Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions. It's The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create actual amazing relationships. I am Jade Warshaw, one of your hosts for the day. Join next to me is Dr. John Deloney. What up? Your other host for the day. That is his voice that you hear if you're listening on podcast. Hey, if you're listening on podcast, try checking out the YouTube show because it's amazing. But if you want to talk to us, give us a call. The number is 888-825-5225. We will chop it up. We'll talk about your life, your money, and the good doctor is in, so he can talk to you about all those things that involve relationships and mental wellness. Love it. John, let's get to these phone lines right away, shall we? Let's do it. Let's go to Brian in Los Angeles, California. Hey, what's going on, Brian?

Hey, how's it going, guys? Thank you for taking my call. I got a quick question. I'm on Baby Step 2. I have one credit card left with about $12,000 on it, and then I have a car loan with $49,000 left on it. My wife suggested we We finance the car loan when we're done with that other credit card to try to get the payments higher and paid off sooner. But once we're done with that credit card, I believe we might be able to see double or even triple what the payment is. I was thinking What would be the best option for that car loan?

I think you're right. I think you've got the $12,000 and the $4,900. You do them in order. You pay off the $4,900, and when it comes time to do this $12,000 deal, you just pay as much as you can as fast as you can.

Why does she want to refinance it? Does she want to unlock you all into higher payments like that? Does she not trust you?

No, it's actually $49,000 that we are. We just got this car last year.

Oh, $49,000?

Yeah, $400,000. Why don't you sell this car, dude?

Well, it's the only big car we have. We've got five kids, and it's a suburban.

What do you earn a year?

Well, monthly, we bring in about 10,000 net, me and my wife.

What do you earn a year?

Well, see, last year, we didn't earn much because we were both… I'm currently on what's it called, workers comp. My wife was maternity leave, so we made in… We bought in 50-something last year, 40-something. But Our regular pay, we bring in like 100 and something thousand, 120 a year.

120? Is this your only car?

No, we have two other cars that are paid off.

Two other cars paid off, and what are they worth? Yes.

One's about 7,000, the other one's about 9,000.

You had to go out and get a real nice car, didn't you?

No, we just needed it because we've got five kids. Now, we don't fit in those smaller cars.

I think that you're half right. I think that you need a vehicle that fits the size of your family. But I don't think that it has to be a $50,000 car. Here's my rule of thumb here. Technically, there's two rules to think of. Number one, you don't want your vehicles to be more than half of what you bring in for the year. You're under that. For the most part, I understand last year was different. For the most part, you're under that. But then the next rule of thumb is, can you pay it off in two years or less? In your case, I don't think that you can, and you've got another $12,000 of debt laying around. If you wanted to make and simplify your situation right now, it would look like selling this $50,000 truck or van or whatever you're calling it and downsizing to something that's way used and way cash.

Like, dude, just rolling down the streets, not smoking endo, but just ride in a minivan.

Laced back.

Sipping on grape juice. Laced back. It would be not cool at all. At all. Not cool.

But it'd get you out of debt.

There's no way you're going to do it. I know you're not going to. I know you got a $7,000 car, $9,000 car, and you got this nice suburban out there. You can fit everybody in it. You feel like a little bit of a miniature baller. You're not going to sell it, but Jade and I are both telling you this would be the way to accelerate freedom in your Well, what if I'm upside down on it?

How upside down?

It's not worth about, I think it's like seven or $10,000.

Sweet. Take one of those cars out of the driveway that's just sitting there.

Sell it. Yeah. You have options.

Yeah. I was thinking of doing that, sending one of the cars that we do have at the Trade Off.

That's exactly what I would do. Then to get out of it, don't paint yourself into a corner. I think you said, We need this car. This is the only car we can get. Maybe I want to sell the car because I'm upside down. We're just showing you that there's lots of options here for you. The $7,000 car, what type of car is it?

It's Infinity M37, it's 2011.

Okay. I put that up and have it sold by this weekend. On Facebook marketplace, have it gone. Take that cash in. I mean, that would more than wipe out half of your $12,000 debt, right?

Yes. That's one last credit card that we just have. We've been doing your baby steps. We've pretty much paid off seven or eight credit cards already. This is just the last one that's worth 12,000 right now that we owe 12,000.

Think about this if you decide to hang on to that suburban. By the way, I love suburban. It's a great car. I love them. You're going to work real hard over the next 10 months, real hard, and you're going to pay off about $10,000 of that car. Okay. That's about what it's going to go down in value.

Yeah, it went down already.

You already felt it.

I know. So all this work you're throwing into it, it's like you got a shovel and you're filling up a hole with sand, and the hole is getting deeper from the bottom.

Okay.

You know what I'm saying? And eventually, you're going to depreciate the whole thing out, right? So you can buy a I'm in with 150,000 miles for 20 grand. At some point, it just is going to be 20 grand forever. What Jade and I are saying is, sell this one and go buy one that somebody else paid all the depreciation on it. Yeah. And it won't be as nice, dude. It won't be as nice. It won't be as fancy. It won't be. Brian and his family will be free.

That's the plan. I'm going to put this in. I'm going to put this. John just laid it out in the best terms possible. I'm going to put it in even more relatable terms. I want a suburban. I either want a suburban or an Escalator or a Tahoe, a nice one, right? I can't afford that right now. I have a 2012 Tahoe XL. It's 2012, and it's just as big. I bought it in cash. It gets us around.

From the outside, it's way nicer than my car because she actually takes care of them and washes them. It's fine. It's nice. But on the inside, but only Jade knows. I saw it, I was like, Man, what are they paying these new personalities, man? She must be rolling in here. It's a 2012. She takes great care of it. It looks fantastic.

Yeah. My other one is a 2013 Cadillac XR. I don't even know what it's called. It'd be nice to have a 2018 is all I'm saying or a 2020, but that's not a huge priority for our family right now. One day we'll get it and we'll pay cash one day soon. My point is that's what that looks like. It's this place in between where you're able to pay cash, you get as close to what you want to get. Here's the thing, I don't have a car note. I don't have an $850 car note, so we can save up that money really, really fast if we want to. What's your car note right now?

It's 824 a month.

Brian, what are you doing? Can I tell you the most annoying part of all of this, just globally speaking? I say this because this is how families get trapped. Jade is going to buy your suburban from you at some point. Hey, okay. She's going to buy it at a $10,000 loss to you. Because she bit the bullet for two years and saved cash, she's going to buy your car from you less than you paid. She's going to end up making money off it. And that's how people who are disciplined with money become wealthier than people who get trapped in these cycles where they just want to look rich, but they actually aren't.

I'll be laughing all the way to the bank at Brian's expense. We love you, brother. We love you, Brian. This is The Ramsey Show.

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You are listening to The Ramsey Show. I am Jade Warshaw. To my right is Dr. John Deloney. We're taking your calls. So call us up. The number is 888-825-5225, and we'll get into it. Today's question of the day is sponsored by Neighborly, your hub for home services. Before the weather warms up, Neighborly can help you find local service pros like the Ground Guys, 5 Star Painting, and Mosquito Joe to turn your outdoor space into your favorite place. Find the help you need at neighborly. Com/ramsey today.

Today's question comes from Help in Illinois. Help writes, We've been married 23 years, and my husband has struggled to find a career. He currently has a business which is not profitable. So he currently has a hobby where he spends our money. I have a full-time job and make about $400,000 a year. My husband is supposed to contribute a set amount per month, but he doesn't and will not even mention when he misses contributions. When he does bring in a big check with his hobby (I added that, we argue about what he's going to contribute to the household. He thinks he shouldn't have to tell me when he spends from our joint account. I am the one paying everything, so I need to know. How do I fix this?

Wowsers. Man.

This is Jade, a marriage that is in way more trouble than it appears to be. That contention. It looks like, Hey, we make a whole bunch of money. My husband's just in there making a time machine that never works, right? I have to go to work. It's like, Honey, I shrunk the kids, right? He's in there making a thing. Walk race. Yeah. He just loses money, loses money, loses money. He gets a big check, and then he's like, That's all mine. But this is a wife that is fully resenting her husband. This is a husband who completely disrespects his wife. This is a train wreck in slow motion happening in real-time. Yeah.

It sounds like they've been in this wheel- In the dance. Over and over and over. The dance. Yeah. This business is going to be the one.

Yeah. All the while, she clearly is co-rushing it. The top 1% of earners in America, right? Yeah. She must amazing at what she does. What a mess, what a mess, what a mess.

Okay, well, let's think about this on both sides, because there is a world where what do we think, John, he should be contributing? Because he may not make $400,000. He may not make $200,000 a year or even $100,000 a year. But he's got to contribute something to the household if he says he's going out and working every day.

Well, I think the important thing here is less about the set amount and both because she makes $400,000 a year.

There's something in here that says she wants him to be making a certain amount.

Yeah, but I don't think it's about the money. I think it's about, I want you to participate in this home, and you don't. You just extract from this home. You're a cancer. You continue to grow and pull nutrients away from the mothership, and you're not contributing anything. I want you to have a purpose here. They and their family have defined purpose as dollar amount, which I think is a dangerous place to be. Instead of saying, Here's our money in this pot. Here's our values outside of this pot. How are we He's going to live those things out? He is saying, I don't care what your values are. I'm going to go do what I want to do when I want to do it. That's not good. Yeah, I agree.

I also think, though, where do they start? Because on the one hand, you said, I think if he just contributed anything. But reading this, I have a feeling if he made $40,000 a year, she'd be like, Now that sucks.

I bet not. You bet not? Yeah, I bet if he did anything. I think there has to be This is one of those I normally will say, You got to stop the dance, right? You got to turn the music off, turn the lights on. What I mean by that here is this is a moment where you say, Hey, starting next month, I'm going to open my own checking account. Oh, you think so? We're going to split this thing up, and we're going to have a hard conversation about contribution and participation and what love looks like in our home. Because this is a recipe for not just a divorce. This is recipe for an implosion. Somebody's going to do something dumb if they're not already doing something dumb.

Okay, so that's step one. What's step two? Some counseling, right?

Absolutely, yeah. This has reached a point where two people can't sit down and navigate this on their own. This is too big of a mess. This is shame. This is control. I'm tired of playing both the feminine and the masculine role in this home. This is you don't love me, you don't listen to me. This is all that. It's very challenging to navigate that on your own. Yeah, go sit down with professional help. Here's what we have to say. We are not trying to save our marriage. We're trying to build something new. If you try to save it, it's, Well, what about this? Cool. This marriage that they had for 23 years has fallen and crashed. We got to build something completely new. Think Hopefully, money is not going to be an option. It's not going to be a barrier. We got $400,000 a year. We can do whatever we want to do. Finances aren't going to constrain us. It's just going to be our own egos and our own decisions to build something together. That's what's going to constrain us.

