Transcript of Debt Robs Your Life of Margin New

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Normal is broke and common Finance is weird, so we're here to help you transform your life. From the Ramsey Network in the Fairwinds Credit Union studio, this is The Ramsey Show. I'm Jade Warshaw. Next to me, George C-C-Camel. Hey, love it.

I love the energy. That was actually me.

That came straight from the camel's mouth.

Hey.

Nailed it.

I know, I did nail that. And we are going to nail it here with Marie, who is in Cleveland, Ohio. What's going on, Marie? How can George and I help today?

Hi, thank you so much for taking my call. Unfortunately, my husband of 46 years old, we were married 21 years, he died suddenly 10 months ago.

Oh my goodness.

And yeah, it's been really hard, but we are trusting in God to take care of us. He— we have 3 teenagers, 17, 15, and 13, that I'm now raising. My husband was the main breadwinner. And I was a stay-at-home mom with the kids. I homeschooled them. And I'm wondering what— how much money I need to have in the bank moving forward if I want to buy a home. We have no debt. We own both of our vehicles. But I am raising 3 teenagers now by myself and having to figure out an income. The only thing that adds an interesting twist to this is that my husband's— the company that he worked with, they're very generous, unbelievably generous, and they have offered to continue his salary for a year. Wow. I know, I am still absolutely blown away by how God has lavishly taken care of us, but I just don't know what to do. Another situation that's been an incredible blessing is that someone has offered to pay our rent. We currently just rent a home. Through the rest of this year as well. So I am in a position where I can save quite a bit of money, um, and potentially pay for a house in cash.

I just am wondering what would be a wise decision to have in the bank if I do find a property.

Marie, was there, um— I'm so, so sorry for your loss, uh, first off. Um, was there life insurance? At all?

Yes, there was half a million.

Half a million. Okay. And have you received that?

Um, I have. I have it in a, uh, like a savings account, you know, a high-yield savings account.

Okay.

So, so it is drawing a little bit of interest.

Okay, good. And that's just where it should be. I, I— so I hear two main questions. I hear, you know, how do I basically plan for life and budgeting month to month as the years go by, and also how do I set myself up to purchase a home in cash? Is that right?

That is correct.

Okay. So I love the generosity that you're experiencing with the folks around you, the year of salary, the year of rent. What I would do is I would go home tonight. We'll send you EveryDollar at no cost to you, and I would go through and I would just budget out what my expenses are. And I would not right now play in the year of rent. I would still put the rent on there just so I can see what it is. Because instead of paying the rent, you'll just pay it to yourself in savings. And that way you'll get used to that muscle of this money comes out. And even though right now it's going to savings, you'll, you won't get used to spending it month to month. And I think that that's a good thing. And you can even, keep your husband's salary on there since they're going to be, you know, be paying you a year's worth of salary. And then after that, I'd say, okay, with this life insurance, can I draw the same amount of my husband's salary and just keep that budget going? So what did your husband earn?

Well, um, he was, he was self-employed, and so he did have to pull out quite a bit quite a bit for taxes, and he didn't have very many write-off expenses, but he was earning a gross about $140,000 a year.

Okay, and that's what he took home into you all's personal budget?

Well, that was, that was gross, so after pulling out a tithe and taxes, um, I would say probably more like around $90,000 or $100,000.

Okay, okay, cool. So if you can, you know, look at that monthly amount and say, okay, this feels good, you know, for me to live off that amount. So that's going to be somewhere around, uh, $6,000 a month. So you'll get to test that out and see how that feels. And in the meantime, I would, George, get with a SmartVestor Pro and start looking at the best ways to invest, uh, this life insurance.

Yeah, what they can do is look at all of the assets in the picture and then show you projections of how, what kind of runway you have for this money to work for you. Because if it's invested, it's in the market. So it could go down temporarily, could go up. And the last few years in the market have been great. And that doesn't tell us that much. We don't know what the future holds, but investing it for the long haul is going to do you way better than just keeping it in a high yield savings account. Now, can you replace $140,000 income off $500,000 for the rest of your life? No. But can it buy you a whole lot of time for those maybe teens to get out of the house? And maybe you have an encore career. Absolutely.

So would you guys think maybe that it's not a good idea to look at purchasing a house just yet?

I would say for cash, I don't think so, because you really need that nest egg until you can secure what your job is going to look like in the workforce. Because to George's point, it's not enough to draw $140,000 off of. Continuously.

Do you guys have any other retirement accounts or any other savings to speak of?

Um, we had, he had a very minimal 401k. It was only around $35,000. And then I have, um, I mean, grand total with everything put together, 401k, Roth, all that, it was probably only maybe a little bit over $100,000. Okay.

Okay.

And then anything in savings currently that you had? Aside from the $500,000 payout?

Not much. We, I have managed with everything right now, I'm sitting at about $592,000.

Okay. Well, you can look at it this way. If you bought a house in cash, that would alleviate having to pay a mortgage or rent. Now you'd still have taxes, insurance, maintenance and repairs, all of that to pay for forever with a home. And so it's gonna cost you a pretty penny to run this household regardless. But I like the idea of you sitting down with that SmartVestor Pro and saying, hey, when would the right time be based on our life season with teens in the house? Should we just continue renting? What are you paying for rent right now?

About $1,100 a month.

That's amazing. That is so much cheaper than you could do as a homeowner.

I know.

When you're—

I know. And it's, it's a great property as well.

So I would just hang on to that right now until you know that, hey, I have this job secured, I have this income, I can support being a homeowner with real money versus draining this, this sort of nest egg.

Yeah. Do you have any ideas of what you might want to do for work? Have you had any free mental space to ideate on that?

Um, so I do have a background in nursing, but I, it was pretty traumatic the way my husband died and I just, I can't go back into the hospital right now.

So, That's so understandable.

Trying to avoid, yeah, trying to avoid all of that.

That's totally understandable. And you know, you have the right to take your time and, and think through this. And luckily you've, your friends and family have bought you a year's worth of time for that. We're gonna send you Ken Coleman's Get Clear assessment. It's actually Find the Work You're Wired to Do is a book, and inside of it is the Get Clear career assessment. And that's gonna help you walk through an assessment of what you're good at, what you're wired to do, and it'll show you what to do with the results of the assessment.

Investment.

Dave, we got a lot of calls on this show where life happens. One day someone's healthy, they're working, providing for their family, and then a curveball hits.

You know, we hear it all the time, uh, a car accident, a cancer diagnosis, a heart attack, and suddenly Everything changes.

Yeah, and that's why you've always said that having term life insurance from Zander is essential, because it protects your family if the worst happens.

Yeah, that's right. You need 10 to 12 times your income in coverage. No gimmicks, no whole life junk, just straightforward term life protection. But there's another piece that people often overlook, and that's long-term disability insurance.

Yeah, it's important to understand the difference between them. Life insurance steps in when you die. Disability insurance steps in while you're alive but can't work. So it replaces a large part of your income so the bills still get paid while you get back on your feet.

Now, if your employer gives you free disability insurance, great, take it. If it's discounted there at a better price, take it. But if not, Zander can help you find the right plan. Whether you're single or married, it's not optional. If you're gonna be out of work for a while, then you need to make sure the money's still showing up.

And that's why Zander is our go-to. They make it super simple to get the right coverage at the best price. No pressure, no upselling.

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Let's head back to the phone lines where we have Max, who's in Madison, Wisconsin. Max, how can we help out today?

Hey guys, I'm, uh, moving jobs at the end of this month and I'm wondering if I should use up a good amount of my emergency fund to purchase my stock options from the current company I'm at before heading— I've got a 90-day window before heading to the new company.

Interesting. 90 days, going to a new company. How much do you have in your emergency fund that you're thinking about using on this single stock?

I have $32,000, and the stock options, there's 4,000 of them, and their exercise price is around $5. It would be about $20 grand.

What would you do with the stocks afterwards?

Well, it's not a publicly traded company yet, so it's kind of a, you know, just an intent on their future, um, you know, kind of earnings.

What if they never go public?

Yeah, that's kind of the gamble and the kind of, you know, thing I'm weighing there. I think they're on a pretty good trajectory, um, about $300 million ARR, so it's No, it's something that they've had a lot of discussion about and have plans to do in the future. So that's kind of—

So if they do go public, it's going to be a big payday for you. What does your $20K potentially turn into if they go public?

Yeah, I don't know what they would go public at, you know, probably maybe $15 to $20 a share.

Okay.

So you could 3 to 4x your money would be the hope. Couple years from now.

Are you, um, what baby step are you in? Do you have any debt?

Yeah, just mortgage.

You know, I got to tell you, if I were in your shoes, I wouldn't do this. It feels like a gamble. And I think that you could take the same money and invest it and know that you're going to get the return on that, on that money. And I certainly wouldn't want to drain my savings knowing that I'm going to go through a 90-day dry spell. With no income.

George, I won't have a 90-day dry spell. There's just a 90-day—

90 days to purchase. Could you come up with that money outside of the emergency fund or close to it?

Yeah, I could. Um, it would have to come from probably Roth or—

No, not from retirement, but from your future income or any other assets that you could that are liquid.

Um, yeah, I possibly could.

I just like the idea of you setting a guardrail for yourself of saying, hey, I'm not going to go less than 3 months of my emergency fund, but I'm willing to drain it down to 3 months and use future income in order to purchase the options if you're going to do it. And that way you're not stuck in a lurch because Murphy will come knocking, man. As soon as you buy those stocks, you're going to have a $15,000 emergency. It's just how life works, right? So I'm not mad if you do this.

There's not an all or nothing exercise option on them. I could do, you know, a certain amount.

Oh, that's good.

Then you're going to go—

if they do go public, you're going to go, dang it, I should have got all '20, I could have made more.' There's, there's always going to be that element to it of the what-if. So if you feel strongly about this company, and even then, once you do, once they do go public, I would then move those stocks into a mutual fund or index fund versus keeping it in a single stock.

Correct. Right.

Well, uh, just a question, why are you leaving the company if you're expecting them to do well and go public and all this?

I have a better offer at a separate company, um, and it comes with $140,000 of RFUs and are already publicly traded. Um, same vesting schedule over 4 years, but you know, it's a stock that's pretty, pretty well traded right now. And so I think it's just a better opportunity also for my career.

And maybe one other question I should have asked early: how much do you currently have in retirement?

Um, my wife and I probably around $350,000, $350,000 across 401(k), Roth, and Another.

I mean, yeah, I can get on board with what George said. I think that if you can find a way to either cash flow this or not go beyond the 3 months, I think that that's a fair— I think that's a fair play on this.

Otherwise, you're going to call us back 3 years from now and say, you guys told me not to get it and I could have made $100,000.

I know.

You know, it's like one of those things, though. There's so— when I, when I look at all the companies out there who are trying to go public and make that transition, it's like, then you go, "Well, gosh, this really is a toss-up." You really don't know.

Yeah, I've got a friend who's in that exact situation. They have all of these paper stocks that aren't worth anything yet, but one day they could be, and it could be their future nest egg or it could be nothing. Like, that's basically— now we're just playing the lottery.

