Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's The Ramsey Show, where Ted is dumb, Cash is King, and the paid-off home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice. We help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create amazing actual relationships. Ken Coleman, Ramsey personality, host of The Ken Coleman Show, an expert on your career and your job. And boy, is that a subject out there today. We're here to talk to you about your life and your money. The phone number is triple-eight, 825, 525. The call is free, and some say the advice is worth exactly what you pay for it. Triple-eight, 825, 525. We're going to start with Baltimore this hour. Robin is there. Hi, Robin. How are you?

I'm doing well. How are you, Dave?

Better than I deserve. What's up?

Thank you for taking my call. My question today is my husband and I own a home, and we're hoping to move soon, but we also have some debt. So we're just trying to figure out the best next steps for ourselves.

Okay. Why are you moving?

We need more space. We have a two-bedroom and we have an 18-month-old son, and we would like to try for another baby soon. Cool. We would like to have a three-bedroom house. I also work from home, so we do need some type of office space or area.

Okay, how much dad have you got? Not counting your house.

Not counting the house, I would say 70, 50 in student loans, and... I'm sorry, 55 in student loans and 15 in credit card.

Okay. What's your household income? $95,000. Good for you. Okay, what do you guys do for a living?

I am a financial analyst and my husband works in auto manufacturing.

Okay, all right. Well, your goal of moving up in house to have a little more room for your family is a great goal, and it's a reasonable goal. I think we can agree it is a want and not a need.

Okay, I would say like we could get.

To- A need is shelter. You have shelter. You have one baby and a two-bedroom house. Everything's okay today. But it'd be nice to move up. It'd be nice to move up. I'm not saying you can't do a want. I spent money on wants. I'm okay with that. But we need to classify where it really is. Now, the number one key to building wealth, the number one wealth-building tool that you have is your income. When you send it all to Sally May, it's very difficult to build wealth. Before you buy once, you get your house in order, no pun intended, and that means you get these debts paid off. If I'm you, I'm rolling up my sleeves. I'm going to work as much as I can work. I'm going to live on nothing, and I'm going to knock out these debts ASAP. That's probably going to take you 18 months, and that's living on beans and rice.

18 months. So you're suggesting in the house for now-.

Stay in the house and get out of debt before you spend money on luxurys, which is a move up in-house, is a luxury. Your family is not going to die if you don't move up in-house. It would just be a really nice thing to get to move up in-house. That means it's a luxury, not a need.

Yeah, it would just be uncomfortable. I guess we have a lot of things to cut expenses, but daycare is so expensive. We pay $1300 a month and daycare is more than.

Our budget. Your option is to move up in-house and keep the debt, and you will be stuck in the middle class risk of your life because you're not dealing with your issues. I want you to become wealthy.

Me.

Too. When you move up in-house, you're going to move up in-house payment. Now your budget is going to be even tighter because Sally May also needs her own bedroom.

Yeah.

Robin, you do make a very good point. You can cut expenses. What can we do to reduce the childcare cost? You got to look at it from 18 different angles. Where there's a will, there's a way, is an old phrase. In this case, yes, $1300 a month for childcare. That's a lot, and it's more than your mortgage, you said. I would absolutely be doing what Dave said, but finding ways to make more money and reduce cost, which means you could take that 18 months, as Dave is saying, with rice and beans and with more income we add, the more intensity we add, the quicker you get out of this debt. Now we can begin to think about the future. But your focus needs to be on the now.

Thanks, Robin. We appreciate your call. Guys, I talked to our staff here, our 1,200 team members Monday morning, and we talked about a little bit on the air the other day, but it's what bears repeating, Ken, that here's what I'm always going to give you. I'm always going to give you the hard path on the short term because it is the easy path in the long term. I'm never going to give you the easy path in the short term because it's always the hard path in the long term. Easy path for her in the short term is to go buy a nicer house. But she's stuck in the debt. Her budget's even tighter. She's going to struggle to be able to build wealth and find money to save and invest for her kid's college and for their retirement investing, and be able to get the house paid off as Sally May kicked out and the other rest of that debt kicked out. That's what normal people do. They buy whatever they want whenever they want it like they're in Congress. And normal finances in America suck. You don't want to be normal. It's awful. And so what you want to be is unusual.

You want to be weird. One of the greatest compliments you get on the shows, if I call you weird, means you're doing hard stuff to get an easy life long term. It's always harder to work out and avoid a doughnut than it is to just pop donuts in your face. Believe me, I know. I have the ability to eat untold infinite numbers of donuts in one setting, and I have to curb that appetite, and it's hard, but it's easier than walking around with all the diseases of obesity. Right.

Well, this is a mindset. A lot of people think of this type of rice and beans, gazelle intensity that Dave that we teach, as a sacrifice. I think it's worth shifting that mindset from thinking of it as a sacrifice and think of it as an investment.

It's a price to be paid.

Yes, I am investing in my future.

It's the price of admission to a better life.

That's it. -and you've got to invest in yourself. So stop thinking of, Oh, it's drudgery, and, Oh, we got to sacrifice, and, Oh, we got to do this. Okay, if we do this, this has yield, long-term yield, long-term impact, long-term return on my investment, not my sacrifice, but I'm investing in me, my family, our future.

Yeah, a buddy of mine, there was a huge negative article written about me. A buddy of mine goes like, Oh, man, I'm so sorry. I said, Well, it's the price of admission to get to be Dave Ramsey. I'll pay the price. It's awesome. I don't want to be somebody else. I like me. Life's good. I got a great life. If all that means is some idiot left-wing journalist thinks I'm a capitalist pig and correctly identified me as such, then have at it, baby. That's the price of admission to be Dave. What's the price of admission to be wealthy? What's the price of admission to raise great kids? What's the price of admission to look at your drunk friend and say, You need to get off the sauce, you're screwing up your life. It's harder to have the conflict than it is to go along and buy him another round. Hard is easier than easy. Always turns out to be hard because you're wimping, you're mailing it in, you're not paying a price. This is The Ramsey Show.

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Ken Coleman, Ramsey personality is my cohost, Open Phones at triple 8 825 5225. Jackson, Kansas City. Hey, Jack, how are you? I'm doing very well. How are you doing? Better than I deserve. What's up?

I had a question about purchasing a vehicle in today's climate for my wife. It would amount to purchasing two vehicles at the same time, basically.

Okay, riddle me this. What are you talking about?

Well, I've been driving a vehicle for about 20 years as my everyday vehicle. I inherited it from my father, brand new basically. He bought it brand new and then got diagnosed with a terminal illness and ended up passing away soon after. And so that was about 19 and a half years ago. I've been driving the car. It's a suburbree race car. Long story short, I've been taking it only to dealers, and my local dealer wrecked the last time they serviced it, trying to install a clutch and destroyed the transmission and did a bunch of damage and basically ruined the car for me.

So they're going to pay you for the car?

We made the deal. We came to a deal that avoided anyone going to court. And so they're going to sell me a new car and give me a bunch of money off on it basically.

The equivalent of the value of the other car?

Yeah, plus a little bit over, I think.

Because we're so bad. Well, yeah, I'm sure there's margin in that thing. I'm not your customer. There's margin in their wheels. So you're getting a brand new Uber.

Yes.

Okay, so that deal is done. Base model, basically. That deal is done. And what are you spending there? Here's the thing. What are you spending on that car? It's going to.

Cost about $25,000.

Okay, what's your household income?

Our household income is about 200.

Okay, and you're wanting to spend what on your wife's car?

Twenty. Here's the thing. The dealer felt bad, and I told him my wife needed some work on her vehicle as well then. He said he would give her the same deal he's given me if I wanted to buy her one. I wasn't thinking about getting her one before he said that.

He's going to give you the price of your old car off of your wife's and your car or just the good price on the nip. He's basically.

Going to give me all the money he's given me off my deal, and he said he'll do the same thing for her. He'll give her the same money off as if he wrecked her car just because he feels bad, he says.

How much value... How much did they give you for your old car?

For the old car? It's leaking out of.

The head. How much money did they give you for your old car?

For my old car? Yeah. They basically gave me about 4,000 for my car.

Okay. Then they knocked off how much more? Then they knocked off how much more.

Then they knocked off another three.

Okay, so they're going to knock 7,000 off of another Uber if you bought two in a row.

Basically, yeah.

Your wife is driving what now?

She's driving a Uber.

That's- What's it worth?

It would be worth about seven or eight, except that it's got to have the leaky head gasket fixed, which will cost you four.

All right, so it's... You're going to be able to sell it for five, right?

Yeah, if I.

Fix it. No, if you don't fix it. If you fix it, it'll sell for seven or eight.

Yeah, I guess.

It's driveable. It's just got a leaky head gasket. It's an old free consumer. Now, what is your net worth? What is your net worth?

Networth? I just did a calculation. I think if I go by just net worth, we're at about 230-ish thousand, I guess.

Between equity and money. Do you have the cash to pay for all these cars? No.

Well, only if I take money out of.

A Roth account or something. No, we're not buying these cars. We're not buying cars with Roth money. I only have the.

Cash to pay for one car.

Okay.

But my mother's been telling me maybe I should be.

Buying some reliable cars for the- Yeah, maybe you should, but maybe you shouldn't be going and taking your retirement money out to do that. I'm going to pass on the second one because I don't recommend people buy new cars that go down in value like a rock, except for in the last 12 months, unless they have a net worth of in excess of a million dollars, because that way you can accept the blow on that. I would save up some money and I would buy your wife a better car that is used, and I would forego this sweet dealer's offer, which is really not that great an offer anyway. It's an okay offer, but it wasn't like he gave you half off the stink and thing or something. He basically gave up his margins is what he did, and he got you back on the hook for more work and everything else in the shop. But now I'll pass on the second one. I would save up and buy her a better car and I would pay cash for it, and I would not cash out my retirement. But we don't borrow money to buy cars.

We don't buy cars where the total of all your vehicles is more than half your annual income. I don't buy brand new cars unless they're a million dollars, unless you have a million dollar net worth or greater. Here's why, because they go down in value and you need to be concentrating on things that go up in value.

In this situation, I'd go and fix the Uber for the wife and then save up. Save up, you're going to get a decent amount. I think Dave, you're right, you're going to get seven or eight for it if it's fixed up. Then you put that into the savings and all of a sudden we've upgraded pretty substantially without any debt. It is doable, and.

People get the itch. I don't fix $6,000 cars at the dealership either. No. I fix $6,000 cars at Independent Mechanics, where the cost is about half of what it is to fix a car at a dealership. If you have a brand new vehicle and whatever, and you spend a ton of money on it, you make a lot of money, and you want to take it in for the dealer to service it, that's one thing. But you don't take a $6,000 car into a headgasket job into the dealership. You're going to pay double what you'd pay with an independent, good mechanic shopping around. So do some shopping around. I'm not doing it. No.