That's good. What a mess. What a mess. That is a mess. That is a mess. Yeah, I think that both people definitely need to be contributing in some way that is agreed upon. If you stay home and you're not making money, you better be taking care of kids is all I'm saying. All right, let's go to the phone lines. We got Ben and Fayetteville Arkansas. Yep, that's it. Let's go, Ben. What's going on?

Yeah. Hi. How are you guys?

Doing good. How are you?

Oh, pretty good. So we actually just finished paying off the rest of our credit cards, and we still have a house loan, but we have the 3-6 month cushion in our bank. And we're actually just looking for somewhere to start investing money. I'm 30 and never really invested anywhere. I just want to start having something to show for that extra money that we're bringing in- For sure. That's not going for those credit cards and car loans.

Technically, you're in Baby Step 4, which is for those listening, that's the step where you start investing 15% of your gross income every single month. A great place to start is to look at your employment situation. I mean, are they offering you a 401k or 403b or anything like that?

No, this is just a small business. It's me and one other guy working for a guy who owns the business, and they don't even offer health insurance. I have that already. Health insurance? That's not a big deal. But the 401k that he doesn't offer.

Well, then if that's the case, I would just start with a Roth IRA. You can max one out. I think the limit this year is $7,000. You could start with that. Then if you still have money to go to get to that 15%, you could open up a simple 401k and set aside some money for yourself? Because are you basically treated as a contractor? Is that right?

No, I'm an employee. I still have a W2 in W4. I'm not at 299.

Then I would start probably Basically with that Roth 401k or Roth IRA. Then from there, you could look into something. Since you do your own health care, you could look into an HSA. That's another great place to start. Then there's always the brokerage account, which is great. You've got some options there. I always suggest working with a Ramsey trusted pro on that because they can help you get started in choosing the funds. The way that we teach here is just this basic umbrella. Of course, you want to start with mutual funds, and we want you to mix that 15% of money that you get over four different types of funds so that you're spreading your money out. You're not just putting it into one or two or three stocks, right? You want it to go into growth funds, growth and income funds, a progressive growth funds, and international funds. So that's how you're splitting your money up when you buy investments within your Roth IRA. Does that make sense?

Yeah. So doing something like, because me and my wife are looking into it before I called you guys. So doing something like the app Fidelity or anything like that, that's not something that is good. We need to- You're saying if you were to go on the Fidelity app and do your investments through them? Yeah, not by ourselves, right? That's not a good idea. It's better to do it with someone who's more knowledgeable, I guess.

Yes. I mean, you can choose the brokerage that you want if you wanted to, but the whole idea is you're getting someone who's got more expertise than you do. I think it is good to get in there and see for yourself what these things are and read about things and get your eye on things that you think, Hey, I think this could be a good idea, and then run it by that pro, and you guys can actually talk about it like adults. You're understanding what he's saying, and he's understanding what you're saying, and you're working together, not just hiring a guy that will automate it and be like, Hey, this is what you do, because you don't want somebody to just take it over for you. You want to feel like you're speaking into it as well. Does that make sense?

Yeah.

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What's going on, everybody? You're listening to The Ramsey Show. I am Jade Warshaw. This is John Deloney, the other voice that you'll hear on the line. We're taking- Yeah, I'm John, not you. Just wanted to clear it up just in case people were wondering who that other voice was, John. We're taking your calls. The number is 888-825-5225. So jump in, and we'd love to hear from you. Let's go to Jennifer in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. What's going on, Jennifer?

Hi. Hey, thanks for taking my call. I'm so excited. It's Jade and John. We're hoping today.

We're excited to talk to you.

So I'm looking for some ideas on how to deal with my adult son. I just wanted to say it's so hard to be a to adult children. My husband and I have three adult children. They're all college graduates. They're all gainfully employed. Our plan, because it was important for us that they go to college, so our plan was that we would pay for 25% of their college need, their tuition and room and board, and then they were responsible for the other 75%. Then of that 75%, 100%, whatever they would need to cover that, we would just loan it to them, and our gift to them was that it would be interest-free. That way, they don't have to pay for it in loans.

One of your kids is not paying you back, are they?

Well, he's paying me back, but boy, it's like a turtle. I meet him. I'm just like our daughter, she got after it right away, and within five years, she was all paid off. Then our other son, his amount is so much smaller, but I'm really not too worried about him. It's that middle son. I'm just like, Wow, honey, this is a lot of money.

How much?

His grand total was $57,750.

Have you written out terms and handed them the terms of the loan repayment plan?

John, that was our mistake. In hindsight, we should have had something written down, some goals or rules or payment plan or something, but we didn't. We just said, nine months after you graduate, the payments will start. The payments will be whatever you can handle at the time. And that's just how we left it. So in hindsight, we should have done it differently.

Oh, my goodness. Okay, so how much would you say you're receiving? Are you receiving anything or you're getting some, but it's sporadic? Tell us a little bit about middle child paying back. Yeah.

So he has a pretty decent job, I'll say. I really don't know what he makes. We don't talk about that. I'll start out by saying our relationship is good.

Hold on. No, it's not. It's not good. It's not good. He's got this hovering over him. You've got it hovering over you. Even coming out the gate saying he's got a good job, you don't know. He could be making 30,000 bucks a year, or he could be making 250. You don't know. You're already bringing some baggage like, Things are good, except that... You know what I mean? It's important just to call a spade a spade on this one.

Okay. At nine months, we decided together that $250 a month would be his payment. That's what he said he could handle. I said, Great. Two years went by, and he was still only at $250. But in the meantime, he's gotten a few raises, and of course, he's probably gotten some tax refunds.

Okay, so you're trying to spend his money for him.

You can't. You all made an agreement. He's keeping up the agreement.

Well, I know. He's never missed a payment.

He's doing exactly what you all sat down and agreed to. The bank can't call you and be like, Hey, we see you make more money. You should pay us back faster for this car note. Like, you all shook hands. Was it a terrible deal that you all shook hands on, both of you? Yes. $250 a month, he's going to owe you for the rest of his life. I know.

19 years. I calculated it.

I know, but you shook hands on it with him.

Jennifer, you're in the wrong. Yeah, you can't- I'm sorry.

You can't spend his money for him.

Yeah. On many ways was Was this not the right choice? I hope that you see this in retrospect. Number one, you can't lend money to family members. You have to give it or don't do it at all because it changes the relationship. Like you said earlier, Oh, our relationship is good. And then John went through and told you why it's not as good as you think. Then the next thing is, you guys decided the terms and you shook on it or spit-shaked or pinkieswore on it, whatever you did, and then you changed them in your mind based off of what you think that he's making more and what he should be doing. That's not fair.

I know.

I know, girl. Hold on. Jennifer, in a perfect world, you're right. He should go, My parents gave me 57,000 extra dollars to go to school. Seventy-five in total, but 57,000 is mine. I'm going to knock this out as quickly as possible. Should that be the way the world just works? Yes, it should.

But he doesn't have... Here's the thing. Unless he starts listening to the Ramsey show and he becomes motivated to get out of debt. He has no real motivation. There's no interest on it. Mommy holds the loan. She's not going to come repo my house or my car. You have not built in any sense of urgency around this deal.

Can I create a payment plan?

You could do whatever you want. Just know it may come at the cost of the relationship with your son, or it's going to have to be, Hey, I agreed to something. I agree to $250 a month, and we're going to begin to plan in three months or in 90 days or in six months, I want to move that up to $500 or to $600, or I want this whole thing done in five years. It's starting to weigh on us, our relationship or whatever. But you don't know that he's not talking to his friends saying, My mom and dad really set me up for success. They gave me an interest-free loan to go to school. They're barely requiring me to pay it back, and it's really setting up me and my family. They may think you were the greatest parents ever in And on your side, you're like, I've got a degenerate son who doesn't... He's just doing exactly what you all agreed on.

What's your son like? What's he like?

I love him to death. Of course. But it's just money. His In her life, he's just ignored money because I think it gives him a lot of anxiety. I think he just thinks, If I don't address it, then I can make all my payments, and I'm in good standing everywhere. I must be making enough money. He just doesn't think beyond tomorrow.

Can we be honest about why? He's never had to. You've always taken care of him. You've always come up with the money for him. Then secretly, you seathed that he wasn't like your other two kids.

Yeah, I wish he'd be more like his sister.

Exactly. You know what? Here's the deal. He feels that from you. He knows he's not enough for you. Because everything's been taken care of, he doesn't know why. He just I know his mom doesn't like him. Mom's always asking about my money. Mom's always asking about my tax return. There's this hovering 50-something, $1,000 gap that makes sitting down at the dinner table really tough for us.

What you're saying is just leave it alone and I just have good.

No. If you and your husband say, Hey, we need this money for retirement, or you and your husband say, Hey, we think we're setting a bad example, I think you sit down. But as part of the conversation, you can't start the conversation with, Your sister did this, and your brother did this, and you're just done. It can't do that because you all shook hands on it. It has to be, Hey, I messed this up. Your whole life, I have let you go around the issue of money, which accelerates anxiety. It pours gasoline on anxiety instead of holding your hand and walking you through the middle I love it. I didn't do my job, and I'm sorry. But we can't do... I'm not going to have my son in debt to me for 19 years. I love you too much for that. That means we're going to have to accelerate the payment plan. I'm willing to help you with a budget. Jade and I, we're going to give you financial peace, university, and every dollar for you to hand to him as a gift and say, Here's a path on how to walk through that anxiousness to healing on the other side of this deal, to where money is not an anxious thing.

But to change the terms, and he might say, I don't have it. I don't got it. And then what? And then what, right?

Then you just have to accept the fact that if you say, I want to change the terms, and he says, I don't want to do that, I can't do that, or I have these other responsibilities, there does come a point where you have to accept.

Yeah, you got a choice to make. You're going to lose your son. You made the bed. This is what we agreed on.

That's what he has said to me. But I don't think he's really sitting down and looking at his finances to know if he I didn't even bump it 50 bucks a month for a homebody.

Yes, but you don't get to choose that.

You don't know. Yeah.

You want to choose it, but you don't get to choose it. Let me tell you something. My husband and I had a parent plus loan that was in his mother-in-law's name, and it got to the point, because she wanted us to off more quickly than we were. It got to the point that it was getting frustrated, and we finally had to decide, When you're around us, you have to choose the mom hat or the bill collector hat. You can't be both. And so once she realized that, and it's like, Okay, mom hat time. I love you, all these great things. And the less that she chose to put on the tax collector hat, the better the relationship got.

