothing wrong with either side. But you've got technology and knowledge and you've got to know the flaws. That's right. You know, you have to know the flaws on whatever whatever you part of, because I'm trying to say this in the correct way.

Whatever side you're on, there's nothing wrong with it. Just acknowledge the flaws of whatever you decide to be. OK, so I care almost nothing what people think. And that's a problem sometimes when I have to get my head. It's been I've been missing for a year and it looks it looks ridiculous. Yeah. Right. Yeah. So there's another side to every one of these things. Absolutely. Absolutely. But all this is a Get Rachels book.

Yeah. It's excellent. We don't make any money off pushing Rachel's book. That's how long Rachel, you know, but I believe I am really promoting life changing products. And this book is she let him know we're talking about it. But I just really want to be like, yo, hey, I read it. I brought it on my show. And I don't just I don't bring a person. I was on my show because of personalities.

You got to bring something to my show that's of substance. The same thing with yours. Right. And I was like, OK, we need to talk about this because this is life changing.

And so get Rachel Spark, Dave Ramsey, dot com slash today. I'm sorry, Dave Ramsey, dot com. Go there today and get that book. All right. Let's let's see. Here we go. Let's go to Christine in Orlando, Florida. Christine, what is going on?

Hey, guys, thanks so much for taking my call. I'm a little nervous, but happy to be here if you guys can help me out. I'm in a situation and I'm getting some advice. I'm loosely familiar with Dave Ramsey plan, but I do agree with the fact that, you know, we should stay with credit cards and I do say for credit cards, but I'm actually in a situation where I use my debit card to purchase a trip and fall.

This is last year and it got canceled because the covid understandably. But my bank is telling me that I'm unable to get my money back because I use the debit card as opposed to a credit card. So I'm not really sure what to do because any advice? Never heard of that at all. Yeah.

Walk me through the process. OK, the trip got canceled. Where were you going?

Went to Europe and I did. Painful to accompany the travel company.

OK, you paid in full to a travel company. OK, so the travel company purchased a all inclusive trip to a particular destination, correct?

Correct. Correct. So that's absolutely true.

You can't get your money back, not because it's on a debit card, but because travel agencies, just like airlines, do not issue a full refund past 24 hours of their original booking.

And so you should have a credit from that travel agency, from whatever particular airline they put you on and from whatever particular hotel they put you at because of covid. Now you cannot get your finances. Prime example, I was supposed to go to Orlando this week. I had already booked the plane ticket, but because of covid, I am not going. So I have a credit with that particular travel company that purchases my flights for me. I can use that for down the road, but I can not get my money back.

And that was on a debit card. And so if you found a dispute because a company wouldn't, that will not give you back the money. Your bank is absolutely correct. But what I would do is I will reach out to the travel companies, say, OK, hey, listen, you got a thousand two thousand dollars of my money and I get it. You can't issue a refund because of it, but it's also not my fault. Do I at least have a credit?

And when covid is over, will I be able to use that credit? So my guess I think, Christine, my guess is that they would have with a credit card company, you may have an opportunity to dispute it and they're just going to write you off, whereas you paid cash and your bank is saying forget you.

But it's sounds like the problems with the travel company. Yeah, but even with even if you did have a credit card, which I mean, it's not going to happen there, too. Here's why. Because the company has to issue back the money. OK. And so if the company doesn't an issue back the money. There you go to the credit card or your debit card. I'm not going to give you back the money.

Yeah, thanks, guys. I understand all that. The tricky part is I actually took the trip with my friend and we in the same exact situation she disputed with her bank and she paid with a credit card. She just did it with her bank and she got her money back and forth.

So it sounds like she got a provisional a provisional credit, not an actual reimbursement. And banks do do that. So what they do is when you put an issue in when you put a ticket in, they will give you a temporarily credit while they do the investigation. That's exactly I'm telling you right now. It happens all the time. You do not get your money back because you have a debit card, because what covers a debit card and a credit card is that Visa or MasterCard logo.

So at some point they're going to go back and say, hey, that travel company still got a credit for you. We're going to take that provisional credit back away from you.

Right. So the travel company going to say, hey, you know what? They denied this thing. You you are not do the money back then you're going to take that money back off of that her credit card. I think I just learned something to your good folks there. All right. My good friend Anthony O'Neal, this has been the Dave Ramsey Show.

Lines Dotcom's 100 percent satisfaction guaranteed means, even if you miss measure or picked the wrong color, they'll remake your blinds for free. You get free samples, free shipping. With the new promos they run every month, you'll save even more. Use promo code Ramsey to get the best deal. Rules and restrictions apply. Today's question comes from Lori in Virginia. My brother and his wife moved into our family home when our mother was moved into assisted living upon her passing.