A Super with 100,000 miles is just getting warmed up.

Yeah. Well, that's okay. I don't mind him moving up. No, but you can fix it. By the way, I forgot to tell you the federal law too. Wife gets the good car. That's the federal law. That means she gets the new one when you get the one with the busted head gasket. You all are about to trade cars out. This is how that works. That's a marriage thing. They're just helping you. Oh, open phones at triple 8, 825, 5225. Dylan's with us in Scranton, Pennsylvania. Hi, Dylan, how are you?

Hey, good afternoon. I'm doing very well. How are you today?

Better than we deserve, sir. How can we help?

Good. I have a general question. I took a job with a church in Philadelphia last year in September. They offered me a $60,000 salary, but it's basically a package deal. I'm currently 23 years old. I'm married. I do own a house with my wife. We purchased in December of last year. Basically, part of the deal is that right now I'm on my parents' insurance, but the church does offer full health insurance, full medical. But I'm going to lose $18,000 of my salary. The church is paying me that $18,000 currently, so I'm bringing home $58,000 a year.

Why would your insurance be $1500 a month?

I have no clue. I had worked for Walmart prior to this, and I know the family insurance was a lot cheaper. I'm just trying to navigate how to approach this because I don't want to get two years. Basically, two years from now, I'm going to lose $18,000 of my salary due to health insurance.

Small church?

Not quite. It's a larger church. They employ 350 people. They do have a full school.

Their health insurance plan sucks.

Yeah, it's bad.

But you got two years. Yeah, I have two years to prepare for this. The reason I wanted to get your professional advice on this was that I'm trying to navigate what to do. Currently, I am a property caretaker, and I'm an apprentice to literally every trade. I'm learning mechanics, I'm learning plumbing, electrical, everything with this job. Do you want.

To be full-time ministry or do you want to add one of these trades as a part-time gig to supplement?

Which one? I think my desire is to be full-time ministry.

Then do the trades on the side to make up for the increased cost of insurance. You got two years to figure this deal out.

Go shopping on the health insurance and see if you can't find the independent market cheaper, too. I would stay in the ministry seat. That's the seat you want to be in. Don't let health insurance drive you out of your dream. Protecting your family comes with important responsibilities and potential pitfalls. Because self-defense in today's world is more complicated than ever, that's why the US Concealed Carry Association is giving away one of their most popular resources right now for free. It's called the Complete Concealed Carry and Family Defense Guide. Inside it, you'll find 23 family defense strategies, six post-incident tips, defensive training, legal information, and more. Go to usca. Com/ramsey and get your free guide from a company I really trust. That's usca. Com/ramsey. Ken Coleman, Ramsey personality is my co-host today in the lobby of Ramsey Solutions on the Debt Free stage. Sean and Tammy are with us. Hey, guys, how are you? Doing fantastic. How are you doing, Dave? Better than we deserve. Good to have you guys. Where do you all live? We live in the Houston, Texas area. Oh, wonderful. So good to have you. How much debt have you paid off? We paid off about $100,000.

Wow. How long did this take? It took us about eight years. Okay. Your range of income during that time? It ranged from about 70,000 to about 130,000 for both of us. Okay, cool. What debt was the 100,000? It was mostly student loan debt. Oh, Sally May. Took a while to get her out of the house. She wasn't. Tell us the story. What happened here? There you go.

We got a copy of your show?

Yeah. We moved to Houston and bought a big house. A big house. It was about 4,000 square feet. I started a new job there. A buddy of mine at work, he went around and he was passing on. I said, Hey, you guys, I got this audio thing. We download on our computers. I listen to it and it was a financial piece of university. It was apparently if I write a copy of it. Okay, that'll work.

We started listening and we were like, Wow, we're doing that wrong, and we're doing that wrong. There's a way better way to do that.

Yeah, it was like one thing right after there. I was like, Oh, man, this makes so much sense. Why are we so stupid?

We made a huge chart on the back of our bedroom door that had all 100 little steps that we needed to get to $100,000. We just got fired up and we started paying it off and paying it off and paying it off. We did great at the beginning. Then I started having these weird spells where I would forget things. We went to the doctor and found out that I had epilepsy and tried a couple of medications and then they didn't help. Then we went and got an MRI and found out that I had a brain tumor.

Oh, there's that.

Wow. Then we were like, Okay, you stopped the debt snowball. You just start stockpiling money and you get ready. I had the brain tumor taken out. Then we find out that if you do it on purpose and you save up your money, it takes a good two, three months to get the bill. And this time, we just paid off the bill with cash instead of adding to the debt like we had our whole lives. One of the debts that we had was the birth of our daughter, Kaylee, this cute little blonde over here. But with her, we knew we were pregnant. It took nine months to bake her up in the oven. And then nine months later, we still hadn't paid it off. And that's how we were living before. And now we get a brain tumor out of the blue, and by the time the bill comes, we just pay it off.

Wow.

That's a nice thing to have while you're facing something that severe. Yeah. Well, it doesn't stop there. Afterward, because of the brain tumor, we found out there was other complications that happened. When they took it out, she lost sensation in half of her face, so she couldn't feel what was in her eyes. She had an eye surgery where they grafted a nerve into her face from her leg, and then she couldn't hear, or actually she could hear too well, I guess is the thing. Three ear surgeries later, she now has much better hearing.

But this was a year later and then a year later, so that we could pay our out-of-pocket max.

Every year. But that kept kicking Sally May down the road a little bit because you're dealing with health stuff.

Exactly. I always say that we're the little engines that could. We were on the debt snowball plan and we wanted to do it, but all these things kept.

Coming up. Much more important to take care of you than Sally.

Yeah. Then we crashed our car.

Yeah, I got in a head-on collision and totaled to an air van. Why not? -totaled our van. Yeah, why not? Well, and that was our first car that we bought with cash because we had to upgrade from the little tiny Sedan that we had because we had six kids now. We bought a used minivan, had totaled that. Then I was informed about a month later that I was put on notice for layoff. Of course. Yeah. It all happens all at once. That's a country song, man.

It's unbelievable. People tell you like, Yeah, I started Dave Ramsey and it's a good idea and stuff, but then stuff happens in life and you can't just follow it. We were like, baloney, we don't do debt. Even if we have six bodies and a car that only fits five, we're going to make due and we're going to buy a car with cash because we don't do debt anymore.

We bought a brand, not a brand new car. It was new to us. It was a used car that had 40,000 miles on it. Lord blessed us with the cash that we needed in order to get it paid for without going into debt at all. So many naysayers kept saying, You guys just get a loan. Come on, you can do it. It's just a car. We decided not to, and then the medical journey just kept going on. I guess what was it?

Total company service? They said for epileptics, there's this thing you can install in your brain and it will help turn it off. I had brain surgery again, and then it didn't work. Then the next year they said, We can just go in and take that chunk of your brain out. We said, Okay. By this point, he was like, Okay, we're putting our out-of-pocket max in our budget because we keep doing it year after year. And then it didn't work because I'm just that patient. But luckily, he said, We can put that thing back in your brain. But I can't imagine how it would have been if this doctor was like, There's something else we can try to help you because you're a difficult patient, but you haven't paid your bill from last year. Because that's the way we were living before, we did the Ramsey plan, but this way, we paid it with cash. So when they had something else that we could try.

To help us- You're telling me five surgeries now or six? How many was it? Seven, I.

Think, total? Seven. Okay.

Total is nine. Well, total is nine. Four of them were six. When was the last one? How long ago was the last one? October.

This long ago, I was bald in October. All right.

How are you doing overall now?

I still have about two seizures a week. Bless you. But the thing is, what would it have been like if every time I needed a surgery or every time I needed to change medication, we had to panic about money? Now it's not.

A problem. While doing all nine surgeries, you go ahead and pay off Sally May, and have some kids, and fix a head on, and get laid off. Yeah, oh, my gosh.

We were the little engines that could.

You know the thing? I think more than that, I think you just didn't quit. Right. Yeah. Oh, my gosh.

Unbelievable heart. This isn't a question, just a comment. I hope the audience is paying attention to this. You had financial peace in the midst of still paying off the debt. The fact that you guys pressed pause, but the ability to do that, Dave, I mean, they hadn't even paid off all the debt yet and still cashflow stuff.

Very amazing. Huge. You guys are something else. Very, very well done. What do you tell people the key to getting out of debt is?

To not pay for Christmas with your December paychecks.

It's very prescriptive.

I'm also going to tell you never quit. That's right. It's like a Winston Churchill speech, never quit. Never, never.

Never quit. Once we got the budget, it was just nice to be able to say, This is how much we need for new school clothes, and this is how much we need for Christmas, and this is how much we need for Out of pocket Max in case Tammy needs to have brain surgery. I'm the free spirit. Now the thought of not having a budget is scary to me because I'm.

Like, but- And a monthly budget meeting. Yeah, really. Let me ask you this. I don't know anything about the medical part of this. Does stress add to the likelihood of you have an episode? Yes, he's shaking his head yes. She says no, but I say yes because I see it. Okay, all right. The fact that you don't have financial stress in the house is probably helping.

It's.

Huge. Yeah, okay. It's allowed us to focus on the things important. These four right here, our relationship with each other. Her health? Her health, exactly. Yeah. Instead of focusing on money, on this material stuff that consumes so many people's lives. Stupid car payment on a stupid car. Wow, you guys are fun. Amazing. You're inspiring. Wow. All right, let's bring the kiddos up. What are their names and ages? This is.

Jacob, Sear, Haley, and Kai, and they are 13, 11, 9, and 7.

All right, very good. We've got a copy of Baby Steps Millionaires for you. That's the next chapter in your story. You guys have quite a story. But the little train that didn't quit, for sure, without a doubt. Also got a copy of a non-pirated Financial Peace University version, and we'll let you watch it legally this time. Available with Ramsey+. It's online now, and we'll give you a one-year subscription so you guys can go through it. Brand new videos on this, and they're the best we've ever done. The class is the best it's ever been in all these years. And also a copy of Total Money Makeover. All right, gang, count it down. Four thousand paid off in eight years while they take quite a journey from 70 to 130. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Okay, you guys ready? Three, two, one. I am debt free!

I.

Am.

Debt.