Yeah, it's a lottery play. And at that point, because of his baby, let's say, kind of break this down, what the logic is. Because of his baby step, in many ways, and because of the net worth that he's built, I think in many ways he could take that money. It's like buying a car. Can you take this and kind of just burn it and it not really affect you? I think he's right on the line of that being the case.

Yeah, he makes a great income. If he was in debt, I'm not going to say, well, don't pay off the debt. It would be a no-brainer.

Yeah, never.

But because he is in a good spot, good financial foundation, it's a risk that he can actually take.

Yeah, I agree with that. All right. Very, very good question. All right, George, there is not a— oh, there it is. Dylan is in Baton Rouge. Here we go. I was about to say. All right, Dylan, how can we help?

Hi, I'm just wondering if I should drain most of my savings to pay off our only non-mortgage debt.

Um, drain most of your savings to pay off your only non-mortgage debt. I'm gonna go with yes, but tell us more so that we can run this thing back and make it interesting.

Okay. Um, well, the debt, the only non-mortgage debt is, uh, my truck, which is at $24,524 is left owed on it. And we have about $39,000 total in savings.

What kind of savings? It's not retirement, is it?

No, it, uh, $31,000 is in a high-yield savings account and then about $6,000 is in a regular savings.

Okay.

It's a no-brainer for me. I'm paying off the truck yesterday. Why haven't you paid it off so far?

Oh, well, mainly because my wife is apprehensive about it because she sees the, the amount that we have in savings and dropping it down drastically scares her.

She wasn't apprehensive when you got a $40,000 truck that went down in value as as soon as you drove it off the lot with a giant payment?

We weren't married at the time.

Ah, there we go. She goes, hey, that was a previous life. That's his problem. And now it's y'all's savings. And she goes, I don't want to see that gone to your past mistakes.

Right, right.

Yeah, I would do it and rebuild. 'Cause the truth is on paper, in an accounting spreadsheet, you don't actually have $39,000. Yeah, you got $15,000. You got $15,000. And so even left with $15,000, you're in a great spot. You're completely debt-free, $15,000 in the bank, and then you can rebuild your savings in no time, even with just your truck payment. What's your truck payment?

$626 a month. Ooh!

You just got a raise. Tell your wife, "Hey, I just got an extra $625 a month, net take-home pay." Man! She's going to be real happy. Yeah! She's going to be like, "How'd you do that?" "Uh, I paid off the truck." Mm-hmm.

And the truth will be told if she's willing to immediately take that entire $629 and put it back into savings, or if suddenly, there becomes a need for, I don't know, some new jewelry or a nice bag.

Yeah, that's $7,500 extra you have in your budget every year.

She wants a trip to Disney.

Ah!

$7,500 will get you there for probably 3 days, but it'll get you there.

Right.

My wife, too. We'll go at the same time, Dylan. How about that?

Sounds great. Can't wait to meet you.

Congrats on the truck payoff!

Yes, and thank you for the question.

I feel like you know the old boat quote, "The best day of your life is the day you buy the boat, and the next best day is the day you sell it." You sell the boat.

Listen, the maintenance on a truck. Same with a truck.

Yeah. The best year of your life is the day you get that truck, and the next best one is when you sell it. When you sell it. You sell it or you pay it off.

I'll take the payoff. I'll take the payoff.

He likes the truck. And here's the other parameter. If all the things with wheels and motors is more than half your annual income, you got a problem.

Yeah, and there's a reason that we say that because vehicles are going down in value constantly, especially if it's something that's brand new. Oh my goodness, never buy a brand new car, people. Unless you're a millionaire, the amount of value that's lost just in year 1 is astronomical. And so we're really, these are parameters, these are kind of rules of thumb that we live by and teach by here, but it's so good. So say it again, George, if the vehicle—

You wanna make sure that everything with wheels and motors in your life, that's bikes, cars, trucks, boats, you name it, no more than half your household income is tied up in those things. If you make $50 grand, no more than $25 grand. You make $100 grand, grand, now more than $50 grand, just so you don't have too much of your world wrapped up in things going down in value.

That's right, you can take the hit. And if you are interested in buying a brand new vehicle, again, you're looking for a net worth of $1 million or more so that again, when you take that hit of depreciation, because you will take the hit like Mike Tyson, you can actually—

it's a nick, it's a nick.

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Hi, my daughter recently got, um, out of a relationship that she was in for about 3 years. While she was in that relationship, they acquired an enormous amount of debt together, although they were not married. We have about $70,000, $80,000 in vehicle loans, $15,000 in credit card, and about $20,000 in, um, a business loan. Her boyfriend had quit his job to— when The owner sold the business so he could branch out and open his own, and the majority of the vehicles are upside down on their loans because he took additional equity to start his new business. Um, now that they are no longer together, she is a co-signer on all of this stuff. Oh boy, she is a single mom of two. And he has no verifiable or income because the business is so new and he is in with a partner. She is the only one that has verifiable income and it's not that much. So we're not sure. She's contacted a couple attorneys. Nobody wants to really work with her to get it to where her name is off these loans. I know it can be very difficult, but we're wondering if she should probably file bankruptcy to get her out of all of this debt that she actually has no benefit of.

Oh boy. Um, and you've already run this by attorneys to see if there's anything there to maybe legally split this or do something, and nobody will touch it.

They really don't want to because where he is the primary loan holder and she is the co-signer, even if they get a judgment, the banks don't necessarily want to take her off as the co-signer.

Well, they know how risky this is. They like her on there. They want someone else on the hook.

Um, absolutely.

Um, tell us about the cars. You said they're both upside down. How, how badly and how many are there?

There currently are 3 vehicles. Um, I believe it's a '22 Chevy Silverado that has about $50,000 that's owed on it. In addition to the vehicle loan, there was also a trailer for a motorcycle as well as motorcycle. I do not believe that has extra equity. I believe that is just straight for those, those 3 pieces of property. They have a Hyundai, a '24 Hyundai that is only valued at $33,000, but they got an additional $7,000 to put into his business. She had a Toyota Corolla that was paid off. It's an older Corolla. Um, they went in and got a $9,000 loan on it. The car's not worth but maybe about $4,000.

So they owe $9,000 and it's worth $4,000?

Correct.

And let's go back to the, the Hyundai. She owes $33,000. What's the Hyundai worth?

It's worth $33,000. They owe $40,000.

Okay. Um, and then let's go back to the first one, the $50,000 one. They owe $50,000. And what's that one worth?

It's probably worth around $45,000 to $50,000. It is a very nice Chevy Silverado Club Cab pickup.

And you're telling me the trailer and the motorcycle are worth nothing?

Um, it's a dirt bike trailer.

Okay.

For, uh, racing dirt bikes. It's— it would maybe be worth $3,000. Okay. That's our area in the market.

We need that. And what about the motorcycle or the dirt bike?

That's, that's probably the, the motorcycle and the trailer might bring 4 or 5 out of them combined together.

Okay, correct. So What I'd want to know, what I'd be seeking out next is if she can sell these items, being the cosigner. And that's what I'd want a judge to approve. Hey, we can't find this guy. We can't track him down. He has no income. This is destroying her credit. Can we have the ability to—

We know exactly where he's at.

Okay.

He will not cooperate.

Right. And that's why I'm saying, can we get a judge to order it? Okay, that's what I'd check on. I don't know if they will because what's taken place is totally legal. She co-signed on, on, on debt, which is honestly— and I mean, you already know this— is just one of the worst things that you can do because you're on the line. That's the whole point. If this guy doesn't pay, I'm saying I will. That's what you're saying when you co-sign. So there's nothing except him being a scumbag. There's nothing illegal going on here. There's nothing, quote, wrong going on here. So it's going to be hard. But I would at least try to say— I'd try to go before a judge and say, this person's not paying. Here's what it's doing to me. And can we sell these assets so that we can clear that?

That is an issue we're running up against, is he is making monthly payments, but at the rate that he's making these monthly payments, If, if he ever stops, she doesn't know until it's too late, right? If he, um, her name's on the vehicles as well, um, so she can't go get something independently of him. And he has come and taken her vehicle while she was at work.

Well, how can he do that? Is she driving one of these?

He has an extra key.

Oh, she's driving one of these? She's driving the Corolla?

She's driving the Hyundai at this time.

Okay.

Are they both on the insurance for all these vehicles?

From what we understand, yes, but at any time he could take her off the insurance and she would have no knowledge.

Why is that if she's also on it as well?

Because they are not currently together. It's his insurance agent.

Um, is, is he trying to actively destroy her life at this point? Like, where's his head at?

Basically, they, they have— he left her one month after they had a child together. He is not ordered to pay. He pays $100 a month for child support.

That's what they have told her, ordered by the courts.

If she can— yes, if she contests it because he does not have verifiable income, she may end up having to pay him.

This is a nightmare. I'm so sorry.

100%, which is why we're wondering if she files bankruptcy, would that get her out from under his cosigner from all of this? So at least she doesn't end up with all this on her lap.

Well, the bankruptcy is not going to help much because they're going to liquidate all the cars, and if they get repoed, she's going to be on the hook for the difference. They're going to sell it at auction for nothing. And then she's going to owe even more while her financial life gets destroyed for 7 to 10 years from the bankruptcy. So I don't love that option. I would try to see how we can get her out of this, these individual situations one by one and get her income up enough to where she could pay them if she had to.

Okay.

And I would try to get up, you're about $15,000 underwater on all these vehicles.

Mm-hmm.

Obviously she needs something reliable to drive and obviously we need the ability to find this car and be able to sell it, which that's going to be the difficult part because he's got most of these toys, doesn't he?

Um, he has everything. He ha— she has access to the Hyundai and the Toyota. Um, but you know, she would love to sell the Toyota. She can't because of this loan that's on it.

Yeah.

Um, she has told him, come get the Hyundai, I will go out and buy something that, you know, I can afford so I can make my own payment. But she can't with her credit wrapped up and all of this.

Yeah, well She could drive the Corolla, right? If she sold the Hyundai, she could do that?

Absolutely.

Okay, so if we at least get out of those two, it solves some problems here because that at least alleviates some of this pain when you owe $33,000 on one and $9,000 on the other, which means you need to come up with $12,000 to get out from underwater on this, and then you can keep the Corolla.

Yeah, and what about the credit cards? Are those still actively going? Because I'd want to make sure that those are shut down. And that more money is not able to be rung up on those.

I would freeze her credit.

Yes.

So that no accounts can be opened under her name and Social Security number as well.

Mm-hmm. And the same thing with this business loan. Her biggest job right now is to work hard to save. I mean, she is on the hook for this money. So let's, let's earn $20,000 and start knocking out debt and make sure it can't come back to haunt us later on by freezing the credit.

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Right back to the phone lines where Harrison is in Augusta, Georgia. Hi Harrison, what's up in your world?

Yes, thank you all so much for taking my call. So my wife and I are in our late 30s with 2 kids under 3. I make about $50,000 a year and my wife makes about $30,000, and together we've got about $100,000 in non-mortgage debt, mostly vehicles and credit cards. And after doing our budget, um, we're realizing we're running about a $2,200 a month deficit. And I feel completely trapped. I have no idea what to do. I've realized we've built our life outside of our financial reality, and it's just kind of snuck up on us. And I just could use some help.