You have to own your mistake on this one and not be mad at him that he's not thinking, 50 more dollars or 100 more dollars. You're going to change a term sit down and change the terms like adults, but you got to go first and say, I messed this up. This episode is sponsored by Better Help. Hey, this is Dr. John Deloney, and some people think relationships have to be easy to be right. Sometimes that can be true, but more often, great relationships get that way because both people put in the work to make them incredible. Therapy can be a place to work through the challenges you face in all of your relationships, whether that's with friends, people at work, your significant other, or even how to get along with yourself. And if you're thinking of starting therapy, try Betterhelp. Therapy isn't just for people who've experienced trauma. It's great for building skills so you can become the best version of yourself. Betterhelp is completely online so it's flexible enough to fit your schedule. Just fill out a short questionnaire to get matched with a licensed therapist, and you can switch therapists at any time for no extra cost.

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All right, all right. You're listening to The Ramsey Show. I'm Jade Borchard. This is Dr. John Deloney. We're taking your calls, America, or wherever you want to call in from. Just know that the number is 888-825-5225. John Deloney. I'm so excited because tomorrow morning, George Campbell, fellow Ramsey personality, George Campbell and I are going to be doing this really cool bonus hour that we're calling the Every Dollar Bonus hour, where we're coming in at 9:00 in the morning? Yeah, 9:00 AM, Tuesday, the 27th. And we are helping people live on YouTube with their budgeting questions. Now, you might be thinking, Okay, Jade, what's the big deal? That's what The Ramsey Show does. This one is different because A, we're going to have every dollar pulled up live. They're showing it on the screen right now. We're going to have every dollar pulled up. So when you ask the question, we can actually show you. You'll be able to see it in real-time. Like, Hey, Jade, I have a problem with irregular income. What am I supposed to do? We'll actually be able to show you in the app Every Dollar how to do it. You can ask whatever question you want, and we'll be able to actually let you see it, which I think is a big piece to learning.

It's one thing to hear it, it's another thing to see it happening. I'm really excited because I think that's going to really help people get their budget and their money on track once in a while.

Dude, we've all been to work presentations where some guy gets up and starts talking you through through a tech thing. He's like, You're going to want to click on the third box, and by the time- Snooze. Yeah, I'm out. Just falling out. So, yeah, being able to watch you guys do this will be fantastic.

I feel like you made it sound like it's the same thing, though.

No, I'm saying If I sit here, okay, when you get the Every Dollar app, you're going to open it up, you're going to like, You already lost me. But hey, you guys are going to sit here and answer questions in real-time. I'm going to show you. Now I'm in on that.

Every Dollar is really… It's intuitive, it's brightly-colored. I feel like there's that are going to make you stay engaged. Plus, it's your question. It won't just be us just talking about it. We're not going to just be yapping about budgets. It'll be because of your questions. Come join us tomorrow, Tuesday, February 27, at 9:00 AM. Remember, it's on YouTube. Matter of fact, you could go there now and click the little alarm button so it'll remind you to be there. It's bright and early, at least central time it is. So tune in whatever time it is in your neck of the woods, and we'll see you there. All right, let's go to the phone lines where we've got Kelly from Oxford, Mississippi. What's going on, Kelly?

Hey, Kate. Hey, Dawn. I'm really nervous sitting here. I'm really nervous.

You don't have to be nervous. We'll be nice.

I've been listening for three to four weeks. Kind of been listening, actually. I'm 22, and I fell in the hole with the trap that America sets. New cars, they're great. I have a car payment, and I'm looking to try to get out of it and just trying to figure out the best way to get out.

All right. Well, let's hear more about it. This car payment, what's the car payment and what's the entire balance on the car?

I pay 565 a month, and I owe 27 a little over 27,000 on it. Okay.

What is your take-home pay? What do you bring home every month?

Let's see. Right now, I'm bringing home around three every month.

Three thousand dollars?

Three And your car payment is 560? Yipes. Yes. Oh, that's a big box of fards. I hate that for you. That's so much money.

That sounds terrible, John. Okay. What other debts do you have?

It's debilitating. That's Because your rent is so expensive right now. Grochets are so expensive. All right, I'll be quiet. I'm just sad for you.

What other bills do you have? What other debt do you have? Is this your only debt?

That's the only thing I have. I'm on my own phone plan. I still live at home with my mom and dad, currently, so I don't have rent. I think that's why I fell into the trap so easy is that I didn't have payment just the time, and it was- Are you paying any rent to your parents?

Yeah. Okay. Yeah, we got to get out of this car. If you were to sell it today, you owe 27 on it. If you were to sell it, what could you get for it? Have you looked it up in Kelly Blue Book?

Yes. Private 40, it said anywhere from 30 to 32.

Listen. Bye, Felicia.

I know. That's right.

Car's gone. She gone.

And you're going to pocket a little bit of change to get you a car in cash. This is a perfect scenario.

Right.

And your next car is going to be ridiculous.

$5,000 ridiculous. Max. Listen, what do you think? You're silent.

I mean, it's scary, but I mean, if that's what gets me out of gets me to where I can sleep at night and not have to worry about debt.

Here's the thing. Let's put it in terms that are a little bit more exciting. You sell the car, you pocket $5,000, you go turn around and buy $5,000 car in cash. Now, you're no longer paying $565 a month. You pair that with whatever other savings you have. Think how quickly you could save up another $5,000 trading your old $5,000 junker. You're probably going to get $5,000 back for it because it's already taken all of its hit. Now, you buy a $10,000 car. Then you still don't have a car payment. Think how fast you could save up another $5,000, trade it in. Now you got yourself a $15,000 car. Do you see how this works? Before you know it, you're going to be driving a $27,000 car that you paid cash for.

And not living at your mommy's house anymore.

Well, let's talk a little bit about that. If you're living at your mom and dad's house, and this is not just for Kelly, but anybody listening, it will behoove you to pay your parents some rent so that there's a paper trail because the time is going to come when you're going to want to move out, whether it's because you want to get an apartment or whether you've saved up enough of a down payment that you're going to buy a house. They're going to want to see at least a year's worth of rental and renter's history, especially if you do our plan and you don't have a credit score, okay? That's not just for you, Kelly. That's for anybody listening. Don't just live at mommy and daddy's rent-free. Make sure that you can show that you paid something. Even if it's 500 bucks a month, show and pay It helps you out in that way, and it just helps you out in the way of being an adult and paying your way through it. Does that sound fair enough, Kelly? I think I scared her away. Are you all right? Yeah, I'm surviving. Okay, you're surviving.

I know. We came at her hard in the paint, but honestly, that's what you need to do to experience more peace. This car payment is just ridiculousness. So sell it, buy yourself a car in cash. All right, let's go to another phone caller. We've got Jair. He's in Indianapolis, Indiana. What's going on, Jair?

Hey, how's it going?

Doing good. How are you? How are you?

How can we help? Yeah. My question is, how do I go off and tell I'm not going to go off, but how do I go on and tell my parents that renting is okay? They believe that renting is just a waste of money, and I don't know how- How old are you? 22.

Are you living at home?

Yeah, I'm living with my I have my wife and son with me as well.

Whoa. Yeah, I would tell you that your parents don't get a vote. You have a wife and son. You've got your own family. Go get yourself a place.

Yeah. That's what I talk to my other relative that I'm very close with.

Well, as long as you live in their house, they're going to think they have a vote, by the way.

As long as you live with them. And they do have a vote as long as you live in their house.

Right. Yeah. They believe my parenting is not as good as theirs, and they always make it seem like they have a say in my- They do because you're living in their house.

Take your family out and get your own place. Yeah.

As simple as that. What's keeping you from renting a place?

I don't know. I'm scared. I've never been out in the real world.

John, come on. Come and get my guy. You should have thought of that before you made a human and before you got married. You're in it, bro. You jumped in the deep end of the pool and you dragged a wife and a child with you. You don't have the luxury of saying, Well, I never took swim lessons. You got to figure out how to swim right now. This is when you move out this weekend and get a one-bedroom apartment, and you get job number two and job number three. You're going to figure out what I got to do and what I'm passionate about and what I'm interested in as you're flying down the highway, brother, because you have a wife and a child to take care of.

Right.

What do you make right now?

I make about 2,200 a month.

Yeah. You're going to triple that? Yeah. You're going to triple that.

I also talked to my wife, and my wife's thinking about going back into the workforce as well.

When? How old is the baby?

He's about to be one years old in four months.

Yeah. Okay. She needs to get back into the workforce. He's a year and four months. You guys have got the family there, so you've got some daycare. Obviously, if you were living with them, they'll probably be willing to help you out in this way. But you've got to start making some major moves to John's point if you want to see the needle move on this. Thanks for listening to this hour of the show. This is The Ramsey Show. Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create actual amazing relationships. I am Jade Warshaw. John Deloney is to the right of me. I'll be taking your money calls. He'll take your calls on really just everything else, John. I feel like you run the gamut.

We were just talking off air. This whole show exists for one reason, to provide hope. That's right. That's just what this show is about. But man, I tell you what, sometimes that light gets real dim out there. It does. Like, when you I'm not a big newsreader, but occasionally, I'll just dip my toes back in. God Almighty. People have lost their minds. Oh, yeah. Across the gamut. When it comes to schools and marriage, we had a call her in a former hour that was like, Hey, man, my parents are speaking into my marriage. I'm married with a kid, and we live in their rent-free in their house. It's like, Yes.

They're going to say, Yes.

Well, I'm scared to grow up, and it's like, I don't have a psychology for it sometimes. And that's why I'm glad you're my friend, Jade.

Listen, at the very least, we are always going to tell you the truth. I'll tell you the truth, man. And the truth should bring hope. At first, it'll make you be like, Oh, crap. And then, if you turn that corner, there's hope on the other side.

And we can always look over here through the glass at the Mighty Bob Rquez.

That's right.

Between two of the most hopeless people sits Bob Rquez, who brings joy and light into Everyone's life.

It's awesome. Oh, boy. And he has a great radio voice. All right. The best. Give us a call. The number is 888-8825-5225, and we will chop it up with you.

And, John, hopefully, you can- We're going to shine the light.

You can find that group that you need. All right, let's go to the phone lines. We got Stephanie in Albany, New York. What's going on, Stephanie? Thank you for stopping me from getting into it.

I'm hoping you can give me some hope. We got you. Trying to get some perspective on a big decision that my husband and I have to make pretty soon pertaining to his career. He's finishing up a medical residency, which is very exciting. He has two offers, and we're trying to weigh the pros and cons of each. We're stuck on where to go, which one to pick.

Tell us about the offers.

Well, one is where we could stay, where we are living now, would not have to move. It's offering about 90,000 more than the other offer, in student loan repayment and a sign on bonus and a little more salary. The other one is still a good offer but would get us closer to my family and friends in Pennsylvania. Yeah. So both good options, but we just don't know what to do.

Let's think about it. How much student loan debt is he going to have coming out of this?

300, K.

So my initial thought, and you can start poking holes in this, my initial thought says, okay, if there's 300,000 of student loans that we're going to have to pay off and we can stay where we're at and make 90,000 more, that's looking like it's starting It's going to look like a green light for me. Help me see why it could be better simply moving closer to your family.