Free! Love it! That's how it's done! Wow! Hey, guys, whether you're starting on a card table like I did, or well on your way to becoming a multi-million dollar company. Netsuite can help your team communicate and plan ahead better like they do for Ramsey. Let me tell you, NetSuite really helped us get our systems together. And more than 37,000 other companies also use NetSuite to know their numbers and their business better. So check out NetSuite today and find out how they can help you become the business you want to be five or 30 years from now. Right now, you can download NetSuite's free KPI checklist designed to give you consistently excellent performance at netsuit. Com/ramsey. Ken Coleman-Ramsey personality is my co-host today, Matt's in Erie, Pennsylvania. Hey, Matt, how are you? Hi, Dave. Hi, Ken. How are you doing? Better than we deserve, sir. How can we help?

Yeah. My wife and I were 23 years old. We got married when we were 21. I'm a youth pastor and she works customer service jobs so that she can stay at home and take care of our baby. We're on baby steps four, five, and six, and we've never had any debt except for our mortgage.

Way to go.

Thank you. Appreciate it. We both have always—thank you, appreciate it—we both have—always enjoyed listening to you and following your program, but we recently took FPU and we left it feeling super inspired to pay off our debt for our house. We currently have 48,000 left on it, and it's a fixed 15-year mortgage. But I don't want to just wait 15 years for it. I don't want to just survive. I want to thrive. You know what I mean? Yeah. I hear you talk about the importance of having a big shovel to pay off debt. As someone who's getting started in his career and his ministry, I don't have a huge shovel. My question is, how can I wisely increase my income while balancing the responsibility and calling being a pastor to pay off our house?

Good for you.

Yeah, I love the question, Matt. My dad was a pastor, and many times in our childhood or adolescence, he would have to, because he passed through a small church, so had a very small income and not a lot of opportunity. He would have to add things. Dad was very good with construction work and things of that nature. My thought would be, where do you have some talent and skill that you can immediately put to work? You've got something premium to offer based on the time you can give. How many hours a week could you give?

I could do evenings and then Fridays and Saturdays, but maybe, realistically, maybe 20 hours.

Something like that. So you start there. I've got 20 hours max. And so what can I do that will allow me to make some money quickly? Because we're talking about hourly work right now. You can make 20 bucks an hour if you're stock and shelves at Walmart or Target. But what's a skill that you have right now that you know you can get paid for?

Well, I really like to work with people, talk with them. I'm pretty relational. I can't say I'm super handy, but I'm learning. I'm 23. I view myself more scrappy than anything. I'll do whatever I can to.

Really make the part. So your degreemean, you went to seminary. Did you have another degree other than seminary?

No. It's a youth pastoral degree with a.

Pastoral leadership. Perfect. Good, good. Okay. Yeah, so it's just a matter of poking around and figuring out what you could do that you can make the most per hour on the short term. Honestly, my general rule is I'm entrepreneurial, so I always move towards some self-employed anything. It could be something as silly as walking dogs or pet sitting, and making 30 bucks an hour doing that. We've had people do their debt-free screens on here that have done that. The great news is you're way ahead. A, you're thinking about this, B, you only owe $48,000. You could pay off this house in two years of extra income. Yeah, that's.

The goal.

That's what I want. Yeah, but I mean, extra income. It's just a matter of how much you guys want to get jacked up about this. Then the other question is, and what Ken's saying is true. The data that we have working with churches all across America, we've worked with about 75,000 churches now over the past 30 years. The data that we have is somewhere around 80-85% of pastors are bi-vocational. Most churches are not of size that they can even support the senior pastor full-time. Just in general, the movement, the way the church movement has been in America. Traditionally, the worship pastor and youth pastor starved the death until you get into a mega church or something. In your calling, it's going to be a few years before your calling pays you a substantial amount of money. Now, as your calling does develop, though, particularly your oratory skills, if you become a great preacher, you may get some side gigs speaking at youth conferences and other things, filling in for a pastor here or there, pulpit ministry, that thing. Even later on, maybe some writing. A lot of pastors supplement their incomes within the calling, and then some just simply have a bread route, a doughnut route, and they deliver off a truck, or they work UPS, or whatever it is you do.

But the good news is you're willing to work, and like you said, scrappy. Honestly, I'll take scrappy over six degrees any day. Six scrappy will get her done.

There's so much opportunity right now, Dave, for somebody who's scrappy. Matt, look, I look at people-based work. You got those 20-hour block, you got that time of day that you're looking at. This is just the hunt, as Dave said. But you got limited hours and you have a limited time during the week. What are we looking at? People-based work sure would be great. Sales, customer service work. But if it's just good old-fashioned delivery or waiting tables, I would do that.

Yep, exactly. Nick is with us in Salt Lake City. Hi, nick. How are you?

Good. How are you.

Guys doing? Better than we deserve. What's up?

I just have a quick question for you guys. We have an opportunity in our life to buy a house, but the problem is that it's a million-dollar house, but it has two rental properties inside the house that would bring in around five grand a month. The mortgage, it might be around $4,000 a month, and we can make potentially around five. Do you think that'd be a smart decision to do to buy that house?

Not if you're dependent on the rent to pay the bill.

Let me.

Tell you what just… I don't know where you were in the last three years, but in some areas, rent, you couldn't evict someone for not paying for six months because of the pandemic, during which time you would have been foreclosed on, sir.

Yeah. The thing is, though, is.

That there- You drove right past that and didn't hear a dead gum thing I said.

I did. But I'm just curious because we feel pressured to do it from certain people that we're hesitant. The thing is, though, that it's not like a typical rental at Airbnb, then they.

Have a three-year- That's even worse.

-tract history where.

They're bringing on- That's even worse because now we've got cities passing laws not allowing Airbnb because they're in violation of zoning.

Okay. Why were you hesitant? You just nailed the whole thing. You're feeling pressure from some people that you and your wife respect big time. They have a lot of influence over you, and yet you're hesitant. What are you hesitant about?

Just I think it's really a good opportunity, but also don't know if we could.

Make it work. Yeah, I think there's a lot more risk here than the people pressuring you have any concept of. They don't know what the flip they're talking about. No, I'm not going to tell you to do this deal based on this. I think you're going to get yourself in trouble. On top of that, you're living in a house with other people. Kind of't. That defeats the purpose, man. If I wanted to live in a hotel, I'd buy a hotel. No, thank you. Just all in the name of I can make a buck. All in the name of all real estate is a good investment. All real estate is not a good investment. Real estate is a good investment. All education is not a good investment. Education is a good investment. But there are stupid forms of real estate and stupid forms of education. You can get a degree in German polka history or medieval left-handed puppetry, but that doesn't mean you're going to end up being anything but a barista. That's stupid education. When you buy real estate, leveraged up to your eyeballs, and you say, Well, the renters are going to pay the rent.

That's stupid. Because I've had renters for 30 years. Let me just tell you, some of them don't pay sometimes. They go in Chapter 13, bankruptcy. There's a pandemic moratorium on evictions, and you're sitting on them. It had nothing to do with the pandemic. They just chose to not pay because the government told them they could. Then when you do finally get them out, they've, Can you tell I'm bitter?

Well, you got to beware of the influence trap. What you just heard, folks, happens to all of us at some point in our lives if we're not careful. People that we respect and love.

Dearly- That are stupid.

Yes, but yet they tell us it's a good idea. Something in our guts, this young man, he said, We're hesitant about it. He didn't feel right about it, but the influence of people who have no idea what they're talking about makes them think, Well, gee, whiz. They said it's a good idea. Maybe I should consider it. Thankfully, he.

Called the show today. Now, read some articles about what's happening to Airbnb politically in a whole bunch of markets. They're getting their face smacked, man, and their hands and everything else smacked. You build your whole pro-forma based on Airbnb performance. You can really get yourself in a crack, dude. Don't do it. Don't do it. This is The Ramsey Show. Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's The Ramsey Show, where dad is dumb, cash is king, and the paid-off-home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice. We help people build wealth, do work that they really love, and create actual amazing relationships. Ken Coleman, Ramsey personality host of the Ken Kahlman show. Number one best-selling author is my co-host today as we talk about your life, your career, and your money. Open phones at triple-eight, 825-525. Reed is with us. Reed is in San Antonio, Texas. Hi, Reed. How are you?

Howdy, Dave. Hey, Ken. Thanks, Jake, for taking my call. I'm glad to be on the show.

Sure. What's up?

Yeah. My wife and I got married about nine months ago. Really excited. We are thinking of buying a house and we are adamant about not having any credit card or credit score. Now, how do we do that?

Okay, you just have to have a mortgage company that does what's called manual underwriting. Like Churchill Mortgage that sponsored us here for almost 30 years here on The Ramsey Show, they do manual underwriting. Manual underwriting is what they used to do before there was a FICO score, like when I first got in the real estate business. That simply means that they, in the old days, now we wouldn't do it exactly this way today, but in the old days, we would mail... The mortgage company would mail a VOD request to your bank, a verification of deposit to see if you have money in the account to do your down payment. They would send a VOE to your employer, a verification of employment. Your employer would write down and say, Yes, he works here and here's what he makes. Send it back to the mortgage company. That was all snale mail in the old days, right? But they actually went around and they checked with your landlord and they looked at your credit bureau report and saw what was actually on the credit bureau report, what was being paid, were you paying the bills that you have on time.

If you don't have any bills on the credit bureau report, they assumed you were smart because you are, instead of dumb, like the FICO score says you're dumb if you don't have any bills, because it's only a measure of how much you play kissy face with the bank. But that's what manual underwriting is. It means they manually actually have to verify that the human being is capable of paying the note, and then you can get the mortgage. It's the same exact rate, no more, no less than a regular FICO score rate. The difference is if you've got a 750 FICO score, a monkey can make that loan. They just look at the number and go, Big number. Do it. Okay. Then there's absolutely zero analysis. Other than they depend on the analysis, that was created that created the FICO score to be their analysis, which is part of what caused the crash in 2008 because we were loaning people with high FICO scores money who were actually broke. We had a whole bunch of broke people buying houses, and it caused the 2008 crash. That's not happening as much now. But one thing, FICO has gone in and worked on their algorithm because it sucks, but it's mathematically impalatable.

But anyway, all that side issue from Myles Soakbox. But yeah, you can get a mortgage. Just go to a mortgage company that does manual underwriting. Ben is in Norfolk, Virginia. Hey, Ben, what's up?

Hey, how's it going, Dave? Thanks for taking the call. Appreciate it.

Sure. What's up?

Yeah. My wife and I will be finishing up Baby Step Three, probably January of 2023. I'm 37. I'll be retiring from the military in five years. Right now, we have income enough to put so much down on our house that we can have it paid off in eight years, but I would not be able to do the 15 % of my gross income into retirement. I was wondering what your thoughts were on that, even though I'd be gaining a military pension in five years, if I could play ketchup on retirement later and just get the house paid off super fast, or do exactly for the baby steps or in that situation, what you would.