Yeah, my— listen, I'm going to tell you right now, I gotta believe that a lot of that red is in the cars. Am I wrong or am I right?

Yes, you're right.

So tell us about the cars. How many are there? And tell us what the payments are. Tell us what you owe on them.

Yeah, so I have 2 vehicles. I have a truck that I owe about $14,000 on. That payment's about $325 a month.

Okay.

And then I have an SUV that's worth— that I owe about $30,000 on, and that monthly payment is $560 a month.

Okay. Honestly, I'm going to tell you, that's not as bad as I thought it was going to be, although I still don't like the car payment. What else is sending you guys, you know, over $1,000 over? When you look at the budget, what do you find are the key contributors?

So it's mostly— I mean, I'm paying $1,950 a month for daycare.

Mm-hmm.

And that's killing me. And then my mortgage is a little over $2,100 a month. So I really, I really put myself in a house that we probably should not have bought.

Yeah.

What's your actual take-home pay every month?

$6,500. Oh, wow.

That feels low. Is investing coming out?

So it was. I was putting about 5% into my 401(k). I just actually paused that this week. I'm trying to do whatever I can to come up with some cash. Downloaded the EveryDollar app and then kind of going through that and just trying to figure out, find some solutions here.

So you said you have $100,000 of non-mortgage debt. I'm counting $44,000 in car loans. Does that mean you have $56,000 in credit cards?

So I have about $25,000 in credit cards. I have about $10,000 in a personal loan and about $5,000 in medical debt. Hmm.

Okay.

Have you and your wife sat down and made an EveryDollar budget and just kind of put this all on paper to get the reality of it?

So I have, and, you know, I've tried to talk with her multiple times and she kind of shuts down. Um, and it's hard for her to kind of see the reality. And, you know, is she overwhelmed? Absolutely, she's overwhelmed.

Well, the, the truth is, if she's making $30,000 after taxes, after everything, that's not covering daycare. Part. It's— I mean, it's, it's breaking even.

$30,000. Yeah, but $30,000 is from a photography business. It's all under the table. But you're right, it's, it's barely covering daycare.

But is that what's keeping her? I guess what I'm saying is, regardless of how it's being paid or who she's working for, she's out making money. And is that the thing that's keeping her from— obviously, I'm not saying everybody has to be a stay-at-home wife, just hear that. I'm just saying, I'm trying to solve a math problem here. If she were to stay home, um, that's something that might pull this back a little bit and maybe she can stay home and do photography and just shift those hours to where, do you see what I'm saying? There's more of a benefit to it.

Absolutely. Absolutely.

Because if she could do that nights and weekends and watch the kids during the day, well, now we have a problem solved because we've kept some income in the door. While getting back our daycare money, $1,950 a month, which gets you to more like a $300 deficit. And that's without paying off any of your debts.

Have you guys talked about that?

We have talked about it, and honestly, we've tried it a couple times and it just did not go very well. She was— she struggled with keeping both kids at home and trying to work. And so, you know, we kind of came up with a plan that, hey, you know, this is a new business, let's get the kids in daycare and give you a real shot to really grow this business and see where it can go.

How long has it been?

So she's, she's only been doing this about 6 months.

Okay, so here's where I'm at with this. Um, there's 3 things, there's 3 options on the table here. Um, and a couple of them are a must. Number 1, we have to sell the vehicles. Uh, at least one of them, at least the $30,000 SUV, um, has to go out the door. The other thing is she either needs to choose between I'm going to do this this, uh, part-time and stay home with the kids and try to bring in as much as I can in part-time hours, or I'm going to find a job or make this job grow in a hurry to be to where I'm making more than $30,000. Because you guys are, and, and the same goes for you too, like you gotta find ways to get your income up, even if it's side hustling, if it's overtime, you guys are up against, uh, some very scary numbers here. And you cannot, and, and mind you, we're not even talking about paying off debt yet. We're just talking about getting you out of the red. We're, we haven't even found them. These are just things to get you out of the red. This is not extra margin.

And so just baseline where you can cover all the bills.

Yeah.

Because right now, are you using the credit cards to fund that gap?

Yes. Yeah. That's what we've been doing. But see, it's coming to a head because my limits are about up and not, you know, at some point it's all gonna come crashing down. But yeah.

And that's why I say it's not a, And that's why I say, speaking with her, this is not, it's not personal. It's not having to do with anything with her photography business. This is math and this is numbers and this is us adulting and saying, this is what must be done in this season.

We need to go from I'm scared to I'm angry, because that tells me now we can solve the problem. And so if you can get her there, you know her better than anyone, and just level with her and say, hey, listen, I know I'm overwhelmed too, but we're going to get through this together. We're going to get on a plan. We have the EveryDollar budget. And if you don't have the premium version, we'll gift it to you. Harrison, if you hang on the line. That'll connect to your bank account. That'll give you all the personalized recommendations. And I think once you see the reality and you can look past the fear and the overwhelm, you guys will go, okay, we can see a path out. And you just got to focus on one thing at a time. That's the Baby Steps. $1,000 cash— do you have that in the bank right now?

I do.

Good, good.

Then it's gonna be attacking all of our debts, smallest to largest. So what's your smallest debt? What's the next smallest balance you have?

Um, it's about $420.

Great. Now, can we knock that out if we worked extra and cut our lifestyle down to nothing?

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

So then at least you freed up that one payment, and so now you see some light at the end of this tunnel. And it's going to be a slog. I mean, this might be 3 to 4 years for you guys on this journey based on your income-to-debt ratio.

Yeah, Harrison, what do you owe on this SUV? You said you owe $30,000, but what's it worth?

It's only worth about $21,000, so I'm underwater.

Okay. Um, that gummit—

the truck, the truck, uh, only owe $14,000 and it's worth probably $16,000.

Okay, so there, there's some money there. Um, I would probably sell that one then and take the $2,000 and, uh, put a little money with it, see if you can cash flow a couple more thousand dollars so maybe you can get a $4,000 or $5,000 deal.

That might mean kind of pausing the Baby Steps for a second to stack up that cash to get a used car to replace that truck to get you from A to B.

Right.

And what about your work? Let's find ways to make quick money for you. What do you do for a living?

So I work for a building supply company running inventory and warehousing, and then I also teach pottery classes on the side.

Okay. Does your— does the main job offer overtime?

No, so I'm on salary.

Okay. And what about the pottery? Is that, is that a great side hustle for you or did you just pick it cuz you like it? Because if it doesn't pay a whole lot, we need to shift to doing something that really pays.

It could be. I mean, I've been doing it 20 years. I'm really, really good at it. I just haven't spent much time doing it cuz it's, you know, with the two kids at home and—

Right.

So what do you make on a month on average doing that?

Doing pottery?

Yeah.

About 600.

And how many hours is that?

Oh, that's— I'm working 2 hours once a week, 4 weeks.

Okay, okay, about 8 hours a month.

Yeah, yeah, I think we can pour gasoline on that. I think we could pump it up into high gear.

Pretty good hourly rate on that if you can do more of that.

Uh-huh. And if you can't do more of that, then tack on something else, and you might be having 3 or 4 different different, you know, side hustles that bring in money here and there. Same thing with her. But the point is, you guys have got to get the heck out of Dodge. I gotta hear some urgency. This is not even my situation, and I'm feeling like I gotta move. We gotta make changes. We gotta shift. So guys, you, you can do this, but you're going to have to get uncomfortable. There's no way this is happening without you guys getting extremely uncomfortable to do it.

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Welcome back to The Ramsey Show here in the Fairwinds Credit Union studio. Again, I'm here with George Campbell. I'm Jade Warshaw, and we're headed back to the phone lines where we have Dan, who is joining us from from Fort Myers, Florida. Dan, how can George and I help you out today?

Yeah, so my wife and I are start— starting on the process of buying our first house, and, um, our lender is suggesting we cash out our 401(k)s for the down payment.

Oh, I'm trying hard not to laugh, Dan, because it's just so funny that a lender, of course, is like, hey, just cash out your retirement to make this happen.

Yeah, come on, so I can get paid because I haven't in a while.

Right, right.

I mean, you do know that this is a horrible idea. I mean, your red flags went up, didn't they?

Yeah, yeah, that was, that was my thought. I mean, um, yeah, yeah.

So let's play this out just, just for kicks and giggles. How old are you?

I'm 30.

Okay, you're 30, and how much are they telling you to cash out?

So I've got I've got about $22,000 in my Roth, and my wife's got about $14,000 or $16,000 in her, uh, employer match.

Okay, so $22,000 and $16,000 is what you would have cashed out if you listened to your lender?

Yeah, about $36,000.

Okay, so $36,000, and I'm just gonna play that out. If you left the $36,000 in, what it would turn into, which is how much you're losing if you did this move. Okay, and that's if you never added anything to it, just $36,000 letting it ride from 30 to 65. $125,000, that would turn into $1.2 million. So this is not a $36,000 decision, it's a $1.2 million decision.

Absolutely.

So that's the scary part. So that tells me though another thing, you may not be ready to buy this house.

Yeah. What took place that you guys even got to the point of discussing such madness?

So yeah, so So we just moved to Florida about 3 years ago. We make about $140,000. We've got, yeah, we've got virtually no cash savings. So that's the thing. We've got $30,000 in credit cards and $20,000 on her car.

Okay, I'm glad you told us that because around here we really do, we love home ownership. We do. We love when people are ready to make that purchase. We love when people wanna invest in 401(k)s We love being able to say yes to these things, but there is a time, uh, that it creates a much better timeline for this to be a blessing, a blessing for you versus a burden. And so the way we teach it here is there's certain things that just have to be in line first. And one of those things is we're never going to recommend you buy a house while you're still in consumer debt. That is just, you're just adding insult to injury because home ownership is expensive. Number one, you're going into debt. Yes, it's different than normal consumer debt, but it's still debt and it's still a financial responsibility for you. So we're always going to say, hey, you got to have your consumer debt paid off. That's numero uno. And then after that, we want you to have an emergency fund because we all know that once you buy that house, something's going to happen.

Everything's on you.

Yes, the roof is going to happen. The AC is going to happen. You're going to have pigeons that like to nest arborist up in your gutters. That happens to us all the time. And it's like, you gotta have the guy come out there and remove them. All that kind of crazy stuff.

That's outside of any family emergencies. Yeah.

There's an ice storm and you gotta have the arborist come, right? And when you have debt, you can't cash flow that stuff. And then if you don't have savings, you can't pull from the savings for that stuff. And then the next thing you know, Dave, what do you— or not, Georgia.

I appreciate that. She called me Dave.

Oh my Lord. I looked at you and I just said, Dave. The next thing you know, what are you doing? You're going into debt. Further into credit card debt. So this, we don't want that domino effect to take place. That's why there's actually reason to why we teach what we teach, George.

So is it too late to back out of this whole thing and just keep renting for a while as you kind of create a better financial foundation?