Well, that's what I'm struggling with. I think financially on paper, that does make more sense.

But you've been dragged around through med school for the last 7-10 years, and you're ready to get back to your family, right?

Yeah. I just don't know how to look at it from a financial point of view, or I felt like I've been looking at it through a microscope through every angle possible, and now I just I don't know where to go.

All right, let's change the whole… Let's back all the way out, okay? It's sometimes the more the finer the microscope, the more we think we're learning, but actually it just blurs up the whole thing. So let's back all the way out. What Jade said is right. The math is the math is the math. You can try to make the math not the math, but the math just is. Right. Instead of, should we do this or should we do this? Stop looking at this as a right decision versus a wrong decision. Just exhale and say, What a crazy, fortunate season of life that we got two options. That means that you're going to pick one, and six months, six years down the road, you're going to have more. You're going to have different ones. And reverse engineer this whole thing and ask yourself in nine months, when your husband comes home from work and your kids come be bopping in the house. What do you want that to feel like? Where is that going to be? And build the life that you want to have. Don't look at it as a scarcity like, it's got to be this one?

It's got to be that. Man, it's such a more It's such a more vast picture than when you're trying to look it under a microscope. Are you tired in New York?

I'm hot and cold with it. There are things that are really great about it.

Is the thought of living next to your family life-giving to you?

Yeah.

Okay. Have you been honest with your husband about that?

I have, yeah.

Okay. As he said, I don't really care. We're going to make a whole bunch more money, get my loans paid off, so we're staying in New No, he has not said that.

But that's another thing that's just complicating this for me is it's not really my career. It's his career.

It's your home. It is your home. It is your home. It is you all's home.

What is your career?

What is your career? Are you able to just easily move?

Yes, I was. I owned my own business for 10 years, but gave it up a couple of years ago, and so I'm mobile. Now, I'm staying home with the kids.

Okay, I see. Well, many times people call in, and I don't know, maybe John and I are opposing. I don't know that we're opposing. We might just be focusing more.

No, I say to stay in New York for For 24 months, Yelshae Cans, 24 months, and we're going to live Spartan, and we're going to pay these stupid things off. Then we're going to see how life looks.

Yeah, I'm with that. I'm with that.

Once we've exhaled and then say, and by the way, we're going to budget for 10 grand because we're making a whole bunch of money for flights for me and the kids to go to Pennsylvania and spend some extended time. I love that. We're going to build some of that in. You can practice life in Pittsburgh, but also you can get these stupid loans out of your hair because you all have made a bed that you got to sleep in for a minute. Then you can begin to decide, what life do we want to have?

That's my picture. No, I'm with that because so many times, Stephanie, people call in after the fact. They've made the move because they've followed their heart on the journey, and now they're in it, and now the reality of the money that they owe comes crashing, hurtling back at them, and it's like, Oh, man, what do I have to do? And it's in those moments that I'm always telling people, Listen, you have to choose. Whenever you've made a... I'm going to call it a mistake because I think that debt is a mistake because it's something that you always have to go and you're having to fix the past, right? So in that way, I'm calling it a mistake. You do have to trade off. And I'm hoping that you can make that trade on the front-end, like John was saying, instead of moving to Pennsylvania now or as soon as he takes this residency and then finding out, Oh, man, we've got this crazy debt. It's not as great as I envisioned it would be because, yeah, I'm close to my family, but now my husband's got to work three times as hard. And it just...

I don't think it will be all it's cracked up to be if you don't have that freedom very closely in your mirror. I would do what John said. This is The Ramsey Show.

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For over 25 years, the only insurance company I've recommended is Xander Insurance. Not only do they search all the top term life plans to find you the best rates, but you can now apply completely touchless over the or the internet. They also have plans with super competitive rates that don't require an exam, allowing you to get the coverage you need faster. Go to zander. Com or call 800-356-42-82. What's going on, party people? This is the Ramsey Show. I'm Jade Warshaw. This is Dr. John Deloney. We are taking your calls, so give us a call. The number is 888-825-5225, and we will give you our best advice that we can come up with. Some say the advice is worth what you pay for it. That's an old-school... Davism. Yeah, that's a Davism. Guys, I want to tell you about a new event that's coming up that I'm super excited about. This is the Total Money Makeover Weekend event. This T-M-O. Yeah, T-M-O. T-m-o. Here at Ramsey, we like to make acronyms for everything and just say the abbreviation. So it's T-M-M-O-W. Total Money Makeover Weekend happening May 10th and 11th here in The Vill. Nashville is what I'm talking about.

We've got an event center up on a hill. It's really amazing if you've never been there. And so the point is, it's a smaller or limited venue, I would say. So you got to get your tickets right away. These tickets are starting at $99, guys, so please believe that they're hot potatoes are going fast. You can get your tickets now at ramsey solutions. Com/events. I think that you should get a ticket because this event is very different, John. This is a crash course on everything we teach people about money. You'll hear everything from brand new content. Brand new. So if you've been to one of our events before, you're like, I already know what it is. No, this one's different. All the personalities are going to be there. We're talking a different spin on budgeting and beating debt and investing and more. And so what I like about it is no matter what baby step you're on, it's for you because we're talking about all the baby steps. So whether you're paying the house off or you're just trying to get a $1,000 saved, this is the event for you. One of my favorite things that we're implementing is more and more Q&A's.

So you'll get to ask your questions and we'll be answering them. I don't know about you, John, but I have some pretty fun stuff up my sleeve planned for this event, so I'm looking forward to it.

Yeah, I think it's going to get off the rails a little bit, which I'm looking forward to. Yeah.

The first 500 tickets have already been sold, and so you got to keep going. Oh, I'm sorry. I read this wrong. It says, With the first 500 tickets sold, you'll get a copy of Total Money makeover signed by Dave. Wow, that's great. Very cool. That's going to go really fast. So make sure you get your tickets again, $99 for a limited time, ramseysolutions. Com/events. That's cool. I'm excited for that. I don't know about the rest of you guys. Let's go to Travis, who's in Portland, Oregon. What's going on, Travis?

Hey. Hello, guys. Thank you so much for taking my call, and I really appreciate your time, and I'm happy to be here.

Well, we're happy you called in. How can we help?

Well, I was just hoping you guys could shed some light on maybe what angle I should be thinking towards our debt and getting out of debt and what steps I should be taking. The premise of it is we have $65,000 in debt to go. We were at $127,000. We were semi-gazelle-intense, then my gazelle got a leg cramp there for a second. But we're back on it.

Okay, good.

Yeah, we're back on it. I'm personally active duty, and I'm a nurse, and my wife is also a nurse, but she has got the harder job, which is being a full-time mom. She homeschools. She has a teaching background, so we're really trying to put an emphasis on giving our kids a home education. In the past, I've tried to look at maybe getting extra work, but being in government, it's really hard sometimes because there's what's called conflict of interest. I found it, in my opinion, too difficult for me to look for extra work without breaking our rules.

What makes it a conflict of interest? Can you give me an example?

Sure. I'd prefer not to give the details of the agency if you don't mind. But I one time applied for a job and I got accepted, so I had to go through our HR Department. Because the other company received grants from the federal government, we can't I see. Work with that company. It's that thing. It seems like that happens a lot in the medical world because a lot of things come from the federal government, payment-wise or grant-wise. Unless I want to be doing, and I'm not against it, but I could do like DoorDash or something, but I prefer to do nursing shifts because they typically are going to pay better. Right.

But if you can't, then because it sounds like you're saying you're trying to, but you're running into this red tape. So the question is, what are you going to do instead?

Yes. I guess the other part of that question, and I have so much respect for my wife, so I'm not saying this. I don't want it to be misquoted or misheard, but my wife also has a nursing license, and I thought about her maybe picking up two or three shifts a week.

That's great.

Yeah, but I guess the issue is I don't think she's quite on board with that, and I don't know if I am either. I'm just wondering what you guys think is the best course to take because- You're both working.

You're working at your nurse job, and she's working with the kids. I don't think it's bad to ask the wife who's at home to also pick up work if you're also willing to pick up work. I feel like it's both of you sacrificing in the way that you can with the hours that you have. John?

Yeah. It's easy to paint these as forever conversations. What I hear a lot on the show is people calling and they box themselves into a cage with their own variables. We have to homeschool our kids. We have to do this. We have to get this paid off. We have to do this, and we have to do this. Well, then there's nowhere to go. What I always want to recommend people do is just think in six-month increments. For six months, could you take the shifts that you're able to work? Because you're also active duty, you're going to become a part-time stay-at-home dad while your wife goes and picks up shifts that you all can send to the creditors that you owe. You all created a world where you owed 120 something thousand dollars. You got it down to 60 something thousand, but that journey is not over yet. Or can we put our kids in a local small school or in a public school for just in one year, and it's going to make us so uncomfortable that we are going to go bananas getting the stuff paid off. Where can every shift we possibly can.

You see what I'm saying? Then if you make that, you know this, you're in the military. You make that short term sacrifice, it pays off forever. It's just being able to say, Hey, this is not forever. This isn't the way this is going to be. And by the way, this is not how we drew this up. We don't want this to be true, but it is. What do we have to do right now? I think you all are too smart. You all could solve this problem. It's just you've trapped yourselves with your own have-tos and shoulds and musts, and it's going to keep you paralyzed.

I appreciate the insight.

Does that make sense?

It does. Yes, it does. I think it would be something that I would want to talk to my wife more about because I think she's a bit more apprehensive than I am, and I don't want to come across as disrespectful to her because I think what she does is incredible.

I think you got to stop apologizing. You're tiptoeing in, and I think that tiptoeing makes her think something's wrong. Both Jade and I are telling you, Man, there's no tiptoeing. You all are both working your butts off to try to meet the values of your family. You all are both in service-oriented jobs. That's just who you all are. You're both great people. It's just a matter of saying, Okay, for this season, can we align our energy in this direction? That's not the direction we want to go forever, but just for right this second. You said something really important that I think everybody needs to hear when you're heading into these hard conversations or the ones that you're apprehensive about with your spouse. Start with, Hey, what about this scares you? It could be, I don't want our kids to get behind because if they get behind in school, then this, then they're not going to know algebra, and then all of a sudden, they're not going to get into the college. Okay, we're going to be okay there. Or maybe it's something more existential. Maybe it's bigger. Maybe it's more X or Y or Z.

But let's start with, Hey, what's scaring you to death about this? Not, Here's the plan. Let's do the plan.

You see what I'm Yeah, I can come across the way you just said it.

I know you can.

I try to bite my tongue a little bit.