Tell people? I just like mustard better and ketchup. Thanks for your service, by the way.

We appreciate you.

Sure. Absolutely. Here's the good news in this whole story. You're actually thinking, most people don't bother. We have a whole population full of freaking zombies that just go along and do whatever Amazon, Mastercard, and Apple tells them to do. And then they Google it and Google tells them they're smart. And none of this is true, by the way. So you're actually using thinking skills. Way to go, dude. I'm so proud of you. I'm not being facetious. You really are. If you keep paying attention like you're paying attention, you're going to be fine. Even if you don't do it perfectly, Dave, the way I would do it, okay, you're going to be fine, because 90 % of people winning is they pay attention. So no, I would not do that. I would get out of debt like you're planning. In January, I'd start putting as much as you can aside for a down payment until you're ready to buy. When you buy, put the house on a 15-year fixed and start saving 15% of your income towards retirement. And yes, you're going to have the wonderful military retirement, which I'm very happy as a taxpayer to pay you.

Thank you for your service. One of the few things I actually think we do well. I'm out of DC. But yeah, all that to say, stay in order.

Yeah, follow the order because you're going to be in such good shape. What do you plan to do in retirement from the military? What's that next chapter look like?

Yes, I'm not 100% sure, but I'm looking at... I finished my MBA a few years ago, and so I'm looking in the project management, maybe financial advising, I'm not sure.

Yeah. So the point is, is everything Dave said, Amen, Amen, Amen. But you, by doing it this way, you're still going to be able to pay your house off because you're going to have that income, retirement income from the military, but you're going to be making money and you're going to have a wonderful ladder for financial growth at a very young age. So you can do all of those things, just follow the order of the baby steps. I think in the long run.

You're going to be glad you did. Well, and here's the other thing. Your income is not going to stay static. No. Your numbers you're running are based on static income. If you projected your income increases out, and then you're guessing what you're going to do when you leave the military, but you keep projecting that out, you're probably still paying the house off in eight years.

Yeah, that's what I think.

But it might be 10, but 10 is just fine. Again, because you're focusing, you're thinking outside of the normative stupid-but stuff that people do in this broke culture. You're not just clicking on Prime all day long and then wondering why you're broke. You're just being smart. That makes all the in the world. Ken, I'm often asked in these interviews that I do, and I don't... Anyway, it always comes up, What's the number one mistake people make with money in America? They always want you know, they figure I'm going to say credit card debt. Well, that's one of them. Student loan debt, that's one of them. Leasing a car, that's another one. Whole life insurance, that's another. There's too many to have one. But really what happens is that the answer is not paying attention because no one sits down and goes, Hey, I want to be stupid. Let's be what stupid looks like. But we just wander along like a zombie and come home with a new car or you impulse a bass boat. Oh, my God. This is what happens. People don't pay attention. If you're going to win at anything, winning is an intentional act.

You want to win at your marriage, you have to intentionally embrace, engage the process of being married. You want to raise good kids. It's not accidental. It's a lot of work because they're weird. I mean, it's just a problem. So everything you win at, you got to be intentional. This is The Ramsey Show. If current times have shown us anything, it's that everyone who has a family counting on them needs term life insurance. 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 phone 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. Ken Coleman, Ramsey personality, number one bestselling author of the book, Paycheck to Purpose is my co-host today. Today's question of the Day sponsored by Neighborly, your hub for home services. As the weather warms up, Neighborly can help you find local service pros like The Ground's Guys, Five-Star Painting, and Mosquito Joe, which you would need in Nashville.

We've got mosquitoes the size of eagles here. To turn your outdoor space into your favorite space and help you find all the help you need at neighborly. Com. We're so honored to have them as a sponsor now. April is National Financial Literacy Month. All monthlong teachers and students in classrooms across America are taking the time to talk about the importance of learning money skills.

Today's question comes from Alex in Minnesota. How do you create a budget that works when you are young and your income is inconsistent and unpredictable? On this one, Dave, we've got a young person, presumably a student, who doesn't have a lot of household expenses. He's living at home potentially. What we want to focus on there is, what are your expenses? What are mom and dad requiring of you? Are you doing gas money, helping out with some of your insurance, whatever that is? What are your spending habits, things you're saving for? I think the budget there, Dave, is created around that when you don't have a livelihood or the four.

Walls that we teach. Exactly. That's what we teach kids, students, in the high school curriculum, Foundations in Personal Finance. It's taught in 48% of the high schools in America now, our high school curriculum is. What we teach folks there, Alex, is exactly what Ken said. Your purpose of doing a budget when you're in high school or junior high school, either one, is not to become wealthy. It's not to become a master budget person. It's to start to build the muscle of telling your money what to do instead of wondering where it went, which by the way, is all the budget is. Adults devise a plan and follow it. Children, regardless of their age, do what feels good. If you're 52 and you do what feels good, you are, by definition, emotionally a child. You're immature. I deserve it. Oh, shut up. You don't deserve anything. You haven't earned. That's when you deserve it. You're not entitled to a new car. I work so hard. Oh, really? You're the only one, you whiner. Okay, so that's a child, regardless of if they're 12 or they're 52. We hear them all the time saying stuff like that.

Well, you don't know. Yes, I do know. I've done it all. I'm old, okay? I've seen it all, heard it all. The thing is. The whole thing here, Alex, is to get you the other side of that and say, Okay, as an adult, because we're training young people to be good adults and training young people to be good adults involves telling your money what to do instead of wondering where it went. All you got to do is go, This month, or, I want to buy a car by September. Okay, how are we going to do that?

Yeah. You begin to go, Okay, if it's a $5,000 car, my mom and dad are going to match whatever I come up with. Let's say they're going to match your 2,500, and you begin to say, All right, how much money do I need to make?

I've got five months. I need 500 bucks. I got.

To get after it. This is interesting, Dave, what I love about financial literacy, and something that you just said I want to add to, the reason we have movements right now among a lot of young people on social media that's called the anti-work movement is because they've never been taught real financial literacy. Because this young man, you take this question right here, and he begins to understand what we just said to him. He begins to tell his money what to do, the budget, as Dave just laid out. Here's what happens. Individual responsibility flourishes when you get taught that you can have enough money. But this anti-work movement, all this junk that's out there is coming from young people who've never been taught how to manage their money and thus they don't have enough. Then they begin to say, I work too hard. I don't have enough money. I want the government to supply me the money. I'm not trying to make this political because it's not. It's actually sociological. When you understand how to handle money as a young person with what we teach and Financial Literacy Month and everything.

We're doing, parents- You control your destiny. They- If you'll get off your.

Little butt. Then they become hard workers because they go, I like what money allows me.

To do. I can be generous. I can be helpful. That's right. I can be calm. I don't have to be pissed off all the time. That's true. I'm not broke.

Right.

This is all goes together. See, I thought the anti-work movement was because college professors were students of Karl Marx and had passed that along to college students and reinforced the fact that they got a participation trophy instead of keeping score when they were playing soccer and they were sick.

Well, you just nailed the two other reasons. But the reasons those message stick is because when you don't have any money and you're broke, those messages make more sense. But to somebody who's got money, you go, What are you talking about? That's a pay cut.

If you're five years old, you know it's more fun to score.

There's that.

You just do. You don't have to be a psychologist to figure this one out. You smile more when you score than when you don't score. So go score. That's what work is. It's score.

Go score.

It's what it is. Just go score. Go put the ball in the hoop, man. It's what you do. You're going to have more joy and more dignity and more choices when you do that. Now, Alex has not got that problem. He's asking a question on that. That's right. He's ready to be money. He's a great young man. We got a lot of great young people out there. But we do have a group of participation trophy graduates who are intent on making mediocrity their goal. It's a problem.

It is. By the way, this is what leads to credit card debt at an all-time high, student loans at all-time high. I've got to rely on somebody else to give me money so that I can get the life I want. That is.

Counterint, and it leads to record numbers of 28-year-olds living in their mother's basement.

Seven million men not working because they don't like.

Their job status. As the lady on CBS News said the other day, That's highly unattractive. That's right. Hard to get a date. Yeah, it's true. You don't feel real eligible because you're not. Right. He's a dreamer, Daddy. Yeah, that's right. He is. That's all he does. That's right. It means you're going to live in my basement. You're dating a dreamer. Oh, God, help me. I'd love for you to say he's a doer. Please tell me he's a doer. Yes. He has big dreams, and he's doing things to make those dreams come true. That I like. I like that a lot. You see, this is highly attractive. It turns out mediocrity is really smelly.

Well, it's miserable. They can try to put another label on it, but a person who's leading a.

Meteoric role- You act like you're cool. I'm beating the man by being a communist.

Yeah, well, you'll notice that anybody who says these things on social media is always angry. I tell you what you never see: an angry capitalist, an angry person with a lot of money and options. You see anger where I feel limited, and they start by being limited financially because we don't teach financial literacy. Ramsey Solutions does this why in schools. But if we don't teach this, then what happens is they come through the system, Dave, and the system tells them, You need a credit card so that you have a backup plan.

You need to get a student loan so you can get $200,000 in debt to get $200,000 in debt to get a degree in left-handed.

Puppet degree. So you can be successful.

And you can be a barista. Right.

By the way, the only people winning in that system are the people giving the loans and the credit cards, interestingly enough. They're the ones that are winning big. Credit card's at an.

All-time high. I'm going to stick it to the man. I'm going to make sure he gets really rich.

Right. If they're upset against rich people, the people that are upset against are the financial purveyors of all of the mediocrity and frustration in your life. See, that's the game. You want to be mad at somebody, it's the people who make really awesome commercials selling you a credit card. They're the best commercials on TV.

Here's the thing. If your job sucks, I mean, you're not in Russia. No. Just go get another one. That's right. If your boss sucks, get you another one. That's exactly right.

Why is this hard. Yeah, well, the gig economy is exploding right now, Dave. Freelance work, people can get out of debt faster. We've had nurses call in on.

This program. I don't like what Walmart pays. Don't work for Walmart.

They go work somewhere else. We've got an unbelievable job economy right now. 3.6% unemployment.

My goal was never to work at McDonald's. It was never a goal of mine.

Unless it's the one I own in St. Thomas, but no thank you. Right.

That's no one's goal. But see, we live in a world now where you don't have to go work at McDonald's. You can go start your own.