The name was deeded to him and me. Oh, they've been living there for four years and it has been a safety net for them due to some financial struggles. I don't know how to lovingly get out of this financial relationship with my brother. I would rather invest my half of the home's value into our baby steps.

Instead of being a co-owner of this home, I know we should either sell and split the proceeds or he should buy me out of my half. How do I proceed without kicking them while they're down?

What do you think anything? There's two sides to this day, I think, and you're the counselor here. But I think that if you know, they're down right now and this house is helping them out and it's not hurting you by helping them out, it feels kind of selfish to me. OK, that's just my original. My my opinion. It's like, OK, this is not hurting you by letting them stay there. But you see this as an opportunity to get money to go benefit you personally.

And then you're going to say, hey, listen, to sell the house or you buy me out, that it's about I when the house was given to both of you. So what I would say is we just make sure you check your heart that you're you're you're wanting to do this for the right reason.

Two, there's nothing wrong with just having a conversation with with them saying, hey, this is what I would like to do with my portion of the house where you all that in life, how can we, you know, don't need another year or two years that can make a game plan like this, really having a good conversation, a healthy conversation, because I do believe the breeding ground for understanding an ending is communication and a beginning. That's right.

And so does have clear communication now. But then before you had a communication, just make sure that your heart is in the right place.

And I, I think the most loving thing you can do is to have a direct, honest, empathetic.

Vulnerable conversation, because if you're not having a love, if you're not having a conversation, then every family gathering for the last four years, there's a little bit of tension. Every phone call, you roll your eyes. You don't respond to text quite as fast as you normally do. Right.

It starts to seep into the all of the parts of the relationship. And then suddenly you find yourselves with them and you with that guy living in my house. And suddenly, man, it's not your brother anymore. It's just some guy that's, quote unquote taking money from you right to the most loving thing you can do, anything you're dead on. Sit down and have a conversation.

And I don't know that you ask somebody for what they're going to do right now.

Yes. Yes.

Want you to I think it's fair to say, hey, my name's on the deed of a house that I'm not living in. I don't feel comfortable with that. Let's talk big picture. I've been living there for years. What do you think the plan is going to be? I want to get my name off that thing and which you're well and you're right to do.

But also, as Anthony said.

If you don't need the money, you just want to get your share and be honest and integris with you, with your brother. Yeah. And there's nothing wrong with that. My father dealt with that with his sisters. I have 18 uncles. And when my grandmother passed, she left the house. All of them. Oh, boy. And so, you know, they all had to have, you know, a little uncomfortable conversation. But one thing what was so good and so fair is they had the conversation.

That's right. And you can't do anything without having the conversation. Right. And Laurie, the most loving thing you can do is not avoid it anymore.

So great question. I love it. And I'd love to be here. I'd love to know how this conversation pans out. Give us a shout back. Let's go to Eric in Sarasota, Florida. Eric, what's going on?

We're doing OK, John and Anthony. How are you guys doing? Excellent. Excellent. How can we help? Well, my wife and I are on our journey. We're not having kids. We're pretty young in our mid 20s, maybe subsects, really excited about where we're going. And in the midst of that, we have a strained, slightly strained relationship with my mother in law. And we have set up some good emotional boundaries. We got great people counseling us and we are walking out the relationship so we can have.

That's been great. However, my mother in law just had a sudden hospitalization, which really scared her. She's already not financially stable and she is now bringing up a conversation of putting us on her bank accounts in order to protect against taxes. And we've told her we don't want to have that conversation yet and we're just trying to prepare in our minds. Is there any marriage? Should we just move on and say, no, we don't want to do this?

Or is there something we should really talk to her about?

So she's asking you to she's asking to put you on or your wife on her checking account or she asking to combine finances with you and put her name on your account.

No, first. OK, so I've heard this, Don, when, when and it's been successful, where somebody finds out that there's medical issues, there may be early stage dementia or Alzheimer's, and we're going to get to a place where they're going to need help or they may be incapacitated and want someone else to be able to just go to the bank, deposit checks, pick stuff up. So that's not that big of a deal. It's when they want to have access to your accounts.

That's when I would hold the line on that boundary.

What do you think, Anthony?

No, I, I, I agree as well, Eric. I don't see it when my parents get to age to where I need to be on their bank account so I can have access to their funds to help make decisions and move things forward. Yes, there should be no issues with that at all. There's nothing. The only thing I could come back, though, is because if you're going to add your name and your Social Security number is going to be attached to it, which Social Security number when the bank starts going overdrawn or anything like that, that that could come back to you because your name is on the account.

But just make sure that you just have a clear conversation. And it sounds like your mom is just trying to make sure that you all have access to her funds to help her out if anything was to happen. And I think that's actually a great move.

OK, thank you, guys. All right. You betcha. Good for you, man. All right. Let's see here. Let's try to take one more quick call. Let's go to Christian in Dallas, Texas. Christian, what's going on, man? Hey, guys, thanks for having me. You bet. We're up against the clock, so give us your quick a quick question. Yeah, definitely.