You know what I mean? Yeah, totally. But here's the deal. By not biting your tongue, your wife is looking for some strategic direction. Because you hem haul around it because you don't want to come across as a guy who's an active military guy with, Here's the plan. Let's execute the plan. So you end up handing your no plan, and that's when fear takes over sometimes. Let's sit down and co-create Create one together and start with, Hey, what scares you to death about this? You say, We owe 60 something thousand dollars and I can't breathe. I don't feel like I'm being a good husband or a good dad chasing this dead around. Now you go, What scares you to death? Here's our kids, someone else raising our children, all those things factor into it. And once we get the fears out of the way and on the table, everybody's got fears on the table, now we can start together co-creating a plan. Then we're just going to follow the plan and knock it out. You'll get there. What do you think, Jade?

I love that. I think just remembering everything is short term. Short term. It's temporary. It's not going to be like this forever. And just always remembering that some people are just afraid of the unknown. I've never had to work this hard before. I don't know what it's going to feel like. I've never had to have two jobs. And that's fair and that's okay. But I think together you guys will be able to work through that. This is The Ramsey Show. What's going on? This is The Ramsey Show. Thank you for listening. I'm Jade Warshaw. He's Dr. John Deloney. Give us a call. The number is 888-825-5225, and we'll do our best to hook you up with the right advice for your situation. Let's go straight to the phone lines where we've got Shantel in Charlotte, North Carolina. What's going on, Shantel?

Hey. I have two questions. I just recently cashed out my retirement from an old job to pay off my car because I had a $700 a month car payment, and I was just really struggling, having to work overtime just to make my regular bills instead of working overtime to pay extra. I took a pretty big hit. I had about 34,000 in that account. They took 20% of it, so I was able to cash out about 26,000. I used that in combination with the money that I had in savings, and I paid off my car. Now I'm just questioning, how do I prepare this next year for tax time? I know there's going to be a 10% fee.

At minimum.

Yeah. Also, I'm questioning, do I turn around and sell this car and put that money towards my other debt? I do have another 05 Camry that I bought in cash just to run around for work because I drive a lot of miles, but it has 208,000 miles on it.

You would cash out your whole 401k to pay off a car, then turn around and sell the car to pay off another debt? That's what we're talking about doing?

Yeah. I'm torn between, do I keep the car?

Yes.

Whenever you're in the medical field and you find yourself going down a treatment, and the treatment is making everything worse.

Even if you don't know what treatment to go to, the first thing you do is stop doing the thing that's hurting you. Right now, you are spinning out. You're making some long-term decisions with a very short-sided lever. Just take your hands off the wheel, put Take your foot off the gas and just slow down for a second, okay?

What'd you pay for the car?

I paid about 41,000 about two years ago.

What do you earn every year? What's your yearly income?

My base salary is just over $80,000. But with the overtime I've been working, my taxable income for last year was 102. Okay.

All right. The car is paid for It's not more than 50% of what you bring in. It's now paid for at a very, very, very, very, very steep cost. I'd keep that car and I'd sell the other one, the one that you're running around town in. Tell me about the rest of your debt.

I have three credit cards and a line of credit. Those total up to right around Around 10,000 total. Okay. What else? Then I have about $14,000 left to pay for my attorneys that I had to use for a child's case. That is zero %, no interest or anything. I just pay what I can when I can.

What else?

Then I have a large $65,000 federal student loan. Okay.

All right.

Are you scared, honey? You sound scared.

Well, I'm a single mom, so.

This is a lot. This is a lot.

Yeah.

Okay. I just want you to know you're not by yourself. We're way across the country, but we're sitting here with you. Okay. I know this one's heavy.

Mm-hmm.

Are you receiving any child support from the dad, or is that included in the 102? No.

No, I just don't get child support. It's 50 custody, and it's actually pretty cordial, and we handle things on our own now.

There's no child support because the judge didn't rule it or because you didn't care to go through with it?

Both. Part of it was because I earned significantly more income than he does, and I thought how it ended up turning around, slightly.

I'm sorry. Speak directly into your phone. Hey, Shantel, you got to speak directly into your phone. Can you hear me? Yeah. Tell me that last part again. Can you hear me? I can. Tell me that last part again.

The part of it is that I didn't pursue child support because I earned significantly more than he does, so I was afraid that I would end up having to pay him. But now things are actually pretty cordial, and he pays for his half of things for the children. It's not something that we do.

Okay. Here's your choices. If you wanted to sell the car that you have, you could. It might behoove you to do that. Now that I know the debt that you have, swap the situation and you keep the run-around car and you sell this other car, if you were to sell it, how much could you get for it? You paid 41,000. What do you think you could get?

It's only worth like, 15,000 private party.

Didn't you say you bought it two years ago?

Yeah, it's depreciated really, really fast because I work from my car and I put a lot of miles on it. I drive a ridiculous amount?

Because of work?

Yeah. In the first year that I had this car, I put 65,000 miles on it.

Okay. Well, I wish it was worth more, but I'm still going to have you get rid of it because you have a $5,000 car sitting there that works just fine, like you said, to get around town. Do you still have to drive an exorbitant amount for work?

I do. Yeah, I work from my car. I drive to different places. I don't have an office or anything that I work in. It's just from my car.

How far are we driving? Tell me more.

I'm a hospice nurse. So I drive to different facilities and homes. It varies. I drive a lot more miles when I pick up overtime because I'm covering the whole Charlotte market. So it can be a lot.

Okay. All right. Could you be level with me? I want you to be 100% real. Can you do the job that you do in the older vehicle?

Yes, I do. That's my daily driver. I hardly ever drive the Buick, which is the car that I just paid off.

Okay, then we're selling the Buick, we're taking that $15,000. We're going to pay off these three lines of credit, these three credit cards in the line of credit, and we're going to take the additional $4,000 left, and you're going to pay $4,000 on the attorney. That's going to leave $10,000 left on the attorney, and it's going to leave you $1,000 saved.

I'd leave about 4,000 bucks. I'd check with the tax person because she's going to owe the taxes on that, too, this year.

She does, but I think she's got some time to stack that up. Or you got to save up for it. Yeah. I would talk to a tax professional to find out. But that's your first order of business with the money from the sale of the car. Then everything else goes into the debt snowball. You've got the 10,000 for the attorney, you've got the student loan for 65k, and know that you're on the hook for taxes come the end of the year. I want you to find out what that's going to be sooner than later so that you can put that into your debt snowball and put a sinking fund where you're putting a little bit aside every month so that by tax time, you'll have that money. When did you take the withdrawal on your 401k? Was it 2024? Or did you do it last year?

It was 2024.

Okay. You'll have until next April. You'll have a year, more or less, to save up for that. In the meantime, you've got to just be... There's no way around this other than to say that you're working like a crazy person. Luckily, you have an asset that you can sell. Do you have any other money laying around? Stocks, anything?

No. I have 1,800 in savings now. It was close to 8,000, but I took a good chunk of that to pay off my car.

Okay. So We're going to... Since you already have 1,800 in savings, I want you to take 800 of that, and I want you to put it towards this attorney bill. And that's going to knock that down because I already kept 1,000 aside. That's going to knock that down even further. So $1,000 saved, everything above and beyond your minimum payments on your bills goes to the student loan. You're working like crazy, girl. Take all the shifts that you can get until this debt is paid off. It's not going to be easy. This is The Ramsey Show. Hey, if you want to make real progress with your money and get that extra push to keep going, then you need to be at our brand new event, the Total Money Makeover Weekend. On May 10th and 11th, join me, the rest of the personalities, and a community of people like you at Ramsey headquarters for new talks, new focus, and new motivation to stay gazelle-intense on your money goals. Early bird tickets start at just $99. So don't wait. Get yours at ramseysolutions. Com/weekend. You are listening to The Ramsey Show. I am Jade Warshaw. Dr. John Delonia sitting right next to me will be your hosts for this hour and the next hour.

If you want us to take your call, you can call in. The number is 888-825-5225. Hey, if you're listening to this on whatever podcaster you listen to, or if you're watching on YouTube, or you listen to it on the radio, thank for doing that. Obviously, we exist here because of you guys. There would be no show if there were no listeners or watchers, or subscribers. So thanks for doing that. And if you could continue to do so wherever you listen to this show or watch the show, be sure to like it, subscribe it, and share it with other people. Because when you do that, it just spreads the love around, and that is good for everybody. And of course, I don't have to tell you guys the algorithm loves such things. So keep doing that. We're sure grateful that you do. All right, let's go to the phone lines. We got Ashley in San Angelo, Texas. What's going on, Ashley?

Hello. Thank you for taking my call. You're good. I am calling because I have a couple of questions about life insurance, first of all. I just got on Xander, probably about a month or two ago. I had my counselor that told me about it, so I got onto it. My husband actually got onto it as well. My payment is about $30 a month for it. My husband's is 100 just because he has a history in the past of Atrial Fibrillation. Okay. He hasn't had any issues since, but they beamed it and his is about $100 a month. Okay. My question is really Because we also have a whole life insurance that we got before we were married that my in-law advise us to get, but listening to you all, I know you all don't recommend it, but we've been paying on it for... We got married in '16, so we've been paying I've been on it since right before then. It's 91, 98 a month, and I called and tried to talk about canceling it, but I wanted to get you all's recommendations. Since we're already so far in, it's a 15-year note, should we go ahead and cancel it?

So the policies you The policies you have now, the one that you have for 30 and the one that your husband has for 100, those are term life, correct?

Yes. Okay, great.

I would go in and I would cancel and cash out that whole life one immediately. Okay. Do you know why? Okay.

Well, my stepdad, he follows you all. He's been phenomenal with it. He's explained it to me, but if you all could explain it to me, it'd probably help me understand it a little better.

Yeah. You know, big picture. When you have a whole life insurance policy, part of it goes to your policy and part of it goes to an investment. That's why you pay more for it. So 91,98, part of that payment goes to cash value, and part of it goes to an investment. So you might have a face value of, Hey, you're covered for this much, but we're also going to take a piece of that, and we're going to invest it for you and have this cash value over here that at the right time, you can have access to. But the problem with that cash value that you're investing in is number one, the rate of return is poopoo, and number two, it dies when you die, which defeats the whole purpose of the insurance policy. Why not just have a policy policy that you're paying into that's there when you pass away? That's the whole point of it. We always say that if you were to take, let's just say you paid into a whole life policy and $40 of it was going into the cash value and they were investing in that. If you were to take that $40 and invest it yourself in good mutual funds that had an annualized rate of return of 8 to 10%, you could far outway what any of those whole value policies would earn you in cash value.

We're just pointing out the fact that the investment side of it is absolutely terrible. We'd rather you take your money, do a term life insurance policy that is worth the time, worth the money. You get what you pay for, and then if you have extra money, you take that money and you add it to your investments and you invest it on your own through your 15%, which is the way we teach it. That's why we say that. For anybody listening, I I don't want anybody to just say, I'm not going to do it because Ramsey says so. It's like, you need to understand it and make sure it gives with you and you know why you're doing it. I'm glad that you asked that question.