Business online today. I never had to. That's the point. I know. I used to cut grass. This was 1,000 years ago when dinosaurs roamed the earth. My buddies were making a $1.65 minimum wage. Wow. This is how long ago it was. True story. I was 12 years old, and I cut grass for three dollars for a yard, and I figured out I could cut the grass in one hour. I was making double what my buddies were making as whopper floppers. So I've never been held to the standard of I am forced to do something. Yes. And you aren't either. You can choose to do anything you want to do, boys and curls. This is still America. That's right. It's weirder America than ever before, but it's still America. This is The Ramsey Show. I just gave away Financial Peace University, that guy who's getting ready to get up on his feet and get going again. You don't have to be broke to go through FPU. You just want to learn how to handle money better. God's and grandma's ways of handling money. What does scripture say about money? Live on less than you make as an example, okay?

What does grandma say about money? Live on less than you make. Get out of debt. Stay out of debt. We're going to show you not only the principles, but then how to actually go about doing those things in your life. We get it. If you're worried about money, it's all consuming. You wonder if you've got enough to pay your bills, you can't afford to fill up at the gas station. Nobody can. It's always on your mind. But you shouldn't have to live with that stress, and you don't have to. When you follow a proven plan, you'll discover peace with your money. In Financial Peace University, you'll learn the same plan that's helped 10 million people. Get on a budget, save, spend wisely, pay off debt, become wealthy, and outrageously generous. Great time to take the course. We've updated a ton of the content, including George Campbell, Dr. John Deloney. Decide today that you're done. I've had it. No more like I was talking about before the break. You can do this. Go to ramseysolutions. Com/fpu. Check out FinancialpeaceUniversity@ramseysolutions. Com/fpu. Barbara is with us in Minneapolis. Hey, Barbara, welcome to The Ramsey Show.

Hey, Papa Dave and Ken, good to talk with you guys. Thank you for all that you're doing. You too. My husband and I have been married for 10 years. We have a blended family with children ranging from the ages of 32 down to 21. There is a 26-year-old son, my stepson, my husband's son, married, lives in Wisconsin, has five children under the age of seven, so they're busy. This son has asked us over two years ago, asked to borrow $3,000. My husband and I, we are baby stepers. We are on baby step six. And hopefully we'll be seeing you in about a year and a half for our final death-free screen to go into the list of baby step seven. We've had a difficult time getting the son and daughter-in-law to pay us back, and it is causing significant strife in the family. My husband and I are to the point where we just know we're not going to see the money again, the remaining balance of 1,500. And we've accepted that and we've moved on. However, the son continues to just give dagger and say that we were... He was entitled to the money.

He deserved the money. Our other adult children see this and hear these comments. And where I would really love your experience, Ken, is the son does not work. He is not supporting his family. And then throws the emotional manipulation to my husband and I that we will be the ones responsible when him and our grandchildren get kicked out on the street. So we're trying to determine how we just allow these arrows to bounce off of while holding the empty bag of a financial loan, which caused a strife between my husband and I because I did not want to borrow the money. So we've had to.

Solidify our marriage- You borrowed the money to give him? I'm saying again. You borrowed the money to give him? We borrowed the money. Oh, that's a double dip. Oh, my gosh. Not only did he not pay you back, but you went into debt to do this. Oh, ouch.

No, we did not go into debt. No, we're.

In baby step. Oh, you loaned him the money. You didn't borrow it.

We loaned him the money.

And now we're- I got it. That's what I.

Thought you said. -we're the bad guys for asking for the repayback as promised. But we can't get him to work. We can't get him to maintain and manage our family.

You can't get him to do anything. He's an adult.

No.

Well, exactly. You don't get to tell him what to do. No. His bank doesn't get to tell him what to do.

Right. So any guidance on how we just don't engage in this toxicity while you're trying as a.

Parent of an adult? Absolutely. I think his dad needs to call him up and say the loan is forgiven. Forget it. Just forget it. We're not going to loan you any money anymore, ever again. But this loan is forgiven. You don't owe me anymore. I love you. I don't agree with a lot of things you're doing, but you're a grown man and you're allowed to do those things. We're still going to be friends. I'm still going to be grandpa. You don't owe us any more money. Forget it. If you want some help, we can give you some coaching and we'll be your biggest cheerleaders. But we won't give you either one, coaching or cheering, without your permission. Cut him loose. Set him free. This is bothering you way more than it's bothering him.

Oh, yeah.

You've had $28 million worth of grief. He's had 20 cents worth of grief. He hadn't got enough character for this to bother him.

Well, exactly. Yeah.

Barbara, let it go. It's just $1,500.

No, absolutely. What breaks my heart more than my pocketbook is we don't need.

That much. You're not wrong. You're a broken heart, it doesn't even matter to him.

Well, right. But it hurts my heart how he speaks to my husband, his father.

That's your husband needs to say, You can't speak to me that way anymore.

Yeah.

Okay. You can only speak to me in tones that are reasonable. I don't allow anyone, family or otherwise, to speak to me in unpleasant ways in an ongoing process. Now, if somebody can have a moment, that's one thing, okay? I don't cut everybody out of my life that has a moment. That's not what I'm talking about. But as an ongoing abusive thing, that's you're welcome to call here and you're welcome to be in our home, but you're going to maintain these levels of volume and this level of reasonable respect, and I'm going to give you the same thing. But don't call here and we're not responsible for your children. They're your children. Correct. We love you and we're cheering for you. If you ever want any advice on how to get where we are financially, we can show you. But we're not going to tell you what to do, and you're not going to make us give you our money. You're a confused young man. He just needs some boundaries. Your husband is a nice, gentle man, isn't he?

Yes, he's a 6'4 giant.

Yeah, with a big old heart and a very soft, gentle personality. I want your husband to roar just a little bit. You do, too. I don't want him to be mean. I don't want to be mean, but it takes strength to set boundaries. That's what's lacking here is boundaries. Let me tell you, someone like your stepson who doesn't respect boundaries, anytime you put up a fence and he's used to playing in your yard, he's going to have a fit. So don't expect this to go well.

It's.

Not going to go well because this kid's a twurp.

Okay.

And so all you can do is just say you have to sit over there in your yard and have your little fit. You can't sit in my yard and have a fit. Just don't worry about the money. Money's off the table. The fact that you forgive it is not going to make this young man suddenly have character.

I think that's also one of the hardest things for my husband, too.

Is that my husband has amazing work ethic. Exactly. That ship has sailed. It's sailed. That ship sailed. This kid's way too old for you fix him. You just got to love him where he is, and if he wants some help, I can show him how. You can show him how. But until he's ready for some help, it's everybody else's fault.

Barbara, I would just add, you need to encourage your husband that this is not a direct reflection on him. It's very heartbreaking when you see a kid and a grown man make these decisions and say the things that he's saying. But I'll tell you this. I want parents to hear this. It's really hard when you see adult kids do things that you didn't model for them. You didn't teach them how to do it. But when you see an adult kid like this who's not working to support his family-.

There's a lot of stuff going on.

There's way more going on. He's not lazy. Even though he presents as lazy, he's lost. You said earlier, this is a confused young man, and I think you're right. Confusion can make a person so lost that they lose all gumption to get out there and do something. That's the best your husband could be aware of, is to try to love his son that way. But I agree, Dave. You got to cut it off for a while.

Until he gets a wake of call. Kids do not loan money. Do not loan money to your kids. If you want to give them money, give them money. Never loan them money because you change the relationship, and that's part of what soured this relationship. Hang on. We're going to send you a copy of Dr. John De Loney's book, your past, change your future. It'll help you guys navigate this part of it. Listen, we all.

Know the.

Christmas season can be.

One of the most.

Expensive times of year. So right.

Now you're.

Probably.

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Ken Coleman, Ramsey personality, open phones at triple-8-8-5-2-5. John is with us. John is in Atlanta. Hi, John. Welcome to The Ramsey Show.

Hey, thank you so much for taking the call. I got a unique tithing question for you.

Okay.

I've listened to your show a lot. Obviously, you teach on tying, which I've done, anybody out there, if you're not tithing, you're making a huge mistake. But anyway, I'm giving 10% to my local church, but living in Atlanta, I have quite the commute to work and back. I try to educate myself every morning and listen to different sermons throughout the morning and the evening. I'm finding myself listening to Craig, Rochelle, Michael Todd, and I'm getting a lot of information from them and really growing from those two pastors, among other ones, but those are the two major ones that I listen to. Now I'm feeling like not only should I be giving a portion of that 10% to my local church, but I'm growing just as much, if not more, listening to those pastors. Should I be supporting those churches also and giving a portion of that 10% to those churches or those pastors.

I really love your heart. I appreciate that. Mike, Todd, and Craig Grochell are both personal friends. Craig is a good friend of mine. I'm just emailing with him about an hour and a half ago, a matter of fact. I do know what those guys would tell you, and I think it's the same thing I would tell you. I have Ken chime in here because he's a PA as well. Okay, what is the purpose of the tithe? Is it for you to buy a ticket to a self-improvement Christian seminar? No. Okay, it's not. The purpose of the tithe is to support the work of your local congregation. It's represented in the Old Testament, Storehouse. In the Storehouse, fed the widows and the orphans and paid the priests. That was the function of the Storehouse. You gave a 10th of your grain to the Storehouse. The Leviates ran it in the Old Testament, and a little bit of Biblical history. But the point of it is not to pay them for services rendered to you. The point of the tithe is to get a rhythm of giving in your life and to remind you each week that you don't really own anything.

You're just managing it all for God. There's a lot of grace around the tithes, so you can do whatever you want to do. God's not going to be mad at you for sending Mike, Todd, and Craig, Grochell, or whoever else you watch. Both of those are wonderful teachers, by the way, world-class. But the local church function is supported by you also, by your giving. But that's not even the reason for your giving. The reason for your giving is so you learn to be generous, not so you purchase a ticket to a self-improvement event. I'm being a little bit smart, Ellie, because you're like, Well, this is all where I'm growing from, but this isn't about your growth.

Okay, I got you. Yeah, well, I was just feeling like if part of the tie, in my opinion, obviously, especially for the local church, is you're supporting that local church so they can go out and do other things and win souls to Christ. These two gentlemen are doing a phenomenal job. I felt like if I'm listening in the.

Morning- Neither one of them are hurting for money.

I understand, yeah.

Neither church is in financial trouble. Both churches are in excellent financial condition and are winning plenty of souls to Christ. Okay.

John.

I would just add. I think most pastors would agree with Dave, but they would also say this is a preference, not a principle. The preference is to support the local body, the local church. However, the principle, as Dave says, is to give back what you've been given a portion of to the Lord. Let me say this, though. I think you've got to shift your mindset from, I should support those two ministries to I could support them.