No, no, no, it's, it's not too late. So I mean, the, the whole story, right? So we've got about $10,000 in savings, in cash savings, but so it's not a whole lot, but there's a little bit there. The issue is, you know, we live about an hour and a half outside of where where we work, where we're currently renting for $2,500 a month. So, I mean, it's pretty, we're already paying a high rental, you know, even being out in the boonies. And then, you know, so we just had a kid last year. So we're trying to move closer into town, rentals in town or about rentals in town, you know, closer into town by daycare is about $3,500 a month. And that's about what the mortgage would be, um, to play the devil's advocate on the, on the cash out the 401k side of things. My wife's 401(k) match grew that in under 3 years, in like 2, 2.5 years. So if we replayed that scenario, ideally we'd be back at that same number within 2.5 years.

That's true. That could be true.

You'll be there even if you didn't touch the retirement. You'll add that if you kept where you're at. And so it's still, you're still losing that $1.2 million that you unplugged. and even though you're adding to it with the new $36,000 over time, it's still unplugging that growth for the rest of your life versus adding to it. So I still think it's a— and you're, you're making a— you're also going to pay penalties and fees as well.

Yeah, we didn't talk about that.

That's, that's aside from that. And so I, I think you guys are tired of the commute, you want to be homeowners, and the truth is we made decisions that just has kind of put us two steps back with the car loan and the credit cards. Like, you guys are making $140 grand and you still had to turn to the credit card. So it tells me we need to get our current income under control before we step into this new chapter.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, so, I mean, the, the, the income is under, under control. The $30,000, that, that's been there for a few years now. We've just—

that's even scarier. That's at 25% APR.

Yeah. So, and we've just been, you know, paying that. So we've actually been living on cash cash, you know, a cash budget for a few years now.

I also want to call out another part of this, and, and again, I don't want to sound like I'm here to bust your bubble. That's not what I'm trying to do. I want to give you fair numbers so that whenever this all goes down, it feels good and you can actually keep it. But with your— if you're bringing home $9,000 a month, doing a $3,500 mortgage is not good for you. That's way too high for you.

It's $1,000 over where it should Ideally, you're sitting at about $2,200, which means you need to have more saved up for the down payment to then lower the mortgage or choose a different home that's at a lower price point. So there's going to have to be compromises. Otherwise, you're going to be calling us back when, yeah, maybe you lose one income or income goes down, and all of a sudden you're going, hey, we can't afford to stay here anymore, we need to move, or we can't invest 15% to retirement because this mortgage is killing us.

And, and hear it from this angle, you know, you called in saying your lender gave you some bad advise, they have money tacked onto that. And so they're kind of driven by, by, you know, making a commission. George and I have nothing. We're completely unbiased for you. And so we're just looking at this as the numbers are there. We get no commission, we get nothing. And we can just look at this and go, at the bottom line, Dan, is you're just not ready to buy a house. You just don't have the money yet. And you can get there. And I think that you can get there pretty quickly. Relative to, you know, the span of your life. But the day is not today, and maybe next year you could be ready. But the truth is you guys have $50,000 of debt that needs to be paid off. You need to stack up at least 3 to 6 months of expenses.

And then, so that's probably like an $80,000 swing before we even start saving up a down payment.

Yeah. Which is probably another $100,000.

Yes.

And that, I guarantee that's not what you wanted to hear when you called in.

Yeah.

Right.

But I think you knew in your heart that this was a bad decision, hence why you called our show.

Yeah, yeah, I was, I was thinking, you know, I probably got to go find $80,000 or so. I mean, the cool thing is my— I'm self-employed, I own a construction business. Oh, and I've been—

sky's the limit for you, sky's the limit for you.

And, you know, $30,000 to $40,000 a year, just—

yeah, go bust it, man. Your income is your greatest wealth-building tool. So let's use it to pay off the debt, get the emergency fund, get the down payment. If you really want that home, prove it. Pay off the debt, get yourself to a good financial spot.

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Headed back to the phone lines where we find Samantha, who's in Miami, Florida. What's going on, Samantha? How you doing?

Hi, I'm doing great. How about you guys?

Excellent. How can we help?

I am calling because, um, my husband and I love the Dave Ramsey Show. We watch it all the time on YouTube, and I am trying to convince my husband to let us buy a new iPhone for me. Um, my iPhone does kind of work, but it's not fully functioning. Apple Pay doesn't work. Um, it doesn't connect to my watch. But I do tend to kind of break things. I don't think super fast to the average, but compared to my husband, he is like— he takes care of all his technology. His iPhone's like 5 years old, you know. Mine's about, about to turn 3.

Okay.

Um, and I want a new one.

Okay, so it It doesn't connect to Apple Pay and it doesn't connect to your iWatch.

And it's only 3 years old.

Yes. Yeah, it's 3 years old. It's fallen a few times. I work in an industry where I move around a lot. I travel a lot.

So by fallen, you mean you've dropped it?

Yes.

Okay. It didn't trip on its own. That's what we're asking. Okay.

Samantha, let me—

frequently falls out of my hand, though.

Let me tell you, Samantha, if you could have been in the commercial break, George was making fun of me because my iPhone is so destroyed. It is just, it's been, it's fallen many times. It's completely cracked. And I am on your side on doing our best and it's still not being enough with these iPhones.

So let's talk through that. You're talking to a former Apple Store employee and it hurts my heart when I see an iPhone fall. It's like dropping a baby to me. Almost as bad.

I drop, I drop babies pretty frequently.

Oh gosh, Samantha.

I mean, dropping babies, your own babies or other folks' babies?

Just the iPhone. Just the iPhone.

Okay, good. I was like, don't give Samantha a baby. All right, so you're— I get— I understand your husband's frustration, and he's going, why would we get you a new one for you to then make it an old broken one very quickly?

Exactly.

What's a new iPhone run these days? I haven't bought a brand new one.

The Pro— the Pro Max one, or the Pro— I was looking at was $1,100.

Why are you looking at the Pro Max? It's like knowing you get into car wrecks a lot and going, I'll take the Porsche, please.

Oh boy.

$1,100.

Well, even though these— even the least expensive one I think was around $700.

But can't you get— can't you get an older model?

I'm looking right now on Swappa, which is a— I've sold my old phones on Swappa, so you can buy an iPhone 16 in great condition for $350.

Oh, love that. And what would be the problem with that, Samantha?

Because I just wanted the new one.

There we go. Thank you for your honesty, Samantha.

She just wants it.

So it went from my phone doesn't work to no, I just want the fanciest, latest, and greatest.

If I'm gonna get the new phone, I just want the new phone.

Well, let's see, can you even afford it? So tell us, tell us, is this something that you could do and it's just not a thing, or if it's something that would really set you back? Do you guys have any debt?

We have no debt for Baby Steps. We're on Baby Step 6.

Just the mortgage?

Just our house.

Okay. How much is in the emergency fund?

A year.

A year's worth?

Almost a year.

How much does that equate to?

That's like, well, if you include some of our investments, I guess if it's just purely cash on the emergency fund, then 6 months.

Okay.

It's about $60K. And then we also have some investments we could liquidate if there was a bigger emergency. And in a brokerage account, we invest— brokerage accounts. And when we do invest, almost 30% of our income annually gets either—

what's your net worth?

All the things.

What's your net worth?

About $1 million. $1 million.

Okay.

So, so it sounds like old boy is, is being a little stingy.

I have an idea, Samantha. What iPhone does your husband have?

So he's— his work pays for his, and he just got the newest one after having his for 5 years.

Okay. What happened to his old phone?

He cracked the screen.

Oh, see, look at that.

Here's where— this is what we really need to discuss. 5 years.

He had it for 5 years.

But what we really need to set is a baseline, and we need to know what is a norm of keeping your phone. Like, what is the normal amount of time that a person should keep their phone before they upgrade?

We were just out in the lobby and it was an iPhone. With the single lens. It must have been an iPhone 4 and it was working great. Yeah, because they took care of it.

Okay, George, we need to hear because we don't know unless the people speak. So if you're watching this in the comments, put what is a normal amount of time to have your phone before you upgrade? Is it 3 years? Is it 5 years? Is it every year? I would like to know.

As long until it just literally doesn't work anymore.

So for the audience, is 3 years a fair time?

I see one person said 10 years, one said 5. I'm seeing another 5, 2, 3.

Okay. So I think that we're in— it seems like we're in the threshold. Anywhere between 2 to 5 years, you should be able to upgrade your phone. I'm— I agree, Samantha.

So you can upgrade it. Here's my condition. If I'm your husband, day one, we are getting a screen protector on there and an OtterBox case that is indestructible. The ugliest cases, the ugliest, biggest case you can find to protect it. Because the truth is, I doubt you've had screen protectors and good cases on your phones this whole time.

Yeah. And even if she has, like, just double down on it because you need it. Put it inside of a baggie.

I am mister, like, I'm proudly, my phone is like perfect at all times.

Really?

I take care of it. Screen protector at all times, always in a case. People who, you know how I know someone's rich? Their iPhone is nude.

Oh.

No case, no screen protector, I go, you can't hide money.

'Cause he just, it doesn't matter. If they shatter it tomorrow, they'll just.

I can spot a trust fund kid a mile away if they've got an iPhone with no case.

But it's slick, you can't even get a good grip on it to hold it.

Exactly, you're living on the edge and there's total confidence.

Total confidence, I can just go and ride through and get another one tomorrow.

So nonchalant, be a little more nonchalant with your phones, guys. You're carrying a $1,000 device.

Yeah.

You wouldn't do that with your laptop.

I've never had the brand new phone. I've never had the most brand new phone ever.

I'm proud of you.

I don't even know which one this one is, but it ain't the— it's got two holes.

Well, you know what's nice? I buy old ones off like coworkers, you know, as they upgrade and they'll sell them on our little forums or whatever, so ask around. I mean, Facebook Marketplace, don't get scammed there, but Swappa is another one. There's a bunch of cell phone sites to sell old phones, buy used phones.

Okay.

So all of that really helps because I don't want to overpay.

So if I go to the Apple Store, I feel like I get them at the Apple Store. I get an older one. You can get refurbished.

They'll have them refurbished.

But it's cheaper on Swappa.

100%. Refurbished is just a little bit cheaper than new.

Interesting. And there's more that you can choose from on there?

Yeah.

Interesting. And it's all legit. Not a sponsor, but it's just a site I use.

Maybe they ought to be.

Hit us up, Swappa.

Okay, so do you think it's fair that, you know, obviously some people like Samantha and myself, we drop them more often. Even if you hadn't dropped it, even if you just had the phone for 3 years and you were like, you know what, I'd like to see what the newer model looks like.

Yeah, if you budget for it, you pay cash. I mean, you might need a sinking fund these days because of how expensive these things are. Absolutely. If it's $1,000 and you need one every 2 or 3 years, You know, that's $50 a month you got to set aside.

This is a loophole that a lot of people do. Do you want to know what they do? They, you know, when they're AT&T or Verizon, what do they do? They just do the payments for it.

Oh, yikes. That's my least favorite option.

They just add it into the—

it's just in my phone bill. Which, by the way, locks you into their contracts.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So there's some golden handcuffs there. So never think, well, it's super cheap. I just pay it every month. That's what they want you to do.

Can I tell you, I got I kind of got tricked 'cause I didn't know. So this was several, several years back. I was going, I got a notice on my phone that was like, time to upgrade. And to me, when it's like, it's time to upgrade, I'm thinking, okay, I'm just upgrading my phone. It's time to just swap 'em. Swappa.