Okay. I went back and forth about it just because I'm just a little personal information about me. I was diagnosed with MS last year, so I was like, Am I going to be able to even get term life insurance again in 20 years? I know I'll probably be able to get it, but my premium will probably be through the route.

Well, how old will you be in 20 years?

I'm 36 now, so I'll be 56.

56. Okay. Yeah, it's probably going to be more expensive. The whole point, though, and just to make this clear, the hope is that you get to the point where you're self-insuring. The hope is that you get to the point where you're investing. You're working through the baby steps quickly so that by baby step four, you're investing 15% of your income over the course of time. That's going to compound and grow. Then you off your house and you've got equity there. And then after you've paid off your house, you're at being able to add even more than 15% to investments, maybe or to 20 or even 25% into your investments. And the point is that you're building wealth to the point that when this term runs out, you can go, All right, I'm good. I've got a million dollars here in investments. I've got my home. It's worth this amount. And if something were to happen, my family members would be covered. Because the thing to remember, and this is not just for you, Ashley, but anybody listening, The point of insurance is to replace income for people who are dependent on your income. So your husband, if you have children, if something were to happen to you and they're dependent on your income, they'd be covered.

But if you've invested to this point, you're already in your 60s, then suddenly you need a lot less of that. Does that make sense? Some people look at it as their ticket to wealth, and I'm like, no, the whole point of it really is to replace income for those who need it, for who are dependent on it.

Can I ask you all another question? Of course. I don't know how much time you all have.

Yeah, go ahead.

We have a Roth IRA that we got a couple of years ago as well, and I think there's 10,000 in it. I had transferred some money over I'm going to put that in there. I mean, maybe just put the 91,98 that I was paying towards that and that Roth IRA every month.

Yes, ma'am. Love that. Well, what baby step are you on?

I'm not going to lie to you all. I just started. We're going through a big change in our life right now. We're going to be selling our house, hopefully within the next month or two. And we're actually buying some property. I know you all probably don't advise the way we're doing it, but I feel like it will actually work out.

Wait a minute. Wait a minute now. You done told me about it now.

Where are you buying property, Ashley?

I know you're from West Texas area, so it's in San Angelo, off the 277 near Cristoval area.

What What are you going to do? I know that area well. What are you going to do with that land?

We're buying five acres from somebody, and we're going to build a house on it. We can probably make a good amount of money from our house, at least 170 to 180 that we're living in right now. With that money, our plan, what I'm working through and what I've written down and tried to process, is I'm going to pay off my student loans. I'm the only one who has student loans. My husband does not. I owe 79,000 We have a camper. We're going to live in our camper. We're completely fine with it, both of us are. We do owe on it. My plan was to try and sell it and then get another camper that's a lot less in price to where we're not paying the full 50,000 that we owe on it. Rather pay like 15,000.

When you buy the land, you're just going to live in the camper or are you going to build a house?

We're going to live in the camper and save up money.

Oh, Ashley, you got to get off YouTube. You got to get off YouTube. You were in San Angelo last summer when it was a thousand degrees for like 150 straight days.

I know, but I mean, both of us are.

Hold on. What about?

The rain here is ridiculous.

What about staying in your home, you'll look at each other and you make a two-year plan, and you'll work like B-A-N-A-N-A-S, and you get this stuff paid off?

Oh, and I'm doing that, too. What I do, I have the potential of making an extra, approximately, 2,000 a month.

Go make that. But listen, you're trying to do everything all at once and some cool stuff and some dream stuff. Here's what you're going to do. You're going to have no home. You're going to be sitting in a used camper in the middle of a field in the middle of West Texas in July.

And then a tornado comes.

You're going to see... Yeah, forget a tornado. You're just going to... Just the Dirt from Lubic is going to fly over, and you're just going to be staring at your husband, and you're going to think, I don't love you anymore. Listen, we're trying to do too much all the same time, running, running, running. Just follow the steps. They're boring, they're not sexy, and they work every time. Slow down. Just do it right.

This is The Ramsey Show. Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it This is The Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create real, actual, amazing relationships. I'm Jade Warshaw, your host, your other host today, Dr. John Deloney. He is the author of Building a Non-Anxious Life. He is also the host of The Dr. John Deloney Show, which is popping off, if I do say so myself. We'll be taking your calls. The number is 888-825-5225. Get in where you fit in, and we'll give you the best advice that we muster up for you.

Dude, get in where you fit in.

Get in where you fit in. What's that from? That's a T-shirt right there. It is. I don't know where I got that from. I like that. All right, let's do it. Let's chop it up. We got Jacob in Dallas, Tejas. What's going on?

Hey, can you guys hear me?

We can.

Awesome. I love your guys' show. John, I absolutely love your show. Been a long-time listener.

Thanks, man. I appreciate you, dude. What's up?

Yeah. Got a two-part question for you. This might not be as much of a money as it is a relational question, so do with it what you will. My wife and I moved to Dallas around five months ago, and it's been super rough since we got here. We're finally getting our feet underneath us. We both got jobs. She got a job in marketing, and I'm in the end stages of my background investigation with a local police department in the area. We are on track with the baby steps all this stuff. She's having a really hard time at her job and her boss is being a real jerk. I don't know my place as her husband where it crosses the line for me to step in and speak to him. I'm a little bit of background so you guys know what I'm talking about. He is a very stubborn guy. She's running a business for him where he's trying to market this new product and essentially start up a business. He put a a lot of trust in her from the beginning to hire a team and be that person for his business, and he put it in her hands.

He's been super indecisive this whole time and shortening the deadline of launch to now six weeks where it's supposed to take nine months. She's got her hands up in the air like, What do I do?

Do you trust your wife, Jacob?

I trust my wife so much. She's so smart.

All right, stay out of this completely. She's a grown up, and this is where she works.

That's what I'm thinking.

It's real tempting to take this back to recess and be like, You talk to my This is a place of business. If she doesn't like it, she can walk out the front door.

Right. That's what I think. I just don't know the boundary because when he starts speaking to my wife in a way that is extremely dishonoring in front of her coworkers- She gets up and walks out the door. Exactly. Okay. That's what I was thinking.

Why hasn't she?

Well, we're in a little bit of a place where we need the money right now. We're in a position where we hate it, where it's like, I can't just have you walk out right now, which is what I want to be able do.

No, my dignity is not for sale. My wife's dignity is not for sale either. Do you all have little kids?

No.

Okay. Then it may be that I'm going to put my enrollment in the academy on hold because I'm going to go work three jobs so that my wife can get out of this mess. But you all created a world where you feel like we got to put up with this. When Jade and I, we're always talking about freedom, Dave, we're always talking about freedom, freedom, freedom. This is exactly what we're talking about. Because if you all don't owe anybody any money, then laugh and smile at the student and be like, Dude, we out, right? No one's going to talk to me that way. But you all feel trapped. What would it take financially for her to be able to walk out the door?

I think the smart choice is finding another job before she leaves because we've had little to no income since we've been in Dallas.

No, I mean, it's so bad that you're about to do something stupid. What do you mean? You're about to go confront another grown man at his place of business where he pays your life.

I want to in the fact that that's my wife, but I know that's not the smart choice. I'm not going to do that.

No, but I'm saying it's that bad.

It's that bad. I mean, and you called in here saying, should you do that? So you definitely considered it. Let's be honest about that. What does she earn at that job?

She takes around $4,000 a month.

Okay. Is there something that she could find in her field to replace $4,000 a month? I'm thinking, yes.

Yes. No question in my mind.

Sure. We've had a long journey trying to find a job, though. She's had a lot of interviews, and people just don't want to hire for some reason. So this is the first job that she's actually gotten hired since she's been looking for four months.

Okay, but it's not the last job she'll get hired in. Understood. That's the thing you got to- The other kicker is, in a month, I'm going to be on the Police Department's payroll.

So it's like, Okay, we only have one month to pledge this. So what's the... I don't know, because I keep telling I don't want to overstep. You have your thing to do with your boss, but also this would- If she were to call in today, what would she be telling us? In what manner?

Is she coming home every day saying, I want to quit. I want to quit. Or is she coming home every day just being like, Gosh, my boss is such a jerk. What a butt head. And is she not talking about quitting?

She loves her job and the team that she works with. She just can't get anything done when she She's at work because her boss is a jerk, and he doesn't trust her to do the job that he hired her to do.

This is you busybodying, brother. This is between her and her workplace. Okay. Why? You see what I'm saying? If she loves her job, she loves the work, she loves the challenge, she just has an annoying boss.

I'm just sitting here listening to her talk, and I'm like- Okay, so maybe that's the boundary, right?

That might be a conversation. If she's coming home every day and she's trashing her job, it's making you feel confused. You can have that conversation with her to say, Listen, if you love your job and you're happy, but you come home every day and complain, it makes me think that you need to move on.

Or she may be, yeah, she's using you as a garbage bin for all the bad stuff.

If you don't want me to think that you need to move on, then I need to hear both sides of the story. I need to hear the positive stuff, and in that way, it's a little bit more balanced, and we're just normal people talking about day-to-day life.

Dude, I was bad about that. I'd come home and tell my wife all the stuff, the good, but also, Man, this guy did this and this guy did that, until she finally said, I can't solve any of these problems, but you're continuing just to come home and fill our communication with negative, negative, negative, negative. Either quit. When she said that, I was like, I don't want to quit. I realized, Oh, all she's getting is the worst parts of the day. That was on me, and I had to change that. But that took her drawing a boundary, a relational boundary, saying, If you have something awful that you want to share with me, that you want me to sit with you in it, we're going to grieve it because we're getting ready to do something different. Awesome. I'm all in. But if it's just to complain, I'm over that.

I don't want to hear that all the time. Yeah, because if you're going to complain that much, at some point, you do have to take action. It's the old piss or get off the pot analogy. Can I say that, James? That's all right.

Well, we just did. You're sitting there, you're about to get yourself kicked off the police force before you even join. I know, yes.

By accosting a dude in his own parking lot. You cannot assault this guy and cuss him out in the parking lot.

I do think a valid question is, are you asking for my advice or my wisdom, or do you just want me to listen? I love that. That's good, John. That's a question that will frame any of these conversations, because if you want your opinion, she wants your opinion, you're going to give it to her. But otherwise, I'm just going to sit here and I'm going to listen. And dude, I get it. When somebody talks to your wife, you get all riled up like it's middle school again. It's her job. She's a professional. You trust her. She's smart. Let her handle her business.