Yeah.

That's good. I think that's the deal. I think you really love them. I think you.

Are- But that becomes an offering above the tithe.

That is above and beyond. Tithes and offerings.

Are- There's another ministry over here that does good work for GodThat's right. A good work for orphans, a good work for whoever, a good work for the unborn, a good work for… I want to support that ministry. That's an offering over and above the tide. The tide has a different set of principles. But now, having given you all this nicky-nacky detail stuff, I also want to back way up and just say there's a tremendous amount of grace over this whole thing. The whole principle is God wants to make us over in His image. He's a giver. He gave His only son. He's the ultimate in generosity. He's trying to make us in His image. The principle is to build the giving muscle, the generosity muscle, and always be building your generosity muscle. You hear me say that all the time anyway, but this is a uniquely Christian discussion we're having here for those of you that are not people of faith. But that's the technical answer from an evangelical Christian perspective. What has been taught for hundreds of years is that the tithe is modeled after the Old Testament storehouse, and that's why it goes to the local church.

That's where the model came from. But I'll bring all your tithes to the storehouse. That's an Old Testament direct quote. Then we can have all kinds of other discussions. But I don't think you're going to hell if you don't tie it. But I can tell you this, there's a high correlation between people that are generous and people who win at life and money. It's very unusual to find someone getting a divorce who's been tithing for the entire time they've been married. Because generous tends to make you less selfish, and it's very unusual. If you've got the two of you as a couple have made a decision to have a steady rhythm of giving, and you're in agreement on where that steady rhythm of giving is going, called the tithes in this case, it's also very unusual that you're not in agreement on most of the things. It's an indication of the health of the relationship in your marriage. I had an old pastor tell me one time because I've been pastoring for 45 years, never had a couple in my church get a divorce that were tithers. He was saying that as if the tithe somehow is magical.

But I think the tithe in and of itself is not. It's the principle, as you said, behind the process. The principle is generosity and a steady rhythm of generosity. That's a wonderful question. Thank you, John. Yeah, very thoughtful. For letting us get back on something that actually matters. That's really good. That was a great question. We'll back up one more step, because I'll just take a second more on this again, because I loved what you said there. I want to recap that. Because you do want to pan back from these things. I became a Christian as an adult. In my early days. I became very pharisetical, very detailed about stuff like where the tithe goes, what counts on the tithe, how do you calculate it, and all that. I finally went, Oh, wait a minute. God doesn't really need my money. As if I was somehow singularly supporting the kingdom. That's hilarious. The arrogance of that is unbelievable. But pharisees are arrogant, and I was a young pharisee. But what I got to later was that the tithe is not for God. He doesn't need my money. If he wanted me to take it, and I'd be a greasy spot.

It's all his. God, he don't need my money. Really, that church, Craig and Mike Todd, they're doing fine. They don't need your money. But if you want to support the work that they're doing because it's incredible work and they're not your local church, then that would be called an offering.

Yes. I think that there's something beautiful there, too, as you're talking about generosity that if you feel that you're receiving a blessing and you want to return some of that blessing, that is also generosity as well to say, You know what? I'm blessed by this. I've felt some impact. You know what? I want to give the widow's might. If you.

Look at that terrible. Well, it's like leaving a tip. That's exactly right. -in a sense.

-it's an active appreciation.

You blessed me tonight and the way you took care of our table, and I'm going to be a blessing back to you. It's called class. That's right. Oh, my gosh. Selfish, dad. People out there. I love John's question because he's anything but selfish. That's right.

-a abundant mindset. One of the final thing on this, John. Abundant mindset. God's not up there with a clipboard looking at where you're giving and how much. It's the attitude, it's the heart condition. You're in good shape there. Don't worry.

About that. Just give. You're a wonderful young man. Very cool. Good stuff. Good stuff. Ken Coleman-Ramsey personality, my co-host this hour. Thanks to Austin, Ben, Zach, Andrew, and Kelly in the booth. I am Dave Ramsey, your host, and we'll be back. Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's The Ramsey Show, where Debt is dumb, cash is king, and the paid-off on mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice. We help people build wealth, do work that they love and create actual amazing relationships. Thanks for joining us. We're so glad you're here. Luke is with us in Jackson, Mississippi, starting off this hour. Hi, Luke. How are you? Good. How are you all? Great. How can Ken Coleman and I help?

I'm.

Currently in a job. I'm 22 years.

Old.

And I've.

Been in this job for about two months, and I've quickly found out that I'm not really passionate about it.

Why?

Well, I'm in the wine and liquor industry. I'm a sales rep, and it's pretty difficult to watch people come in a store who already have a pretty.

Difficult life and.

Walk out with your products. It's just a hard thing to deal with.

It's hard to.

See that happening. So it's a values disconnect.

Yes, for sure.

Everyone that walks into a liquor store and buys wine is not having a bad life.

Yeah, I know that, but it's the ones that are… I'm in a pretty poor area, and so it's the ones that are coming off the streets, just pennies in their pockets coming in and buying the cheapest things on the shelf just to get a drink.

Why did you get.

Into this? Did you work in a liquor store or you're a salesman for a distributor?

I'm a salesman for a distributor.

How are you dealing with the people coming in off the streets?

Well, I've got to go into the stores and talk to the liquor store owners to try and get.

Them to.

Get my product.

Which a lot of them.

We have some high-end products, but a lot of them are to target those cheaper customers that are just trying to get a quick drink.

Okay.

I'm just curious, and I understand all of that. I understand it's very personal for you. What I'm curious about is, how did you make this decision to get into this two months ago?

Well, I.

Wanted to originally get into medical device sales.

Which is a difficult field to get into without sales experience. My original intention was to just try and get my foot in the door for the first couple of years and just get some sales experience under my belt so.

That I could then move into.

That other field. But it's just right now it's getting pretty difficult to get going because it's just a.

Moral.

Thing. Sure, I get it. But you took this opportunity just because it was, I need some experience. I got to sell something. This presented itself and you jumped into it. That's what I'm understanding. Exactly, yeah. Here's the deal. Stop overthinking this. You're going to stay in this role and you're going to have to suck it up a little bit and you're not doing anything morally wrong. I understand your feelings. I don't want in any way to discount what you're feeling, convictions, all that. But the fact is you're not doing anything wrong. So sit still and keep doing the job until you find another sales job to replace it with. That's the advice. I appreciate what you're trying to do, get some sales experience somewhere else. But now you got to learn from this and go, Wait a second. I'm not just going to take any sales job. I need to make sure that I'm going to sell a service or product that I'm okay with. You can't overthink this because, again, there's nothing wrong with distributing alcohol or selling alcohol. But in your situation, this is very, very personal. I wouldn't overthink this.

Let's make the move. How much are you making? $45,000. Okay, so find another sales job making $45 to $60,000, selling something you're proud of, and then change. That's what Ken's saying.

That's right. But then get in proximity if you can. If you could get selling something that's near or around that medical field, I would try to look for that first. Do you understand what I'm saying? Because it's connections at this point. Not just experience, but connections.

Okay.

Make sure that as you're doing that, that you're taking on something you can be proud of. Everyone in sales needs to remember it's very difficult to be a great salesperson selling something you don't believe in. Yes.

That's the.

Thing that I've been.

Struggling with because I've got alcoholism on both sides of my family from both my parents' sides. That's been the hardest part is just not really... I don't really believe in the products that I'm selling, and that's been the.

Hardest part to just wake up. If an opportunity similar to this presents itself, don't take it.

For sure.

There's something else. Because you had red flags before you took this. Yeah. You're only two months in, so I know you did. Now it's manifested and it's actually worse than you thought it was going to be in terms of convicting you. Your morals are saying, Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. The alarms are going off, get out of here. Yeah, go find something else as soon as you can and then quit. But don't just quit every time you have an adversity situation. Again, I don't want you there six years from now. I don't want you there six months from now. You ought to be able to find a sales job doing that. So doing something that you actually believe in. Ken, here over the years, we've developed products, books or software or apps or classes or whatever. One of the biggest challenges is to make sure that we're all proud of what it is we're putting out. The instant we're not proud of it, we can't ask anybody, including me, to suggest it to someone, sell it to someone. That's what sales is. It's suggesting you do something. You can't suggest buying a car if you hate that brand and you think that brand is a piece of crap, and then you're going to go to work for that dealer.

Yeah, that's going to be a problem. Don't take a position where you're not proud of where you work.

So true, and specifically in sales, because sales- Period.

But it's very difficult in sales.

Very difficult in sales because you're an evangelist, right? That's your role. People can fake it, and there's a lot of fakes out there that hit their sales numbers. But if you are a person of conviction and you've got a true ethical code to you, it will wear you down if you can't get excited to the point of evangelizing on behalf of the product or the service that you're selling. It's absolutely will cripple you. It just will.

Yeah, it's very difficult because people can... Your body language changes, your tone changes, your facial expressions change, all your nonverbales are just not there- It's correct. -when you're doing that. And so... I mean, if you're selling, in his case, a line of whiskey that is the bottom of the barrel, no pun intended, and it's designed to take advantage of the homeless, then you're not going to be fired up about that, the drunk homeless guy. You're not going to be jump... Nobody's going to be excited about that. You just got to find a way to do the thing you do that is not violation of your morals or find something period that isn't. But don't be just after two months jumping out without having something to jump to.

That's right. That's why the first thing I said was, Hey, you're going to stay put and you made this decision, so you're going to be an adult about this until we find something to replace that income. You don't just say, I don't like it. I can't do it anymore. He wasn't saying that, but got to be careful.

That's.

Honorable work for a lot of people. For him, it's not a.

Good fit. Exactly. This is The Ramsey Show.

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Hey, guys, if you like this show and you want to help us out since we're doing it for you for free, you can help us out. We appreciate it. A couple of things you can do. You can subscribe to the show on YouTube or podcast or follow or whatever you do on your particular version of how you consume the show. You can leave a review, five stars. No need to leave one star. Mama said if anything nice to say, don't say anything at all. You can share this with a friend. Just tell them where you're listening on Talkradio or that you're watching on TBN or that you can click the link and share it if it's YouTube or a podcast link. So just spread the word for us. Let people know. That would be a huge help to us. It really does matter. It affects all the algorithms and all the things and causes us to be served up and so forth. Just about a week ago, I think, were the number 19 podcast in the world in size in terms of that over a billion downloads of the show now. 100% of that is because you guys told someone.

Thank you for doing that. Sarah is in Houston. Hi, Sarah. Welcome to The Ramsey Show. Hi, how are you guys? Better than we deserve. How can we help?