There you go.

And I didn't even realize because they just did one phone for another. And then I realized it was in my bill.

Oh, they snuck it on you.

It was just automatically. And so all of a sudden, one day our phone bill went down and I was like, why did our phone bill go down? Phone bill go down. And I realized I'd been paying payments on the phone and I didn't even know it.

Wow, that is brutal.

Diabolical.

Oh, the other thing I need to mention is that a lot of people think, well, my phone is broken, it doesn't work anymore. No, it's just user error because you put so much crap on that phone, it can't function anymore.

Too much, not enough memory.

You gotta clear some space. And so resetting your phone and cleaning it, you'll feel like you got a new phone. Just like with a car, get your car detailed and that car fever will go away pretty quickly.

You know what though? Some people, that's just their thing. Like if it weren't for Sam Warshaw in our house, I would have no dealings with the technology. Like he does all that stuff. I get frustrated. One thing doesn't work. I'm like, this stupid phone. And he just walks by and pushes one button.

Yeah.

And it's all fixed.

See, me and Sam, we're tech support.

Tech support. Every household needs a tech support. I could tell it was you in your house.

I can't use a, you know, a screwdriver, but I could fix your wifi. No problems.

Tech support. We need it.

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Ask Ramsey is our free AI tool that's built and trained on proven Ramsey principles. And so today we're going We're going to talk about some of the most asked questions that you guys ask Ramsey. We get questions all the time around budgeting, paying off debt, but this time the top question was around retirement savings, George. As a matter of fact, the most asked question was this: How do I know if I have enough saved to retire?

Well, the simple answer that you will hate is, you know you have enough saved to retire when your retirement income can cover your retirement lifestyle without depending on Social Security. So figure out how much you'll need to live on each month in retirement, which easier said than done, 'cause we don't know what inflation's going to be. Will Social Security be there? How much will it be? Healthcare costs, all of that. But to the best of your ability, go, okay, here's what I'm living on now. Here's what I think it'll be, you know, 10, 20, 30 years from now. Then list all of your expected income streams. Hopefully, if you follow our plan, you've got the 401(k)s, IRAs, maybe even a pension. And if your monthly income is close to or above that expected monthly spend, you are probably on track. If there's a gap, that tells me you need to lower the lifestyle. You need to increase how much you're saving now or plan to work part-time in retirement. Not a bad idea. Important callouts, though. Be debt-free before retirement. Work to pay off the house. Make sure you have everything paid off before you head into retirement.

Plan for those healthcare costs. Be on a written retirement budget, not just vibes.

Yeah, not just a guess. That's so good. Ask Ramsey can really help you walk through a retirement planning checklist. Checklist to make sure that you have your retirement savings that can actually float you and your lifestyle in retirement. So again, ask your question today at ask@ramseysolutions.com, or you can just click the link in the description if you're listening on podcast or YouTube. Again, if you want to ask Ramsey your question, go to ramseysolutions.com. All right, we got Jeff who's in Nashville, Tennessee. Hey, Jeff, how can we help out today?

Hey, guys. Well, I have a question, um, about my career and I was wondering if you guys could help. So I've been with the same company for almost 13 years and we're in kind of the restoration cleaning industry. The plan for my future was that I'm to take over the company. Um, we have no written contract. There's no written agreement. It's just something that somebody told me. Uh, but lately I've found a lot of moral and ethical disparity, uh, between my owner and my question for you is, do I hang on and wait until I can take over, or is it time to just go ahead and move on?

Oh, I would love to know the moral and ethical, because that sounds very serious.

Is it like crimes are being committed or they're just doing things in a way you wouldn't?

Not as far as the world is concerned. Biblically, a little bit. Essentially, in this industry, I'm not, I'm not about giving people money to give me work or people to give me work, me give them money back. And that has started to happen after 16 years of this company never spending a dollar on marketing at all. We're now paying off a person to quote unquote give us work that, that's just not profitable.

So you're paying a marketer?

Oh no, this is paying, um, essentially a maintenance guy to approve contracts or approved bids that we, that we offer up to them.

Okay, what is that doing for the company? What's the upside?

I will quote, we have to do what we have to do to get work, and that's, that's what I was told this is all about.

However, am I missing something on the moral part of this or the ethical So help me understand. I feel like I'm missing something. So there's a person who's helping you get contracts and they're approving whether the bids are good enough?

No. Essentially, this is a maintenance guy that works for somebody who has the ability to approve or deny estimates for this property. And my company paid that man $7,000 in an attempt to get him to approve more of our estimates.

So it's basically a bribe.

That's a, that's a perfect way to put it. Yeah.

Okay.

Okay.

Yeah.

That makes more sense. I was, I needed that clarity. Okay. So you're bribing, they're, they're bribing this guy.

If we pay you a little money on the side, you'll approve more, more clientele.

I see.

More projects.

Okay. You don't like the way that's being done. That makes sense. Um, the part that I'm really wondering about is you said people are talking about me taking over the company, but there's neither contracts nor paper trail for this. I would need more.

I would need like a date in writing versus just a vibe of like, well, maybe when the time comes, you could take it over.

Can you have that conversation?

We've had the conversation several times. It's loose-ended. There's no definition. There's no timeline. There's no payment. None of that stuff is discussed. And we're talking a company that may value somewhere around $350,000. $1,000.

Okay. If this was a significant other in your life and we're talking about commitment and marriage, you would go, hey, clearly she's not that into you. If she's kicking the tires going, yeah, maybe we'll get married. Ah, we'll see about that.

It might just be a way to keep you, keep you warm, like keep you on, you know, on their side and keep you as an employee. Cuz maybe they know that you don't like the way things are going and you've addressed it.

It sounds like cuz they gave you the answer of, hey, we gotta do what we gotta to do.

That's it. And this has been addressed many times. Um, I feel exactly like that, that they're trying to keep me on a hook for a while until the day comes and then we just cut the line. So that question is, I've already kind of formed up an LLC and before I just start really moving forward with it, my question is, do I maintain what I'm doing now and try to cold start my LLC or do I just jump right into this thing?

Well, yeah, that's a whole different question. Because I, you know, you were— there's income on the line here, right? So how much are you earning now?

It's, it's minimal. I make $60,000 a year.

$60,000 a year. And how quickly do you think you could generate that same profit from you starting up your own business?

I would need about 6, maybe 7 months.

Is there any part of this business that you can do ethically while you're still working for your boss?

Absolutely. Nights and weekends.

Oh, okay.

And it's not in conflict with any contract you signed to, like, a non-compete?

I don't have a non-compete.

Okay.

Okay. That's good.

Then there's nothing wrong with you going, hey, it's, it's my time. When the time is right, I'm gonna go launch this thing on the side. But I don't think in good faith you can continue working for this person because of the soul tax that you're paying right now, the resentment building up, I mean, it's gonna eat you alive. It's a poison that you're drinking every day you stay here, knowing this business is not being run ethically.

Fair.

You're not excited to go to work for a guy who does that.

Who—

you're not aligned in the values. And so, for that reason, I would get out as soon as possible. Even if you go work for someone else in the meantime while you get this thing off the ground.

Do you think you could find someone else to go work for quickly?

I— well, unfortunately, for this company, about 80% of our book of business comes through my phone. It's, it's my contacts, my people, friends, etc., family. So the, the work for me won't stop. It just, it will just go through.

What happens when you divert those leads to your new business versus them and their business hurts even more?

Unfortunately, they're the ones calling me. I'm, I'm not in control of who, you know, whether they choose the old company or the new company.

But you're going to tell them, hey, I actually started my own thing if you're interested.

So if realistically, how many leads do you think would come with you and how much money is that? Like how much could you have on the table within your first 30 to 60 days?

First 30 to 60 days with a cold start, not necessarily having everything together. I could probably, I could probably pull together $25,000 to $40,000 in, in project work pretty quickly.

And that turns into how much in profits? Does that replace your current monthly blow your current income?

Oh, it would absolutely blow my current income out of the water.

I think this is gonna happen faster than you think.

Yeah.

I think you try this for a month or two and realize, oh, okay, I can do this repeatedly.

Yeah.

With stability.

Absolutely.

And cuz here's the thing, you might just flip it. Usually it's the opposite. We say, okay, you know, do this other job while you build the business. But I think you can build the business and if you have extra time, yeah, sure. You could work a side side hustle and fill in gaps, but I don't even think you need to do that. It sounds like you've got it right there. There's no non-compete, so there's nothing ethically here.

Um, you just want to run a business differently.

I'm all for it. And you want to do it the right way, I think that's really, really good, and we're rooting for you.

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01:16:53

Well, it's my favorite time of the show, George, where we get to talk about my favorite budgeting app, which is EveryDollar. And, uh, one of our favorite things is when people share their stories about how EveryDollar is helping them win. As a matter of fact, we have this from a They said, "It's just being able to use EveryDollar and see all the extra we have every single month. It was super motivating. We'd have thousands of dollars just— we'd have thousands of dollars extra and just throw it on the mortgage." And hey, I think that's amazing. And you can do the same thing too. You can take control of your money. You can change your family tree. And you can live like no one else. So start EveryDollar for free today in the App Store or Google Play. Matt is in Phoenix, Arizona. Matt, you are on the line, my friend.

Hey guys, how you doing?

Doing good. What's up?

I am at a weird crossing point. We are on Baby Step 2 and we have no consumer debt left. We just have our mortgage, which is up for $416,000, and we have $75,000 in student loans left at 8%.

Okay.

We are trying to figure out, we have $50,000 in the bank too.

How much? You said $52,000?

What's that?

How much do you have in the bank?

$50,000.

$50,000, okay. We're trying to figure out if we should pay the student loans right now, and the only reason I would be second questioning it in the process of all this is because in our mortgage is, the PMI, uh, high— the mortgage insurance, which is $250 a month. Our student loan payment is $117 a month. So in order to get our PMI insurance off, we would have to pay $70,000, right around there, on our mortgage to drop it off. So my thought process was, do I pay the $70,000 on the mortgage to drop that down so I can roll that extra $250 towards the student loan since it's more than double the student loan payment and then tackle that? Or do I just keep trucking along and knock out the student loans and then keep going from there?

It's a fair question. I mean, you're looking at what you'll receive back. So you're looking at the payment in essence more so than the balance itself of the consumer debt. And I understand that, if I were in your shoes, because really when we're talking about the, the mortgage, that really is a Baby 6 activity, Baby Step 6 activity. And so I would continue on with the student loans because there's $75,000 of these bad boys. You gotta knock this out. The good news is you have $49,000 that you can put towards that cause. And I would totally do that. I would totally do that.

My guess is you, you're knocking out a bunch of student loans in the process, right? Yeah, that's because they're broken up, so you're going to free up a whole lot of payments too.

Yeah, how have you done the calculation?

How much is that, um, as far as interest?

If you paid off the $50,000 of the smallest loans right now, how many payments would that free up? What does that amount to each month?

Um, that I have not calculated.

That's a better calculation, I think, than the minimum payment on the student loans. So I would definitely tackle the student loans. I know the PMI $1,000, but you're going to get there real fast if you knock out these student loans. What's your household income?