This is The Ramsey Show. What's up, guys? It's Jade Warshaw here. Now, I want you to take a moment and dream with me right quick. Imagine a life where you don't have to feel stressed about money anymore. Got it? So here's the deal. That life is possible for you, and your first step is to get on a budget. Budgeting helps you make a plan for your spending so you know that you're covered all month long. And the best way to budget is with our budgeting app, EveryDollar. You can get started for free right now at everydollar. Com or download it from the App Store. That's everydollar. Com. This is The Ramsey Show. I'm Jade. Jade Warshaw. He's Dr. John Deloney. We're taking your calls all afternoon long. The number is easy, 888-825-5225. And we will come on through with the advice for whatever questions that you ask. It's tax season, and a lot of you guys have questions about taxes, and we get it. Taxes are so confusing. I actually hate taxes. I'm going to be honest about that. But to help you get a better handle on them, let's unpack some questions, a question from one of our listeners, and hopefully you can see yourself in this, and maybe it'll help you.

He says, I'm a new business owner. What are the most important things I need to do to make bookkeeping for my business easier? All right. First off, Congratulations on starting a business. That's legit. I'm excited for you. And bookkeeping can be a lot. I'll be honest, when Sam and I had our business, he still runs it. I tried to be the bookkeeper for the first couple of years, and it drove me crazy. But the good thing about when you try to do it yourself is you learn a little something. But if you're not ready, keeping your personal and your business expenses separate, you have to do that. If you're not doing that already, that's numero uno. Keep those separate. And two, create a regular bookkeeping routine so that you're always on top of tracking your expenses, whether it's receipts, invoices, et cetera. That's thing number two. Then number three, try to automate any processes that you can by using accounting software or by working with a tax professional. Number three is a real zinger. You need to do that. Go ahead and spend the money on the software. Go ahead and spend the money on the tax professional.

It's going to be worth it, and it's going to save you just a lot of stress and headaches. It can pay to have a CPA. I will say that. They can review your books and help you reduce risk. They can help you eliminate errors and maximize your tax deductions. Because I will also say this, the worst thing ever, John, is when you feel like you've done it, like you've done it all right. You've paid everything into the IRS, you've done everything right, and then you get a letter Like, later on, that's like, Hey, you owe X amount of dollars. It'll be from like, quarter three, four years ago. You're like, What am I supposed to do? That was explicits, by the way. If you can pay- There's a great meme that says, Hi, it's the IRS.

You owe us an amount of money for taxes that we know. It's like, What is that number? We're not going to tell you. You have to guess. You send us a number, and we'll let you know if you go to jail or not.

It's like, Come on, Yeah, it's crazy. For that reason, having and paying a CPA is totally worth it. It can be, which means you just can focus on growing your business and doing the stuff that you're really good at. A Ramsey trusted TaxPro can help you. Our team has already vetted them, so you know that they're going to be top-notch. If you are interested in that, go ahead and head to ramseysolutions. Com/taxpro to get started. That's ramseysolutions. Com/taxpro. Do it today. Let's go to Elizabeth in Dallas, Texas. Man, Texas is blowing up the lines today. What's going on?

Hi. Thank you for taking my call, number one. I need some guidance. I'm late on the whole baby steps situation. My dad passed away last May, and so we had a lot of financial things come through, and I saw what my mom was going through, and I was like, I don't want that to be me. So I'm just trying to take charge, and I paid off about $12,000 between a private student loan and a credit card, but I don't have that $1,000 baby emergency fund. But so my question is, I've got this by snowball going. I've got just under $80,000 of debt left. Most of that, about 71 of it is student loans, and then 8,400 is a private is a personal line of credit through my bank. I've got my debt snowball going, but I want to do the steps. I want to get back on track, making sure I have that emergency fund in case something happens. What are some help to get back on track or to get on track?

What's keeping you from putting aside $1,000? You tell me.

I have been putting money towards a high-yield savings account every month. But in my brain was just like, The interest on this debt is killing me. I want to put money towards the debt. But after I discovered the baby steps, I was like, Oh, so that's not the first step. The first step is going back and making that $1,000 emergency fund. I guess my question is, Should I go ahead and pause, just do my minimum payments, and then put everything towards that savings account? I guess in my brain, that would make the most sense.

To stack up the $1,000, you're saying?

Yeah.

I'm going to tell you to work the plan.

Back to Okay.

Every time I'm going to point back to the steps, and I'm going to point to them in order because, Elizabeth, the point of it is to set you up with the best possible foundation possible. Right now, you're feeling that. You're going, Man, I've paid off some debt. But if something were to happen, I don't have a cushion there to help me out. And when you don't have that cushion there, what happens is people end up going back into debt because they get out a credit card or they do a line of credit to cover their emergencies instead of having $1,000 sitting there. That way, if something happens, they've got that thousand plus whatever they might take in from their paycheck that month, and they're able to cover basically anything that could possibly come up. Having that thousand dollars is super important. Remember, it's temporary, right? It's a temporary thing. Right. Yeah, I I would say that if you can stack that up, most people can get it done in 30 days or less. Can you?

Probably not 30 days. I could probably do it within three or four months.

What's something you could sell?

Yeah. I'm sorry.

What's something you could sell?

To be honest with you, I don't have a lot that I can sell. I travel for work. I'm a park ranger with the Texas Park and Wildlife Department. I've been I'm very blessed. The car that I drive is totally paid for. I don't have a car payment on that, but it's my only transportation to work. But I'm basically using my income, and I do my zero-based budget. I did start with that. That was my baseline. I have specific money that I put towards savings every month.

Yeah, but I have a flag to raise because you told me you've been putting money in this high-yield savings. But then when I asked you how quickly you could save $1,000, you said four months.

Well, right now with my budget, it's about $200 a month.

That's the only margin you have? $200 a month? Right now, yeah. And that's just you making minimum payments?

Yeah.

Okay. So we need a bigger shovel because with $80,000, if you're paying $200 a month, we're going to be doing this until the Stone Age comes back.

Okay.

We've got to get a bigger shovel. What are you earning right now?

I don't even know what that means, Jade, but it sounds ominous.

It means that the world has restarted again.

The Stone The age is back. That's some Flintstones' Apocalypse right there, dude.

I just came up with that. Hey, what are you earning right now every month?

I'm earning just over, sorry. Per month, it's about, I'm bringing home $3,300 a month.

Okay. Tell me, let's just quickly, we got a little bit of time. Tell me what your rent is or what you're spending on living.

My rent runs me about 1,500.

Okay. That's a big issue. Okay.

Then I do a lot of cooking at home. I don't eat out, so my grocery budget is about $200.

Okay. Is there a paid-for car?

Yeah, paid for a car.

Okay. Are you pulling out anything for retirement? Is anything coming out of your check for retirement?

Yes. Right now, I have two Roths. It's after-tax. Each of those is about $20 a month is what's getting pulled out. All right.

It's not a lot of money, but you need to... Again, with working the plan, we need to temporarily pause that and get that money coming back in. The biggest thing here, Elizabeth, is you got to earn more money. I know you're a park ranger. That's a job you do because you love that job and you love that field, and you're not earning a lot of money because of it. You've got to pick up a second job and double your income, because right now, your rent is half your income, and it's going to be almost impossible to make the headway you need to make with that imbalance going on. So we're doubling the income. We're looking for a roommate, and we're getting this debt paid off slowly but surely. This is The Ramsey Show.

Buying or selling a home is one of the biggest deals you'll ever make, and that comes with a ton of pressure. But you can close on your home with confidence and keep on top of your financial goals.

You just need a roadmap showing you the right way, which is exactly why I wrote my new book, Real Estate, the Ramsey Way, covers everything I've been teaching people about buying, selling, and investing in real estate for over 30 years. To get your copy, visit ramseysolutions. Com/stuff. Com. Store. Hey, you're listening to The Ramsey Show. I'm Jade Warshaw. Next to me is Dr. John Deloney. We're taking your calls for the rest of this hour. You can call in. The number is 888-825-5225. The illustrious Austin Selby will pick up and he will monitor to make sure you're not going to say something crazy on the air. That dude is a lot of things.

He is not illustrious.

I mean, look at that beard. Look at it. Well, you can't see it, but I can see it.

I can see it. I think you got it trimmed up at PetSmart.

Oh, gosh, John. Sheesh. I'm over here trying to give this man, throw this man a bone.

See, exactly. Back at PetSmart. Back at PetSmart.

Give us a call. The number is 888-825-5225, and a guy behind the glass with a beard will pick up and make sure that your call is safe. And we have a couple of those on the line now. As it is, we've got Jill in Reno, Nevada. What's going on, Jill?

Hi. I just found out that my husband's been opening credit cards. Oh, man. And he's racked up $3,000 in credit card debt.

On what? Do you know?

Well, there's some online gambling. There's some online prescription medication. He knows I know. We've already had our come to Jesus moment. To preface this, I have been complicit in this because I knew something was up, and I've never wanted to deal with finances, but I'm on it now. There's that.

Ownership is usually step one, so I'm proud of you for that. Just don't own it all because he's- No. Out there, too. Good on you. How can we help you?

I don't want to be codependent. Yeah.

How can we help?

He wanted to borrow from his retirement, and I said no, because I already cashed out mine for credit card debt before. Hold on.

Before all of this, you got to protect yourself. I want you to call the three credit reporting bureaus, and I want you to put a freeze on your social security number, okay? So that nothing can be opened up in your name. That's not going to fully protect you because you are married, but that will at least stop him. If he cares about you and your marriage, he'll do the same thing. He'll freeze it. That way, they have to go through you for anybody to open up any more credit or to make any more charges.

Okay. Yes.

That way, you haven't slept because this thing is still spinning underneath you, and you have a man in your home that you don't trust that is digging a hole. He's digging a grave for your family, right? This at least takes the shovel out of his hand for a second, so you can then begin to exhale and figure out what's your next step.

Okay. All right?

We're going to call the credit. There's three reporting bureaus. We're going to call them. Just Google them. Experian. I forgot them off top of my head.

Equifax, Experian, TransUnion.

Transunion. Call and just put a freeze on it, okay? Nobody's taking out any more credit. No one's racking up any more charges, okay?

Okay.

Then no, we're not cashing out anything. We're not robbing Peter to pay Paul. We're going to sit down. While you're on the phone with those credit agencies, I want you to... He's with you. We're going to pull credit reports instantly, and we're going to find out how bad the damage is. I guarantee you it's worse than you think it is. Okay. It's almost never in this situation when you catch somebody, is it all out on the table on conversation one, almost never. Then, listen, I'm walking you through, okay? The next one is, you can't have any conversation, any come to Jesus, any healing conversation until he gets his addiction is under control. That might mean rehab, that might mean AA, that might mean Gamblers Anonymous, that might mean he's got to go see a medical doctor because he's got himself hooked on pain pills. But any trying to heal this thing and come up with a plan, and he's still using, is a fool's errand. You're wasting your time.

I know because I'm a recovery nut. There you go. You know.

Yeah, you know.