Good. I have a two-part question about a job change. I just recently went through a job change after nearly 15 years with my previous employer, who I started with right out of college. So this is a pretty big shift. So I'm trying to figure out is what is a reasonable timeline for feeling settled with this new job, meaning that you're understanding processes, you're building those relationships with people and then just understanding how things work? And then the second question is, how do I discern if the overwhelming stress that I'm feeling is normal for starting with a new company after such a long time with a different company, or if it could be a symptom of a.

Larger problem. How long you been there?

I started, it's been about four months.

What do you do?

I'm a plastic manager.

Okay.

Yeah. There's no set rule on how long it takes somebody to get settled. There's no just hard and fast rule. But I will tell you that being settled will happen when you get over some of the natural fears and doubts of starting something new. That's just natural. I don't care what area of life we're talking about. We've been doing something for a very long time. Fifteen years is a long time. It's the only culture you've ever known. The way they did work at that last company was all you've ever known. I think the settling will take care of itself. I think the bigger thing that I want to know is, what are your concerns? What are you feeling concerned about right now? I want to find out if there's some depth to that or if that's just some natural stuff going on.

Yeah. I guess at my previous employer, I felt confident that I had built a very a good reputation and that my loyalty to the company and I always had the company's best interest in my heart. If I made a mistake, it's like, Okay, we'll work through that. At a new company, it's all new people and I have a lot of responsibility, and this is the exact job that I've been wanting, so I love it. But I'm also just afraid.

That's 100% what's going on. Let's start with reality. In four months' time, you cannot build a reputation. You can make an impression.

You can build a bad reputation.

Yeah, you can. That's right. But a good reputation is developed over time. Right now, we're trying to make a good impression, and you're really worried, and I understand that. But here's the deal. If you look back on your past job, you developed the reputation to where if a mistake was made, they understood this is a rarity, and this is not a character problem, and it's not a competency problem. It's just the natural workflow. We all make mistakes. But you developed that over time, so give yourself a break. You got to remember your history. You developed it before, you'll develop it again. Right now, this is a mindset thing, so here's a little exercise. When you start to feel that fear and worry pop up during the day, you need to just find yourself a quiet moment, even if it's just shutting down the email. People think you're looking at your computer, but you're just going to run through a mental exercise. Does this fear have any evidence? Does this fear have any evidence that it's true? If it has no evidence that it's true, we know that it's our mind and it's based on fear and it's going to hold me back, and so then we flush it.

If it's true, then that means fear is protecting you from something. But in this case, you have no history at all that says that you're going to make a bunch of mistakes at this new company in a job that you've longed for and you worked hard for. There's no evidence that says you're going to create a bunch of problems and mistakes that they're going to fire you. You would have to really intentionally do something boneheaded to get to that place. True or false?

True. All right then.

Believe in yourself, invest in yourself, and operate in confidence because you've been there before.

Yeah, that's fair. That's very fair. Okay.

Anytime you do anything for 15 years doing the same thing in a different place is going to take a little while, period. Whether it's job, whether it's a relationship, whether you change cars, you've been driven one car and you get a different car, it's going to feel weird going down the highway. I mean, it just takes a little while. It's just whatever the thing is, because our human mind gets in a groove or a rut, one of the two. Now you bumped up out of that and you're in the land of adventure, darling.

It's not unlike marriage.

I love what you're doing, by the way.

We went to dinner with a young couple other night, Dave, Stacey and I, and they just gotten married. Stacey and I are coming up on 25 years, and they were just saying, What advice would you give us? Stacey gave some great advice, way better than mine. But one of the things I said was that realize that first year is so difficult because you've grown up in one home, both of you grown up in different homes where there was a rhythm of how life was done. Maybe the dad did things this way in your home, but the dad completely did something different over here. You both are bringing expectations based on the environment you grew up in. All of a sudden, you get two completely different expectations because of different experiences and environments. You got to learn to adjust to each other in marriage. I think this is a very similar situation. All she ever knew was the way that company did work. The company has a very unique culture. If you come to Ramsey Solutions and you've never been in a place like this before, man, it'll blow your mind how we care for each other, how we communicate so unbelievably, clearly, very intentionally.

Any place, good or bad, is going to take some time because it's a really different environment. Yep.

It just takes a minute. It takes a minute to get your footing. It's that simple. Sarah, I like what you did, though. I like your spirit of adventure. I like that you stepped out on this and said, I'm going to go do something big. It's time to shake off the cobwebs. Good for you. It's going to pay off for you. It's going to pay off for you. Good stuff. Buvana is with us in DC. Hey, Buvana, what's up?

Hi, Mr. Emzy. Thank you so much for taking my call.

Sure. How can we help?

Sure. I am 23 years old, and I'm going to be starting medical school in a few months.

Congratulations. Thank you.

I want to first say I'm super blessed. I was able to go to undergrad for almost next to nothing. And so most of my 529, I think, will cover all of my medical education expenses. Sweet. Yes, my parents are really generous with that. And I'm almost certain it'll cover all the expenses, but I do have $30,000 in savings. And so I'm wondering how to divvy that up in terms of whether I should keep some of it just in case I have a couple of thousand dollars left over that I do need to end up paying for if I should start investing, because I know my retirement investments will be probably 4-6 years delayed compared to most people who are.

Starting work now. Yeah, and it'll be 4-6 times more income. That's true. So I think you'll be okay. Listen, the best possible investment buvana can make right now is in buvana. Yes. You are what's known as a cash machine. You are getting ready to make some serious bank because dumb people don't get into med school. They don't let them in. You're going to go through this, you're going to graduate, you're going to pass your boards, and doing all of that with zero debt and starting off your career with zero debt is the best investment you can possibly make. You are a better return on investment than a mutual fund is.

That's good to know. Yeah.

Just trap all that money. I want you, listen, you did a lot of planning. You did a lot of scheming and scamming. You've laid everything out. You've dreamed about this in detail. Now do the same thing for the money part of it. Okay. You sound a little bit wishy-washy and disorganized about whether the money is actually going to make it or not. I want you to sit down and develop a plan where the money makes it, your money makes it, and graduate with $30,000 still in the bank. That'd be great. I want you to lay out a detailed, HD, high-definition game plan to get through med school with the money you've got. That's going to keep you from buying stupid-butt stuff when you're tired, stressed out, taking some test in the middle of the night. Seriously, lay it out in detail. This is The Ramsey Show. Hey, folks, Dave Ramsey here. Do you feel like you're stuck living paycheck to paycheck and can't make any progress with your money? Listen, you do not have to live that way. On January 11th, my team and I are hosting a free live stream where we'll break down exactly what's keeping you stuck and how to break out of the cycle for good.

It's time to decide you're ready to make a change. Go to ramseysolutions. Com/breakthecycle to register for free. Ken Colman, Ramsey personality. Number one bestselling author is my co-host today in the lobby of Ramsey Solutions on the debt-free stage. Jake and Kelsey are with us. Hey, guys, how are you? Doing well. Doing well. Good to have you guys. Where do you live? Irvine, California. All the way to Nashville. All the way across the whole stink in United States. Way to go, guys. Thank you for coming. How much debt did you pay off? We paid off $456,000 in six years. 300,000 of that was in the last three years. Wow! Good for you. And your range of income during that six years?

We started at $175,000 and we ended at $285,000.

Cool. What do you all do for a living?

I'm a teacher and he's a physical therapist.

Okay, and so wow, great incomes. What in the world? What debt was this? Student loans. Yeah, primarily student loans. We had one car built in there, but it was all pretty much made up of student loans. $456,000 in student loans for a teacher and a PT. It was foolish in the beginning, but when we were signing up for things, it was just it'll be our problem in the future. We'll worry about it later. And then obviously it became our problem. Yeah. How long have you guys been married? Twelve years. We actually had our anniversary on Saturday. Oh, happy anniversary. Thank you. Very good. Okay, so halfway through your marriage, six years ago, that student loan is just still sitting there, almost a half a million dollars staring at you. You wake up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat. I mean, what happened? What in the world? What changed the direction on this?

We grew up in Minnesota, and then we moved to California for Jake's physical therapy school. When he was in school, we knew that we wanted to get rid of the debt somehow, we just didn't know what the plan was. While he was in school, we were living on the teacher's salary, and I had a long commute, and I listened to the Dave Ramsey Show on my commute, and so I asked Jake if he was interested in trying the program. Basically, the minute he got out of school, we started running. I would say at the beginning, we were a little bit Dave-ish, and then that's when the last three years you saw how we picked up and really worked to pay it off.

Yeah, a 100 grand a year for three years. You were after it. I mean, your own beans and rice.

Absolutely. Jake at one time was working four jobs. He's an inpatient physical therapist, so he was working at four different hospitals. That became a little too much, so he scaled it back. But we sacrificed a lot of time. I didn't see him a lot. I did summer school. He worked really hard, 10-hour days every weekend. I would tell people, Jake works every day, and I think they heard, Jake works a lot. It was, Jake works every day.

All day. Yes. A lot of days. Yeah, for a lot of days in a row for three years there. Amazing. Wow, powerful. Guys, there's so many times that I have sat with people or talked to people here on the air, either one, and they have a mountain of student loan debt like this, and you guys are incredible. Because that was a wee bit daunting to look up and go, I got 450,000 on a teacher and a PT's income, because neither one of these are six-figure incomes usually. But the way you worked them, you turned them into that. Oh, my gosh, amazing.

Yeah, I got to ask because just the strain on your relationship, just not seeing each other, then you're exhausted, you're working every day, as your wife said, what kept you going in some of those dark days?

It was definitely knowing what the future held. And as the one question we figured you'd maybe ask about is one of the keys is sacrifice. And we definitely made the most out of our time. On the weekends, a lot of times when I'd come home, we knew we would maybe go to church, we'd prepare a meal, we'd eat, we'd visit with friends for a tiny bit, and we'd have maybe one to two hours together. So we really learned to cherish those one to two hours, and we knew that once we got over with this, life was going to be so much better on the other side. And a few months out, it certainly is. Yeah, have you had a moment to emotionally and financially and relationally exhale a little bit? A little bit. Is it hit you? You know what? In a sense, it hasn't because I'm still working some, working my way through the steps. And I actually jokingly have told Kels a couple of times, when I go to work on the weekends, it almost feels natural. Like when I'm going to work extra jobs and extra shifts. When I stay home, it actually feels more abnormal.

Yeah, I'm like, What are you doing here on the weekend? But it's starting to sink in. It's starting to feel real that all the hard work that we did for these years is paying off.