Okay, uh, $318,000.

Goodness gracious. Oh yeah, we'll knock out the student loans and the mortgage. Yeah, why not?

Yeah, over the course of this year, why wouldn't that be the goal? To pay the— to be out of Baby Step 2, so $75,000 down, and then we're act like aggressively saving up 3 months of expenses where— and then from then we can aggressively, uh, put extra towards this PMI.

100%. Yeah, we can definitely do it. We take home about anywhere from— I'm on commission, but we take home about $14,000 to $17,000 after taxes every month. Um, so we, we've been aggressive. We paid off $120,000 in the last like 15 months.

Excellent.

So we've been— we got everything, all the consumer stuff out of the way. Um, the only monkey wrench here is in about 12 months my wife is going to, um, we're gonna have her say home and just raise the kids.

Okay.

And so we're going to lose about $68,000 in income. And, um, we would, um, we would— our take-home after taxes would just be around $13,000 to $14,000. Okay. But, um, but then after we put on health insurance and 401(k) and all that stuff, we would only be saving about after, um, bills and utilities and mortgage, we would only be saving about $2,000 to $3,000 a month. That would be the extra play after all the bills is what we would have to left to play with, rather than right now we have about $11,000— $10,000 to $11,000 in play every month.

So you're saying that, uh, that feels like a huge swing, bigger than I thought. So she stays home, obviously your income goes down from $17,000 to $13,000, and then you figure how much for Insurance?

Well, from what I was getting quotes from, like the home family, so it'd be me, my wife, and 2 kids, health insurance full plan was like, it was like $1,800 or $1,900 a month.

Is that marketplace insurance?

So we'll call that $2,000.

Through my work.

Through your work? Okay. Yeah, that's real high for an employer-sponsored healthcare plan.

It feels high. But for now we'll take your word for it. I would look at the high deductible plans too, which will have lower premiums.

Have you looked at those options? Options?

No, I just kind of got some rough numbers from the, um, uh, from the representative.

Okay, I would make sure to look at those high deductible HDHP plans because the premiums will be way lower. Okay, hopefully.

So you're go— you're down $6,000 for the month. So I see what you're saying there. Um, it sounds like the point is just let's try to kick out as much of this debt while we have this high monthly income, and I think that's a great play. You can obviously afford for her to stay home. You can afford those things, but it really just frames what George and I said beautifully, which is, yeah, while you have this money for the next 12 months, let's kick it into high gear.

Knock out consumer debt, get the emergency fund, and get that PMI knocked off. Now we have a whole lot of extra margin.

Yeah. Love it. Thank you for the call. Next up, we have Daniel, who's in Salt Lake City, Utah. Daniel, how can George and I help today?

Hi, yes.

My, uh, my question is, uh, that my business has debt still, but my wife and I personally do not carry any. And so it's kind of a weird spot where we're on Baby Step 4, but the business is still, I guess, technically on Baby Step 2. Who runs the business? Trying to figure out.

Yeah, are you solopreneurs?

Boom, looks like you're in debt, Daniel.

Right, exactly. Exactly, we're in debt. So that's what I thought you were gonna say. We're on Baby Step 2 till the business is paid off then, right? Uh-huh.

How much is left on that?

Yeah, $80,000.

Okay. How quickly could you knock that out if you guys got intense?

It'll be done this year.

Oh, okay. Before 2026 is over, this debt is gone. And then you need to build up an emergency fund?

Yeah, I mean, a business emergency fund. My wife and I have about $70,000 ourselves. Okay.

I would use your personal money to pay off your debt.

Is it just— is it just— are you the only two owners? Is it just you and your wife?

No, I'm a 50% partner, so I have a partner.

I would love to do that, but he doesn't have the same amount of money stored up, and so we wouldn't be able to evenly split paying off the debt personally.

Could you knock out your part and have a signed agreement saying, hey, your part of this debt is done?

Yeah, I guess in theory.

I mean, your name is still on the debt, which is the risky part, right?

That's the whole thing is like the businesses have the debt. Technically, the debt that's left is under his credit.

I— yeah, kind of, uh, why wouldn't you—

he's not interested in using profit to pay off the debt over time?

Oh yeah, no, we're doing that. Like I said, we're gonna have it done probably by the end of the summer.

Um, but, uh, what—

yeah, I mean, it—

yeah, so if you— and how much was it again? Was it $70,000 or was it How much more?

It's $80,000 left in business debt on a credit card and a line of credit.

And it'll be done at the end of the summer if you use the profits from the business?

Uh, yes, that's correct.

I would aim for that. Yeah, I would do that. I would get on the same page with them and go, hey, listen, I don't want this debt hanging around any longer. It's adding risk to our business. If we get real intense, we can knock this thing out. Do you guys have any reserves in the business as well?

Yeah, I mean, well, technically we've got customer deposits.

You know, those are technically not our money yet either until the jobs are produced. Residential painting company.

So, okay, you know, the deposits, you know, yeah, you do need to have some reserves. I think because if you had told me that you were 100% owner of this business, I'd say yeah, pay it off, reach over, do whatever you need to do. But because you're not full owner and there's another guy that's associated with this, yeah, as long as you guys can have this using those profits by the end of the summer, I love that. And, and stack up some reserves. 6 to 12 months is what I would do in Welcome back to The Ramsey Show here in the Fairwinds Credit Union studio, here with George Campbell, myself, Jade we got Ryan, who's in Chattanooga, Tennessee, just down the road. Ryan, you're up next, buddy. How can we help?

Hey guys, thanks for taking the call. My question for you as a 26-year-old man married to my wife that's 24, I'm curious. We put a large portion of our monthly income away into savings and retirement. We have little to no debt. And I'm just curious, how much money is saving too much for retirement versus being able to enjoy your 20s and 30s?

That's a very good question. Can you clarify for us a little bit, two things, what it means when you say little to no debt and just how much are you putting towards retirement and savings?

Yeah, so our debt, my wife has about $4,000 worth of student loans. Um, we across the board do not have any credit card debt. Debt. I do not have any student loans and we just have our mortgage. Both cars are paid off. We put roughly $3,000 a month into investing for our retirement.

Why haven't you paid off the student loan?

We had it set up on an automation that was kind of her spectrum and that's what we're planning on tackling within the next month or so.

Well, how much do you have saved? If you've been putting away $3,000, how much do you have in non-retirement savings right now?

In non-retirement savings? So as for our, I guess, emergency fund, so the $2,000 a month correlates with, I guess, the 401(k) and our Roth IRAs.

I'm interested, how much do you have savings?

So we have roughly about $25,000 in our taxable, I guess, liquid brokerage outside of our initial retirement.

So do you have any, do you have any high-yield savings money? Like just any money in savings?

Uh, well, that, that is, I guess, drawing from the high yields right now. It's uninvested cash in my brokerage account.

Oh, got it. Okay, so it's just sitting there like a money market situation. Okay, cool, cool.

Correct. Correct. Sorry.

All right, so you're wondering, are you saving too much by putting $3,000 away a month into investments?

Correct. When I did my calculation, 11% over the next, you know, 32 years or so till I've hit 60 for retirement. $15 million, which is a great number to have with contributing that much each month.

So the 3K is 11% of your money?

What do you mean by that?

You're saying 11% is the rate of return when you calculate?

Correct.

Oh, got it. What's your household income? Gross household income?

We make roughly $130,000 a year.

Okay, so our Baby Steps go as follows. Baby Step 1, $1,000. You have that. Baby Step 2, pay off all consumer debt, which means the student loans are paid off today, which brings your brokerage down to $21,000. Trackin'?

Correct.

Now we need 3 to 6 months of expenses. What does 6 months of expenses look like for you guys? Is it more than $21,000?

I would say between $20,000 and $25,000.

Great, so we'll call that good. Now we're at Baby Step 4, 15% of household income, which for you guys, 15% is going to be $1,900.

$1,600 a month. $1,625.

So that's the amount you should be putting away, and any extra money then gets diverted to the mortgage and to enjoying your life. So you asked, how much should we— can we use some of this to enjoy our 20s and 30s? Yes, you should be using it. And I think investing $3,000 and putting every dime away into retirement is a bad idea because you have a flat tax. Retire.

And it honestly, I think this is just a mental shift more than a, more than anything, because after you do the $1,600, uh, every single month, if you did another $1,500 extra on the mortgage, it's the same $3,000. You're just splitting it up and doing it in the right ways. So you're still, do you, do you see what I'm saying? So in many ways you're still investing because a mortgage in many ways isn't, it's, it's an investment. It's, it's, it's definitely a forced savings account at best. And so you are investing, you're just doing it in different ways. So it's just a mentality shift there.

Sure.

Okay.

The dollar— the dollars themselves don't really change.

Yeah, I guess there's— I guess it's harder from mentally, from a, I guess, liquid versus illiquid standpoint.

Well, let's talk, let's talk, let's talk through that. Let's talk through that because it is worth talking through that. We have found that it sounds like your goal is to build wealth, right?

Correct.

Yes. We've done the largest study of millionaires. And one of the things that we found is there's two, there's two key portions of this. Number one is these people, they invest in their 401(k). That's where they build the majority of their worth. It's not they've got all this real estate. They don't have these crazy— no, they invest in their employee-sponsored accounts. That's what they do. And then the other thing that they do is they pay off their home mortgage. Mortgage, and they do it relatively quickly. And so if you can do those two things, combined effort, that is the ticket. That's what we have found works time and time and time again for millions of people. And you're, you're right there. Like I said, the amount that you're putting towards savings doesn't change. You're just not investing at all. So we're creating diversification in many ways.

You have a forced savings plan by putting it into that mortgage, paying it off, having all that equity.

Mm-hmm.

And that's exactly what my wife and I did, and we are very much, I mean, you guys are earlier than we even got started. We had a paid-off home in our early 30s, became Baby Steps millionaires in our early 30s. You guys are gonna get there even faster at the rate you're going. But I would caution you to slow down a bit, move from intensity to intentionality once you're out of Baby Step 3 and you begin to invest. Because I don't want you to look back and go, oh my gosh, we have kids now, we're not gonna, we didn't get to do all those trips we wanted to do, life got crazy and chaotic and complicated. So I would allocate in your budget, budget money for vacations and trips and some little luxuries. You guys have earned it. You've worked your tails off at 26 and 24 to be soon to be debt-free as soon as you're off this call.

Yeah, I appreciate it. It is, it is nice to know that percentage threshold of, you know, how can I still be secured for the future but also enjoy today. So I appreciate it.

If you just do 15% until the mortgage is paid off, you're going to have so much in retirement. And by the way, once the mortgage is paid off, You can ratchet that up to 20, 30, 40, 50%, but make sure that you're also giving and spending. You gotta have all three in check, investing, saving, giving, spending. So all of those in check, 15% investing, 10% giving, especially if you're a person of faith, and then you can enjoy it after all the bills are paid. And that's where the EveryDollar budget comes in. It forces me to go, "Oh yeah, I need to put money away for that vacation." So we don't go, Wait, this savings account is just for life. No, no, no, you earmarked it for vacation.

Yeah.

So use it.