Just a quick background. I'm currently a senior at Richmond University over London, so I'm currently pursuing a degree in international sports management. But as of now, I've got forty seven thousand dollars in student loan debt. And I'm taking a leave of absence this semester as a result of the national lockdown that I've got in the U.K. Now, I'm going to work as a teacher to pay down my term loan balances or interest. But since no one really knows when everything will return back to normal, should I take an even longer break from school to pay off my loans even further or just go back to normal in September and allow that to continue to accrue?

How much would it cost you to finish it, Christian? As of now, I'm expected to graduate with around 70000. So how much more cash would you need to pay right now or borrow right now as now for the year will probably pay around fourteen thousand. So that'll be right for the semester. And then I still am interested in taking on a part time during the week as well. Yeah, finish the movie. Get that up to sixteen or seventeen thousand.

Yeah.

But I'm not sure that's why I finish. I want to go and finish. I don't want to get to your last semester. I have all the student loan debt and you do not have your bachelor's degree. And so what I'm saying is finish and try to borrow as less as you possibly can, but as soon as you graduate college, you need to get Cazale about paying off your debt. All right. And so if you were telling me this is your first year, I would say, heck, no, stop.

But the fact that you put almost 40 complete years into a graduate degree, actually, these are the back end of last semester of a graduate degree. Yes, I'm going to finish. And then once you finish, pay off all of your debt. Do not get back into school no more. But Line loved. Today, Scripture of the Day is Joshua, one nine. Have I not commanded you be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened. Do not be dismayed for the Lord.

Your God is with you wherever you go. Maya Angelou said, I can be changed by what happens to me, but I refuse to be reduced by it. Come on, Maya. I say that one more time.

I can be changed by what happens to me, but I refuse to be reduced by a light that a light that I mean this. Oh my what?

You know what? It's almost like in your. Let me ask you this question, she said, let me read it because I just loved it. She said I could be changed by what happens to me, but I refuse to be reduced by it is almost like, are we a product of our upbringing? Do are we are we always going to be a product of how we were raised?

So something I say often is you get to choose your thoughts. And what's deeper than that is you get to choose who hurt you. And I say I've said often Dave can fire me, he can frustrate me, he can annoy me, he can take away my livelihood. But I get to choose whether he hurts me.

And I decide a very limited number of people in the world who have permission to hurt me. And I actually went back and did a heart exercise. I learned this in a grad school class.

I did a heart exercise. I called them and told them, I want you to know I'm letting you way, way, way in my wife, this particular friend, this particular mentor, you have access to my pain. And so if you ever call and say you are not living up to who we agreed, who you said you want to be, right.

I've given my wife permission to hurt me.

And that's true vulnerability to your relationship. Right. But I limit that because otherwise I'm all that people on the Internet hurt my feelings. I don't let people on Instagram hurt my feelings. I'm going to let politicians I disagree with people that I don't know that well. You can frustrate me.

You can make me change, right? Yeah. You can take my job away. But I'm not going to give you I'm not going to give you way down my heart.

Right. Yeah. And my Angela man and. Oh, man, oh man. I love it. One after the other I feel.

All right. Let's go to Kristen in Chicago, Illinois. Kristen, what's going on? Hi, Sondhi, Anthony, happy Friday. Happy Friday to you. What's going on? How can we help?

So I will pass them by to ask that I know doesn't necessarily have the right answers, but rather to listen to the Lord and he has me and acting wise counsel give you some background. I'm twenty nine. I'm debt free and single. I have six months of an emergency fund and we'll have 20 percent down for a one bedroom condo by July. And so my next step is to invest 15 percent in retirement as of July when I have my 20 percent down.

Well, my question to you is whether or not I should pull the trigger on the condo if the direction of my life is kind of unknown, being single. Not sure where God has been. I mean, you're in a great place financially. You know, you're debt free, you're young, you are single. You know, the Dave Ramsey people are always looking for single people like you. So you may not be single much longer. But, you know, when you said that kind of creepy Anthony, just don't put that out there.

But go ahead. I'm just saying people on YouTube are listening to it.

They're going to Google it. Watch. Now, when you say that you do not know where God has you, I want you to break this down for me a little bit more like are you saying God may you may move somewhere. You may you may get married here soon or you may transition, you know, because I hear some doubt inside of you and I'm trying to understand that doubt a little bit more before I give you my my suggestion.

Yeah. You hit that on the head with that. But I was previously engaged. That broke off two years ago where I thought my life was going and settling down and getting married, having kids before I did not. And so in the last few years, it's just this idea of that I just move across the country, you know, like experience something new, like do I want to purchase where I grew up? Or so I don't quite know where I'd like the desires of my heart now or where God, you know, wants to continue my life at this point.