In our future. Did you have a sense of release when it was gone? Definitely. We knew the day that it was going to be gone, and we had the loan company that we were going to call and do it, and we had cookies made with getting out of debt and stuff. Once we made that call and once it was processed, we definitely felt the relief. Yeah, wow. Okay, I'm going to go back to what I said a minute ago. The $450, almost $500,000 is daunting because a lot of people give up right there. It's too overwhelming. I can't get there. It's hard for people to internalize the belief, the hope that they could ever get there. You guys did it in six years, most of it in three years. What do you tell that person who says, Oh, man, there's just no way. I see how you guys did it, but I can't believe it for myself. You know what I'm saying? All right. They need to definitely believe in themselves. We're living, walking examples, a teacher and a physical therapist. And we made it work. As we said, it really comes down to dedication and hard work and definitely sacrificing and planning yourself.

I think that you have to have a goal. I don't think there was a day that we didn't talk about the death. Every single day we talked about it, and I think that's been the release now too, is you don't have to talk about that, but you have to have that goal that.

You're going- I have to find something else to talk about. What are you doing at home? And what am I supposed to say to you?

Exactly. But I think that people just have to figure out what you can do, that you can work those extra jobs, that you can be willing to sacrifice. Ours was a longer journey, and I think a lot of people sometimes are shorter. And so it's just, what are you willing to give up? We drive a 1998 Camry. There's things sometimes you have to give up to get to the goal that you want at the end.

Well, it's time for you to buy a car now. You really do need to get a better car. That one sucks. Oh, my gosh. Still works. I know, but you got to break loose, man. You got to be done. I don't want you to go crazy here, but go pay cash for it for sure. But oh, my gosh. I mean, you have worked so, so hard. I'm so proud of you all. You all are an amazing couple. You look like you got a little PTSD a little bit like you're still trying to do a little shell shock still from you gutted it out so dramatically. I mean, there were so many years of saying no, and we can't do this, we can't do that. Now, like you said, the release is taking a trip to Nashville, going to visit family, doing things like that that we said no to a lot over the last several years. Now we get to enjoy these things on a much grander scale. When you take on something this size, do you feel accomplished? Quite, yeah. If we did this, we could do anything. Exactly, yeah. All along the way, Kelsey and I always tell people that once we even got towards the end, we could already feel the freedom.

You talk about the peace and it's indescribable. Even when we knew we weren't fully done, we still felt, as you mentioned, the release already, you've mentioned before, it always feels like you're giving yourself raises all along the way. We, for the longest time, never even had to think much about money because we knew where it was always going to be going. Now we just transitioned that into better ways to save it and invest it.

I think we felt the peace along the way too. At first it was so daunting to put all those student loans and see them, but once they started going, we felt like we had more money, even though every month or money went out the door, but you just felt that you had that, I think, because you're giving every dollar a name and knowing where it's going.

That's good. You felt a sense of control before you were even debt-free because you actually were in control. Good for you.

Hey, we got a copy of Baby Steps Millionaires for you. That's going to be a cakewalk.

I.

Hope.

So. Yeah, really. We got a copy of the total money makeover book and a financial peace membership as well. You guys are incredible. You're heroes. I'm so proud of you. Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Jake and Kelsey, Irvine, California, 456,000 paid off in six years, 300 in the last three years, making 175 to 285. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream.

Three, two, one.

We're debt-free. Yeah! Wow! That's pretty fun, boys and girls. This is The Ramsey Show. Our scripture of the day, Matthew 10:31. Do not be afraid. You are worth more than many sparrows. Sarah Blakeley, Billionaire woman, founder of Spanks. I think failure is nothing more than life's way of nudging you that you are off course. It's course correction. That's what it is. I agree. People in the technology field fail for a living. They call it iteration. Yeah.

Our good friend John Maxwell, wrote a book entitled Sometimes You Win, Sometimes You Learn, which is a great perspective on failure. There's no progress.

Without failure. He writes a book a week. Another one was called Failing Forward.

That's.

Right. Jessica is in Syracuse, New York. Hi, Jessica. How are you?

Good. How are you? Thank you so much for taking my call.

Sure. How can I help?

Long-time listener, first-time caller. That was from my husband. Okay. I know that you generally say that emergency funds are not there to build you wealth. Obviously, they're there for your security. Good. With that being said, how much of them would you put into chasing a better rate? Almost none. Almost none. Our emergency fund and our long-term savings has been in a high yield account. Before the pandemic, it was at two and a quarter. It dropped me down to 0.5, and it's sitting at about 0.85 right now. Out of curiosity, I jumped on the internet today to see what's out there, and I saw another one sitting up at 1.5..

That's fine. Move it over there.

If you want. Double what we've got.

Yeah, that's fine. How much is in your emergency fund?

The emergency fund is 10,000, and we've got our automotive sitting in there as well, so maybe another 2,000.

Okay, so 1% of 10,000 is what?

Oh, goodness, I'm an accountant. You're going to ask me to do that.

Well, 10% of 10,000 is 1,000. 1% is $100.

100, yeah.

Okay, so moving from a half to one and a half over a period of a year, you made $100.

Yes, I know. They're a tick in the shirt is sticking me out, right?

Yeah. So it's okay. I mean, $100 is nice. You can go out to dinner, a nice place on that. Well, reasonably nice place. But it's not going to change your life. Right. Even over a period of decades, it's not going to change your life. But what does change your life is having the emergency fund as an insurance policy when life happens that keeps you from cashing out things that are growing at a rate that does change your life. If you don't cash out your 401(k) to fix your transmission because you have an emergency fund, that is a lot more than $100. Absolutely. Your original point is what I would refer back to. But again, would I spend 500 hours to get $100? No, I don't think I would. Would I surf the internet every so often and see if I can get a high yield thing that makes me an extra 100? Yeah, I might a little bit. I've got a bunch of cash laying in the company here in our retained earnings business version of emergency fund. We spend some time on that trying to figure out how we can park that in some float account so it's not all just sitting and checking.

It's just because there's a lot of money. But even then, its purpose is not to grow wealth for the company. Its purpose is to protect the things that do grow wealth for the company. You just have to balance that out. So yeah, I'll spend some effort on it, but I'm certainly not going to major and minors. That's what it amounts to. John's with us in New York City. Hey, John, welcome to The Ramsey Show.

Hi, thanks for having me on. How are you?

Better than I deserve. What's up?

Yeah. My grandparents left me with about $200,000. I'm not sure what to do with it. I don't have any debt, landlording, and I don't want to buy a house for myself. But I do want to do remote landlording.

But I was.

Researching and some people said that it's a nightmare and property managers aren't that good.

Okay, how old are you?

Twenty-six.

What do you do for a living?

I'm a software developer.

Good for you. You're a single guy? Yep. Okay, and you don't want to buy a house. Why?

I don't like the maintenance, the lawnmowing, all that stuff, the cleaning.

Okay, that's fair. You like the freedom of not being anchored down to that house. Yeah. They are a problem. I got a dead gun project in one of mine right now. It just driving me crazy. I told Sharon, The more stuff you own, the more repairman you have to know. I go along with you, John, I like it. Especially your stage of life, and there's no rush for you to buy something. I'm sorry about your grandparents. When did they pass?

A few weeks ago.

Whoa, just the other day. Both of them at one time?

It happened within a few days. Yeah, my grandma had a heart attack after my grandpa passed.

Oh, my goodness. Oh, man, I'm so sorry. Were you close to him?

Yeah, pretty close. That's my reason for staying in New York City. Now it's pretty expensive because I would say I love my family and I'd be close to them.

Yeah, okay. All right. No, I would not do remote landlording. I think that's a bad idea. If you're not willing to cut your own grass, then you don't need to be doing landlording. Not that you have to cut the grass there, but it just tells me you don't like hassle and dude, you're going to sign up for a bunch of hassles. That sounds like some get-rich-quick-crappy sight you were on or something there. Don't fool with that. If I were in your shoes, I'll tell you what I would do, and it's very boring, I would park the money in a mutual fund for right now or a couple of three mutual funds and just forget it. Forget that it's there and just let it grow. Then a little further down the road, if you decide you want to buy a property or maybe you're getting married and she wants you to buy a property or that stuff is happening, then that's the stuff. But for right now, it might be three years before you do anything with it. The stock market is way down right now, so it's on sale. If I woke up in your shoes and I had an extra 200 that I didn't really have anything to do with, first thing I'd do is try to put it someplace where I keep my hands off of it, not spend it.

Then the second thing I would do is put it someplace where I couldn't spend it.

Having said that, though, you might want to earmark a little bit of it for fun and pull it out and go do something fun. Have you got any ideas on that?

Yeah, probably travel to Europe or something.

What's that cost?

I haven't looked at it.

Okay. Yeah, I mean, budget five grand or something or 10 grand or something and go do that and the rest of it. Sit down, go to ramseysolutions. Com, click on SmartVester. You can sit down on the SmartVester Pro and begin your education on investing, begin learning from an advisor. You don't take an advisor's advice. You don't take Dave's advice. You sit down and you, other than the piece of advice is you're supposed to learn about something before you invest in it. That puts him in a pretty good position.

It really does. Beyond doing something fun with it, I'd also just let your heart wander a little bit and do something good with it. It doesn't have to be huge. Don't feel like you feel any pressure to do that, but something good. Something good with that money.

Some generosity.

Yeah, generosity. That's not a bad way to start moving into this phase because it'll really set something in place, something special in your heart. This is something your grandparents did for you. It's a way of honoring them. But again, I don't want you to feel any pressure to do that or on a large scale, but just do something good, do something fun. I like that combination, then do something smart.

Yeah. Maybe if you put 5% to fun and 5% to generosity, that'd leave you on 90%.

To.

Something like that. No pressure, but it's always good to try to do those three things: have some fun with the money, be generous with the money, and invest the money. In this case, the vast majority of it, I think, I'd be investing. I would limit the fun, but I think I would do something there. When you get to 30 years old or 35 years old and you look back and whatever you've ended up doing with this money, it needs to be something that would have caused your grandma and grandpa to smile, and then you've honored their memory because they had common sense. They were obviously good with money. They had some money. They left their grandson 200 grand. That's pretty incredible. Ken Coleman, good show today.

Thanks for.

Having me. Good work in the booth, Kelly and Andrew and Zach and Ben and Austin. Good job, you guys. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host. We'll be back with you before you know it. In the meantime, remember, there's ultimately only one way to financial peace, and that's to walk daily with the Prince of Peace, Christ Jesus.

Hey, folks, Ken Coleman here. Did you know the Ramsey Show is one of the most popular podcasts in the world? Get your daily dose of advice on Life and Money. Check out all of our shows from The Ramsey Network wherever you listen to podcasts.

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