One of the things that kind of makes me sad is we can really get into the, the, the Baby Step 2 mode, that just gazelle intensity mode, because it feels good. We're making accomplishments, we're paying off debt, we're saving really quickly, and it's like if that mentality continues to follow you, you never really enjoy the fruit of the Baby Steps. The whole point is to really rush it so you can get out of those painful periods, get outta Baby Step 2, get outta Baby Step 3. But man, once once you're in 4, 5, and 6 and the house is starting to come down and everything is really, you know, starting to take shape, you're investing your 15%, you've got to live a little.

Live like no one else.

You've got to. So later.

You can live like no one else and give like no one else. And, you know, I got a DM the other day. They went, hey, can I buy this fancy coffee machine? I know you like coffee. And I was like, well, where are you guys at financially? They go, well, we're millionaires. We have a great income, no debt. Get the coffee machine.

Yes.

And it feels like you're doing a bad thing because you're spending $2,000, which feels insane. You're right, it is insane if you're broke. Yeah, but if you have the money, it's a small part of your world and it increases your quality of life.

Do it. And what else makes you feel better is when you know you're generous, you know that you're also giving a generous portion of your money. You feel great when you then go and spend some on yourself and on your family and on the things that you value. It is a very delicate balance. Give, save, spend. You gotta do all three.

Hey guys, Dave Ramsey here. Every day on this show, we help people work through real money problems and figure out what to do next. Now you can get that same kind of help anytime with Ask Ramsey. Ask your money question and get answers built on Ramsey principles we use on the show. Whether you're making a decision or just want something explained, Ask Ramsey is here to to help. It's fast, simple, and free to use. Go to RamseySolutions.com and try Ask Ramsey today. That's RamseySolutions.com.

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Today's question comes from Evan in Iowa. I'm a husband and father of two young children currently in Baby Step "Step 2: I do not have term life insurance and neither does my wife. While we were looking at our monthly budget, the subject came up of when is the right time to get life insurance. Is this a financial priority while we are paying off debt or should we hold off until we are debt-free and have our emergency fund in place?" Great question!

Controversh!

And the beautiful answer is that you need term life insurance regardless of what Baby Step you are on. As soon as anybody relies on your income, young children, a wife, even when you're just young and healthy, it's a good time to lock it in.

It's a great— because it's cheaper, number one.

It's so cheap. And so absolutely, both of you need to get term life. You need 10 to 12 times your annual incomes on a, you know, 20, 25-year term, and you will find that it is quite affordable. And if you're a stay-at-home spouse, you definitely need term life insurance to the tune of at least half a million. I like three-quarters of $1 million.

Well, we had a call about that earlier. I think it was maybe our first call today. And it really is that 10 to 12 times number is so important because ideally what you want for anybody who's dependent on your income, if you should go, because we're all going to get beamed up at some point, but if you should go earlier than expected, you want that person who's left behind to not have to worry about, because many, many stay-at-home moms, they've never worked in the workforce.

Yeah. And that was her situation. She had, you know, some teens at home. She was stay-at-home, hadn't worked in a long, long, long time. And she had $500,000 payout, which is, you're going, wow, that's life-changing money. Sure, but it's not, I never need to work again money. And so if he had had 10 to 12 times his income in term life, he would've had $1.4 to $1.6 million.

And she could have then drawn the exact amount of paycheck.

She could have invested that amount. The market would've spit off enough income for her to cover all of her expenses. Expenses without having to worry about when is this money going to run out. And they were renting.

Yes, that's right.

So think about that. 10 to 12 times your income invested, your family's covered. And so while they're grieving your loss, at least they're not struggling financially, figuring out what's next. So get term life in place. Zander is the place we've been recommending for decades now. I just got an extra term life policy.

You do 15?

Well, now that I got young kids and, you know, dogs that are too expensive, I just felt better. It was like, I'll sleep better at night. I might sleep with one eye open now because I might be— I'm more dead than alive. But I know my family is going to be taken care of and Whitney's not going to be, you know, yelling at me. Hopefully, hopefully looking up, hopefully looking up, yelling at me.

If she's looking down, there's a problem.

She hates when I talk about it. She is the person who's like, I don't even want to think about it. Well, me either.

And you bring up a good point because I think a lot of people avoid these types of discussions, life insurance, wills because it is a mortality issue. And it's like, ew, I don't want to think about the worst happening.

Yeah.

But it really is a way to love your family well. And here's the good news.

I hope you never have to use it and it was just money well spent to transfer the risk to the insurance company.

Yeah, sure.

That's the goal is that the policy runs out after 20 or 25 years. You've been following the Baby Steps. You got a paid-for house at the end of that.

Mm-hmm.

You've been investing for a couple of decades. So your nest egg has caused you to be self-insured.

Yeah. That's the, that's the goal. That's what you want to get to.

Exactly. So go check it out. Zander.com is the place to go. Get this done. Do not wait.

Don't wait. Eric is in Kansas City, Missouri. Hi, Eric. How can George and I help out today?

How's it going?

Good.

I am recently retired at 57, forced out at age by my job. I have a 401(k) that I am unsure what to do with it because we can no longer contribute to it, but I don't want to draw from it either. So I'm trying to figure out how to maximize maximize my gain with it.

Yeah, well, you could do a direct transfer rollover and roll it into an IRA, and I would suggest maybe getting with a SmartVestor Pro to help you do that. And you can find those at ramsaysolutions.com. But that's easy to do. My question is, what do you plan to do with your time? It sounds like you weren't ready to retire yet.

Well, part of it's medical, part of it was my age. So I mean, I make enough money right now through my retirement and disability through the VA that I don't need to draw off of my—

when you say retirement, what is your current income coming from now?

I have— I get about $7,000 a month right now. I get $3,000 from my job that I retired from, like a pension. I get—

yeah.

Money?

Yes.

Okay, another $4,000 from disability from the VA?

Yes.

Okay, and so you're saying I don't need to touch the 401(k) money but I want it to grow? So absolutely, I would do what Jade said, do a direct rollover. So you don't want to see that money, it should not pass through your bank account. They will just transfer directly over to an IRA, which is a non-employer-sponsored retirement account, and that way you have all of the options in the world, way more than you even had in that 401(k).

401(k).

But the key is, if it's traditional, you want to make sure it's rolled over to a traditional IRA. And if it's Roth, you want to make that portion transfer to a Roth IRA. That way, you're not having any tax implications.

How much is in that 401(k), Eric?

Uh, it's only $400,000.

Only $400,000?

That's a lot of money, my guy. But in Eric's case, yeah.

I feel like it's not enough.

Well, you know, you're not using it, which is good. And I love George's point. It sounds like it's traditional money, so it is going into a traditional IRA. But depending on what Baby Step you're in, I would be interested in over time moving that to Roth funds if possible. And that's something else that the SmartVestor Pro could help you with, because if you're not touching this money and it truly is for posterity, then you want that to be tax-free growth. You want them to not have to pay taxes on that money when it's transferred to them and when they have the ability to access that.

Can I give you some mind-blowing math? Eric?

Yes, sir.

So based on what the stock market has actually done over, you know, the last several, several decades since 1950, we've seen a 10 to 12% average annual return. And so there's something called the rule of 72, and it's simple. You divide 72 by the annual rate of return. It tells you how quickly your money will double. So at a 10% rate of return, your money would double every 7.2 years. So if you're doing the math at your age, at 64, if you just leave that alone invested, that $400K turns into $864,000, $1.6 million by 71, $3.2 million by the age of 77.

That's what I want to hear.

Yeah, there you go. And that's if you never add to it. Like you mentioned, you, you are fine on your own with your disability income and your pension income. So if you continue to live on less than you make and let that grow, that is generational wealth.

And that's where the transfer of Roth really, really matters for for you. Plus, you don't want to have retired minimum distributions if you don't need it, right?

So that SmartVestor Pro can help you also. What was that?

I said, yeah, because currently, you know, I would like to also contribute more into, you know, my investment instead of letting it just ride, because I've got money in savings that's not making any money, you know what I mean?

Yeah, you can invest that that too. So, so that SmartVestor Pro will walk you through it. And I would also ask them about Roth conversions, because like Jade's saying, if you can convert those strategically— so you could do a portion each year moving from traditional to Roth, you pay some taxes. Doing it all at once is going to bump you way up in the tax brackets and cause you to have a big tax bill. And so that SmartVestor Pro can walk you through it strategically so that that money is then growing tax-free the rest of your life and passed on to your heirs tax-free, which is going to be pretty cool for somebody in your life one day.

Thank you.

Does that make, does that make a lot of sense for you, Eric?

Yes.

Okay, good, good, good. Is it just, and is it just you, Eric, or do you have a wife, kids? Is there anybody else? It's just you. So what, what do you plan on doing with that $3.2 million? I mean, what's, what, what do you think you're feel who's the beneficiary of that?

I try to take care of my, my sisters and my mom.

Okay, I love that, man. Yeah, you are. That's a— it's a really good point, George. You know, um, he's in such a great position, and there's many people who, even if, even if you are drawing off your retirement, there's still going to be a large portion there, and you do want to make sure that you're setting it up as a legacy piece so that whoever is is inheriting that is not inheriting a major tax burden.

Yeah, that's where a good financial advisor is worth every penny. So if you want a SmartVestor Pro to help you think strategically about whatever it is— wealth, estate planning, tax planning— you can go to RamseySolutions.com and click on SmartVestor.

Listen, your home is your most expensive asset, and now you're ready to sell fast and for a lot of money. But in this wackadoodle real estate market, one mistake could cost you tens of thousands of dollars. Here's the deal. This ain't amateur hour. You need a pro in your corner, someone who knows how to price your home right, market it well, and negotiate the best deal. That's where a Ramsey Trusted Real Estate Agent comes in. To find one near you, go to ramseysolutions.com/agent. That's ramseysolutions.com/agent.

Alrighty, guys. It's May and the Ramsey Cash Giveaway is officially here. You can enter every single day from May 1st to May 31st. There's gonna be one grand prize winner who's gonna get 10 Gs, $10,000.

10 bands.

10 bands. Yes. Also bands. Plus there will be one $500 weekly winner, which is pretty legit. And the good news is you can enter daily to increase your chances of winning. So multiple times, once a a day. Plus, be sure to check out our sale going on right now. Kick off your summer with books and assessments for just $12. That's pretty darn good. Go to ramseysolutions.com/giveaway now to enter. No purchase is necessary in order to win. All right, Amy in the city I was born, Spokane, Washington. What's going on, Amy? How can George and I help?

Hi, thank you for taking my call. I'm calling because my husband said that if I could get The Ramsey Show to approve of our house build, we could move forward with it. So no pressure or anything. My entire future is just riding on this. No, but we're in a pretty good place.

I hope I'm not a dream killer. I've been known to be a dream killer, to be fair.

Is he anywhere listening? Is he with a glass on the door somewhere listening in?

You know what? He rides bikes and he is currently listening to the show in his AirPods on a bike ride.

Okay.

Okay.

Okay, shout out, shout out wherever you are on your bike. We're gonna do our best to be fair.

I want to get you there. I want, I want this to be a yes. So walk us through the predicament.