My concern is, We have $33,000 in credit card debt. 3,000 of that is in my name only. Okay. Hope I don't count myself here. I have a guaranteed income of 3,200. I can't work, but I have a guaranteed income of $3,200 a month. I get that every month. I was offered a buyout for that. I never took it. I'm so grateful for that, that I'm guaranteed that. My problem is, is he He's in ministry, and he signed a covenant with his job, and I'm afraid that when this all clears in his head and he realizes that he can't have this job, or they might ask him to step down.

They have to ask. We're going to lose.

He has to step down. He has to. As a matter of integrity, he's not in shape to lead people as a minister right now, period. Does that mean his life is over as a minister? No, but he's got a mess in his home that he has created, and he's got to get that cleaned up.

Okay.

It Maybe he takes a six-month leave and he sits down and says, I'm struggling with addiction. I've made some major mistakes, some major ethical violations of my own home, and I need six months to go clean this. Maybe they'll do that for him or something like that. But yeah, this delusion, he's going to take down a whole church with him, and that's not fair to those people.

He's not the leader later.

Either way. Either way. He's got to complain about this because The longer it's like leading a double life in that sense.

I know. I feel… I've discussed… I've tried to discuss it with him. Here's the question. We have a $17,000 camper, or we owe $17,000 on it. I don't want to sell it because I might have to live in it.

I don't think that's true.

Why might you have to live in it?

That's not true.

Because we won't be able We'll drown without him having a job.

Can I ask the nature of your disability? Are you- Yeah.

I'm 100% disabled.

Okay.

But can he go get a job at McDonald's and you all get a one bedroom apartment?

Yeah. Well, if we sold the house, there's enough equity in my home to pay off everything.

That's all. Yes. So let's don't go caustic because when we go caustic and we start, Are you imagining us walking around in the aftermath of a nuclear strike, we make decisions that don't make a lot of sense. Sell the camper, take the 17,000. You guys got to start paying this stuff off.

Well, we just owe 17,000. I won't make any money on the camper.

I see what you're saying. Okay, yeah. Then you got to stop the bleeding. You shouldn't have a camper, a $17,000 camper, that's a depreciating asset that you're making payments on on a fixed income anyway. Is that fair?

Nothing's fair in this world.

There you go. Let me say this, Jill, and I'm saying this because I love you, okay? Most people in your situation are trying to walk around If you've ever seen somebody in the aftermath after a tornado has come through a town, they'll be picking up a medicine cabinet and try to start putting it back on the wall. But that wall is the only thing standing, everything else in that. It's just human nature. You have to come to the grief-filled exhale moment where you drop your shoulders and you fall down on your knees and you internalize everything about your life is different now. And so there's not going to be a world, but we hang on to the camper. Everything's different now. There's not a world where, but you still need to make this much money and we're going to keep this house. It sounds like everything's over. Everything's different now. It's not over, but it's just going to be different for a while. Not how you drew it up, not how you wanted it to be. Hang on the line. I'm going to send you a copy of Building a Non-Anxious Life and Own Your Past, Change your Future.

Both roadmaps for people who have just found themselves completely in ash and trying to figure out what to do next. But you all are going to have to sit down and have some real talk about getting clean, about coming clean with his workplace, and about what's the next logical right step.

You're listening to The Ramsey Show. I'm Jade Warshaw. John Deloney is right next to me. We're hosting the rest of this hour together. If you want to call us, you can. The number is 888-825-5225, and we will try our best to get to your call. Scripture Unquoted of the day, I say to you, asking it will be given to you. Seek and you will find. Knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives. The one who seeks, finds. And the one who knocks, the door will be opened. Luke 11:9-10. Then Jimmy Buffet said this, Searching is half the fun. Life is much more manageable when thought of as a scavenger hunt, as opposed to a surprised party. Interesting. Wasting away again.

Margaritaville.

He might have been in Margaritaville when he wrote that one. But let's go to Baltimore, Maryland, and talk to Brittany. What's going on, Brittany?

Yes, hi. So thanks for taking I'm on call today. My husband and I are in over our heads in debt at this moment. We've been trying to wrap our arms around it all, but it's coming from so many different places that it's overwhelming. So my question is, we both make up money. My job does a 9.3% match for 401k. I don't want to leave money on the table, but even with that high of a match, I'm not sure if it's the right move to keep investing that 10% each pay because we just… I don't know if we can afford it, but I don't want to leave the money on the table.

Yeah. What you're talking about is we would advise If you're walking the baby steps, we would advise for you to pause retirement until you've paid off your debt and until you've saved up 3-6 months. Then you would come back and start investing 15% of your gross income every single month, right? That's what we're talking about here. And so since you've got this match, you're just worried that, Hey, I'm going to miss out on my match. And that's a lot of money because 9.3% match, that's not chump change. Let's be honest, right?

Right.

Yeah.

What's your total debt profile? How bad is it?

It's pretty bad. We have some tax debt. We have credit card debt. We have a mortgage.

Tell me real numbers. What's the Okay.

Our mortgage is 32, 13. Then we have- That's what you owe?

Tell me what you owe. Tell me the full balance.

Oh, the full balance. We just moved. It's a It's a burning house. It's about five. I think we probably owe what? 520,000 ballpark.

Okay. And what's the monthly payment?

3,213.

Okay. Tell me, what How much do you bring home every month between you and your husband?

I probably bring home about 5,000 with the 401k investment, and he brings home about 8,000 a month.

Okay. Then tell me about this debt you have. How much do you owe in taxes?

We have a prior year tax debt of 14k. We recently had some expenses that we didn't know, we didn't expect, so we had to put them on a credit card. I have a credit card debt of... Well, we have a credit card debt. One of the credit cards is 10,000. We have another credit card that's about 8,000. And then small credit card debt, anywhere between 200... Well, I'm sorry, anywhere between a thousand and 8,000.

How many of those? Those little guys. Three, four.

So probably about five of those. And we also have a loan that we check out when we moved. We're a family of six, so we got our dream home, and we're just trying to make it a home.

No, it's not a dream home. Hey, I'm going to break this up. This is not a dream. This is a nightmare. And you're feeling that. I can't understand why you would go out and buy a half a million dollar home when you're struggling with this debt. And then you add that on top of it, and it's just more and more more and more. I think that you guys have the ability to have a really great life. You've got a great income. I think at some point that crept in your mind like, Yeah, we're living now. It's time to ball out. And you guys went to an extreme that you just can't afford. You can have a really great life on $13,000 a month. I think that you guys just went to an extreme to where it became too much. And you just got to pull it back a little bit. That lifestyle creep has gotten the best of you to where you're putting things on credit cards when you should have the margin to really float just about anything that comes your way. How many kids do you guys have? We have four. Four kids.

Okay. So total debt, not including the mortgage, how much would you say that you have?

Total So that we're probably... It might be 50 grand.

50 grand. Okay. Yeah. You're going to have to pull back. Are you using every dollar? I don't think... I'm going to guess no.

No. Okay. We've tried to do expenses in Excel and stuff like that, but it's just overwhelming. And then our monthly, our minimum, they change each month, so it's hard to anticipate. So we just don't know how.

We just don't know. Well, Excel, let's be honest, it's not the best way to budget. The best way to budget truly is with an app like EveryDollar because it's very, very, very intuitive. You're talking to a person that, I'll be honest, I work on a money show, but I don't like math. I don't like having to crunch numbers and do everything like that. Every dollar is great because it does it for you. You put your income in at the top and you plug in all the things that you could possibly think that you're going to spend money on for the month. It does the math for you. I think that for you guys, being on a budget is going to give you a plan for every single month, and it's going to help you see how you've been spending your money. And you're going to see, Okay, we've been throwing away a lot, hundreds, maybe even thousands of dollars on lifestyle things, right? Things for the kids, going out dinner, picking up lunch over here. And you're going to find that there's a lot more money sitting there that you have at your disposal to pay off this debt.

You're in this house now. The payment's fine. I'm guessing it's on a 15-year fixed, right? No, it's on a 30-year, isn't it?

It's on a 30, but we did. We bought it during COVID, so our interest rate is super low. I think it's like two point something.

Yeah. All right. Well, here we are. So you've got to decide what you guys are going to do. You guys, this is a behavior behavior issue more so than it's a money issue, a behavior issue that's turned into a money issue. And you guys, I say this all the time, and I want you to internalize this. It's going to feel harder. It's harder when you feel like, I've got the job. Everybody sees I've got this job. I've made it clear that I'm making some money. When you're in that situation and you have to start pulling back, you feel it even more because you've created this standard of lifestyle. It's hard to pull back from Tahoe's and Escalade's in $500,000 houses. Right? But you guys are going to feel that. I mean, John, you can chime in here.

Brittany, I'll say it just as direct as I can because I love you. You all are broke. You all make so much money and you're broke. You owe $50,000 spread across credit cards, personal loans, adjustable rate APRs. What an exhausting mess on top of four kids. Fair, right?

I agree.

What about the cars? Yeah, what about cars? With a lifestyle like this, you guys got cars, too.

Yeah, We have my car, which is paid off. It's 10 years old. I've had it since college. There you go. Yeah. Then we just got a van because we needed it for the kids. We owe 17,000 on that. That's part of the 52. But That was a necessity. We did need that.

When you said it was overwhelming, was it overwhelming because your husband won't sit down and talk to you about it? Was it overwhelming because it just feels like there's so many bills in so many different places coming from all different angles? Or is it It was overwhelming because like Jade said, you all finally made it. You're a six-figure family. There's this lie out there that once you make six figures, that you don't ever have to say the word no anymore. Was that overwhelming? Like, Oh, we're going to have to really bite the bullet for a couple of years.

Yeah, I think it was the second and third. My husband is off. He's the one pushing me to buckle down. He is the one mapping it all out.

I want to paint you a picture, Brittany, okay?

Okay.

Imagine you just sleep Imagine you get up and have a cup of coffee because you want to, not because you're so stressed. Imagine your kids are goofy and you all are laughing because you don't owe anybody anything. It's freedom. That's what we're talking about. That's it.

Before you get off the line, Austin is going to pick up. He's going to give you Ramsey Plus. In that, you're going to find Every Dollar, which is the app that I was talking about. You're going to have a couple of months of a premium version of that so you can get this on track. It's going to have Financial Peace University in there, access to some coaches in there. Utilize this. It's going to help you get your mind right so that you can play this game over the long haul and actually get yourself out of debt. This is The Ramsey Show. Hey, folks. Dave here. You want to hear even more life-changing content from Ramsey? Download the Ramsey Network app so you can catch all your favorite shows all in one place, like the Ramsey Show, Smart Money Happy Hour, and the Dr. John Deloney Show. You'll get real talk about life, relationships, money, and your career. Plus, the app lets you browse by topic like debt, business, or home. Get the content you want whenever and wherever you want to listen.

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