Yeah.

So I think this is a spiritual question and a practical question. Spiritual question is God, what is my purpose? Where are you taking me practical? Where am I going to be? And so I'm always suggesting to people, if you are hesitant or doubtful that you're going to be in this place for at least three to five years, do not purchase. When you can answer this question, as in, will you be here for at least three years minimum?

And if that answer is yes, then proceed forward in purchasing. If you're still like, I don't know, you know, at the end of the year, I may wake up and decide and find a great opportunity to move to Nashville, Tennessee, or to go to Florida or you're not going to California. Don't go to California. You know, you may go somewhere else.

And so what? I don't want you to do what I work. What I do not want to happen is you're locked in and now you can't move until you sell your place. OK? And so what I would recommend is spend the next 90 days just really dissecting your life, see. Exactly. OK, where I'm going to go, apply for some jobs, apply for some different career places and see where guy leaves you, see where you and guide land and if it's still there.

And Chicago. Yeah. Go purchase a home now. Now I would advise you to to speak to a realtor because one bedroom current condos are real hard to resell. OK, and so I'm my whole thing is I purchase to resell. And right now, bare minimum, I don't consider anything less than two bedrooms because if I have if I sell it to a husband and wife who don't have any kids, well, one day they may want kids.

And so they're going to want that extra bedroom. And so I would maybe even consider getting a two bedroom condo that may be just a few thousand dollars or more rather than just a one bedroom. But that's just my advice. That's not Dave Ramsey of ISIS, not John DeLong. It's obvious. I'm just saying, as a young single guy, I'm thinking about when I go to resell this, I need to be able to resell this for a family, not for another single.

So that's just my two nephews. But right now, you need to spend the next 90 days just really thinking about where you're going to be.

Christine, do you have somebody speaking in your life with you that you can be honest with and open with? Oh, totally. I have a dead church community that many women who are in my life to talk to. Yeah.

What church do you go to there in Chicago? It's an evangelical free church called the Orchard.

OK, all right. Sounds good. Sounds good. So you have a great community. Just continue to get wisdom and knowledge from there.

So, Anthony, she asked the question that I'm embarrassed to say I've never considered before to sit on the show for a year now. I've never. Felt the need to do the next baby step just because I've got the money, too, right? And so you put your debt smallest to largest, you get a thousand bucks, you pay your debts off, you get an emergency fund, you start investing. I'll have to buy a house, you know, I don't have to start a 529 plan if I don't have kids, right?

Right.

And so once you have these options right, once you got a fully funded emergency fund, then you get to start dreaming like she was doing what she was doing almost apprehensively. Like I could just move anywhere. Yep. Yep, I could.

I could go work over here, go live over here, and that's what we call freedom. Yes, right. Yes, because you've taken care of this basic minimum stuff. And maybe a one bedroom condo in downtown Chicago is a five bedroom house in Arizona or Austin, Texas, or wherever that happens to be. Right? Maybe so.

And I think the key thing is we just kind of step back and just, you know, ask yourself some good questions. You know, as a single man, I'm always asking myself, OK, well, what's next? And then I'm also asking myself, OK, I don't know when I'm going to meet my wife, but will this decision that I make impact my wife and my future family in a positive way or negative way? And so when I purchased my home, I built a four bedroom home.

When I purchased my townhome downtown, I purchased a four bedroom townhome. That's just me because of where I'm at. I'm not saying everyone needs to do that, but I'm all I'm all I'm already thinking about what I desire, OK? I'm living below my means and I am I'm creating space. So when God does send me my wife, I have room for my life and my future family. And so I think as young people, we just got to start thinking about just ask ourselves some deep questions.

And that's what my mentors ask me.

That's what my pastor makes me think. Well, I want to thank producer James Childs, an associate producer. Kelly Daniel, like everyone for sticking with us and for calling in asking about your life and your money. Enjoy your weekend. Find some people, whether electronically over the computer or in person, safely find people to spend time in your heart with. I'm Dr. John Delany, joined here with my friend Anthony O'Niel. We're signing off. This has been the Dave Ramsey Show.

I have a friend or family member that needs a daily dose of Ramsay advice in their life. Let them know about the Ramsey Call of the Day podcast. It's a quick hit of advice about life and money in under ten minutes. Check out the Ramsey Call of the Day podcast wherever you listen to podcast.

Hey, if you've got questions about retirement investing or becoming an everyday millionaire, go bigger and broader with my man Chris Hogan on the Chris Hogan Show. I am excited to be able to talk to you all week in and week out. We're going to focus on your calls and it's going to focus on building wealth investing and how to become an everyday millionaire. Subscribe to the Chris Hogan Show wherever you listen to podcast.

Hey, it's James, producer of The Dave Ramsey Show. This episode is over, but check the episode notes for links to products and services you've heard about during this episode. Thanks for listening.