And we're both— I just want to start with, we're both very much on the same page. We're just like, we want to be strategic and make sure this is the right choice for our family. And so absolutely, I'll give you just a little bit of an idea of who we are. So we're 36 years old. We've been married for 12 years. We're actually— Spokane is the closest town to us, but we're in a very desired ski town nearby. And we own a house. We have no debt. We've paid off our house. We took Financial Peace University right when we got married, and really it's been fantastic for our life.

Awesome.

That's incredible at 36 years old. 6 years old.

It feels really good. It really does. And we, we just built a, um, apartment above a garage on the same property that we live in, in this house right now. Um, and so we're gonna— like, our desire is to build a house because we have a pretty big piece of property on this same property, so it's paid for. and we would then have our house and the rental as income, or, and the apartment rental as income.

Got it.

And so, um, we're just trying to figure out, like, my husband's pretty hesitant to go back into any kind of debt, which I understand. It's been so great. I think we paid off our house about 4 years ago, and, um, so we're just going I'm wondering, do we wait until we have the cash on hand? Or being that I'm pregnant with our third and I don't want our baby sleeping in a closet, do we build the house that will function for our family better than the one that we currently live in? And we don't want to sell our house because it will make really good income.

Okay. Well, how much is it going to cost to build this house?

Um, it's probably about a million.

Okay, and what does that get you? What does a million get you? Is this like a 4-bedroom house? Like, what does it get?

Yep, 4-bedroom. Um, we— like I said, D-Town, it costs quite a bit to build here. Um, and I think a million might be being a, you know, between $1 and $1.2 for the plan that we have. But yeah, it's a 4-bedroom 3 bath.

Okay, 4/3. And what do you have saved so far towards this, not including emergency fund? Yeah, not retirement, you know the deal.

So we'll just give you kind of our, like, cash on hand is $500, um, and that's, um, that's kind of just in the bank right now because we were needing to pull out a lot to build this current apartment that I was talking about.

Okay.

And then in our Roth 401(k), we have, um, about $450,000. And then our joint account— that, that— so the Roth, you know, that's our retirement. We can't—

right, that's off the table. Uh-huh.

Yeah. So $275,000 right now. And our current property is valued. We don't really know because we just built this, but I would say probably $1.5 million.

How much do you guys make? What do you take home every month? Um, well, because that's really what this— that's really what this is all riding on. Because I can tell you right now, if you tell me, hey, I'm looking to do a house for $1.2 million, and I just plug this in the Ramsey Solutions, uh, mortgage calculator calculator, if you put the $500,000 cash down on a 15-year fixed at, I'll put in 5.6 for now. I don't have it on my screen what the current rates are, but that's gonna put the payment around $7,000 a month. So as long as this is no more than 25%, you're on the right track in my, unless you say something crazy in the next few minutes.

Yeah.

Well, what is your average take-home We own a business and we, um, I would say about— it changes year to year, but I'd say about $250,000. Okay.

Is there annual income?

Yeah.

Okay, got it.

Because yeah, I need you to be taken home.

That puts you at— my guess is you're probably taking home around $12,000 to $14,000 a month?

Well, we pay ourselves once a year because it's a seasonal business. Uh-huh.

So what do you pay yourselves? $250K? We're just trying to find out your after-tax monthly income to figure out if this mortgage is gonna make sense because I'm not—

For sure.

If you, you know, I understand wanting to pay cash. It's not a sin if you go back to Baby Step 6 for a season with the intentionality of we're going to pay this off pretty aggressively, quickly to get back to Baby Step 7.

Like our plan would be 5 years.

Well, if you pay off, if you say, hey, we, we pay ourselves $250,000 cash in our pocket and we split it over 12 months, so it's around $21,000 a month. Um, it's getting, it's getting you close. It's getting you close, but that mortgage is still creeping up, right?

But then what would you guys say if, if our house— you know, our house would rent for about $4,500 a month and the apartment for about $2,500.

$4,500 and $2,500.

You can rent out both separately.

Well, separately, yeah, you're right.

That I think that gets you there because that's now considered income.

Now there's still some, you know, variables with that, so you don't want to count it 100% because you've got vacancy maintenance, repairs, tenant issues, all of that is going to play a part. But I feel like you guys are thinking about this pretty clearly. The only concern is you'd have the majority of your net worth in real estate. So that's the only thing to think about if you have $450K in retirement. But I think long-term, you guys are 36, so over time your retirement is going to surpass your home. And the other thing to think about is, is this the same property? If you were to sell one day, could you sell them separately? Is the, is the land big enough?

Yeah.

Okay, great.

Okay, so I just could— and go ahead, go ahead.

Oh no, I was just saying like that's definitely been a huge— and there's more land that we could— I mean, if we wanted to divide off some, we could just sell it as property too.

You could like parcel it out and just sell pieces of it.

Okay, so if you tell me, if I, if I hear these numbers right, which I think I did, one rental is $4,500, the other one is $2,500.

Yeah.

So that's another $84,000 a year. And that gets you there.

Comparable.

If you keep that and it's consistent, that gets you to just about $2,800 or $28,000 a month, which is right where you'd want to be for this mortgage. But what George said is very critical. Usually we would not tell somebody— it's the same as somebody said, I can buy a house, but as long as I have somebody living in the rooms, right, to make the mortgage. For you guys, that's the critical part on this. That $84,000 is really dependent on, is this person going to be dependable month after month?

And will this business income be dependable? You got to think about that too. But you got a green light from us if you You check all those boxes. Congratulations.

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01:57:42

Our Ramsey Show scripture and quote of the day is Proverbs Proverbs 22:26-27. It says, do not be one who shakes hands in pledge or puts up security for debts. If you have nothing with which to pay, why should your bed be taken from under you? Mm.

Shots fired.

Shots fired for sure. Doug Larson said, people are living longer than ever before, a phenomenon undoubtedly made necessary by the 30-year mortgage.

That's hilarious.

Dang, 30 years though. That's a short lifespan.

Doug, come on, Doug, come on, Doug. I mean, he lived a good long life there based on the timeline.

Yeah, that's for sure. We got Damon in Arkansas. Damon, how can we help today?

Uh, yes, hello. Thank you for taking my call. Um, I recently, uh, got done paying off my student loans. I, I didn't graduate. I didn't know what I wanted to do with my life, but, uh, I'm, I'm at a point now where I'm I'm the sole provider for me, my wife, and our 4 kids. We have 2 children who have been diagnosed with autism that'll— she has to stay at home with them. So again, I'm the sole provider, but I have a car note for $15,000. Then I have my mortgage for— I think I have $150,000. $35,000 left on there. Should I go back to school? Should I—

What are you doing now?

I work in a factory.

What do you make?

$17 an hour.

Okay, so that's about $35,000 a year. Is that full-time, 40 hours a week?

Yes.

And what did you go to school for originally that you didn't finish?

I was a physics major.

Okay. So what would you go back to school for today if you were to choose a different career path?

I still don't know. I see a lot of people in this factory have degrees that I would have not even considered would have gotten them their positions, but it almost feels like I just need a degree in anything.

Well, I don't want you to get a degree for the sake of getting a degree, and then you're back where you are going, okay, now what? Nobody handed me a job all of a sudden. So I want you to have some aim and purpose with this, and we can help with that. We'll send you our friend Ken Coleman's book, Find the Work You're Wired to Do. It has the Get Clear career assessment inside, and I think it'll help point you in the right direction. But in the meantime, I mean, $17 an hour you can make doing just about anything. And if you're handy and you can go into the trades, there's a lot of money to be made there. You could triple your income within a couple —years.

Yeah, because that, that does bring up the bigger question, which is whether you went in trades, whether you needed certificates, whether you needed a degree. What, what would be the plan in your mind to pay for this? Because George and I definitely don't want you to go further into debt, uh, for education. We value education, we just don't want you to go into debt for it. So what do you think a plan could look like?

I would like to not have any debt at all, uh, at some point, with having my car paid off and getting my mortgage paid off. Ultimately, I wanna have no debt. I think— How are you getting by right now?

I'm curious, Damon, you're making $35K a year. You got the car payment, you got the mortgage, you got 4 kids, a stay-at-home spouse. Oh yeah. How have you been surviving?

It is a struggle every month, man. Every month, it, I mean, we have a nothing-on-paper budget. But essentially we just have, well, our bills that we have to pay, and then whatever is left over, you know, is our food, our gas. We make— I make not enough to have anything left over at the end of the month.

But you're able to cover all the bills, just nothing more? You're not going into debt to cover any bills? Yes. Wow, that's impressive. I just want to applaud you for making all this work even without a budget, which I encourage you to make one, and I'm gonna hook you up with every Every Dollar, which will give you that plan as well as the Get Clear Career Assessment.

Now, how were you able to pay off the student loans on this?

I had a different job. I was getting different hours and we moved to this town where I'm at now and I lost that job and now this is— I just, we had some residual income left over that that we decided like, okay, you know, I may be able to go back to college and get a better income. Let's just toss it towards these— what's left of my student loans. I've been paying on them for a decade.

What were you making before and what type of work were you doing?

Uh, I was in a tipped position, so it's tough to say. Uh, made $55,000 in 2025. Yes, 2024. Excuse me. And I was a cage cashier. I paid people jackpots. Usually people were pretty happy to see me.

Oh, okay. Well, the good news is you've seen a higher earning potential. Like you've seen, okay, I know I can go out in the world and make $55,000. I would just apply that. Honestly, if I were you, I might just get curious and start looking online and just start applying for things. You can do that for free, right? And start, Ken Coleman would say to use your proximity. Proximity and see who you know. Ask around, ask your friends. I'd make a list. My goal tonight would be I'd make a list of 10 to 15 people that I could reach out to and say, you know, what are you doing? Have you heard anything? Is there anybody hiring in what you're doing? And just start making some phone calls and start trying to make some connections and just see what's going on in your group and your friend group and your church group. Are people working places where they need employees? And that would be a great way just to get started, just to see what can I pull from? And who knows, you could end up landing something where you're making a little bit more and that could lead to the next step while you're figuring out the work that you're actually wired to do here.

Very, very good question. Hang on the line.

We'll send you that assessment and EveryDollar, Damon.

All right. Let's go to Caleb, who's in Fort Bragg, North Carolina. Hey Caleb, how can George and I help real quick?

Hi, how you guys doing? We're doing good.

We're right up against the clock. How can we help? Help you.

Hi, so I am currently on Baby Step 2, but I'm going to be out of Baby Step 2 in about 2 and a half months. Uh, when I get out of it, I did some budgeting. I realized I'm gonna have about $2,700 every single month just for free. Nice. And my expenses are going to be like— my 6-month emergency fund is literally going to be less than Baby Step 1. And so I do need to buy a car, and I'm looking to buy a car, and obviously Obviously my emergency fund's gonna change when I have to buy insurance. So my question is, one, should I buy a brand new car or a piece of crap? And then two, how much should my emergency fund be since my expenses are so low?

Yeah, very good question. First one is, I love that you're gonna free up that much margin. What is so urgent that you need a new car right away? Because if I could hold off on the new car and save the emergency fund first. I would do the emergency fund first. And you want to build your emergency fund based on your current or very quickly foreseeable monthly expenses. It's a bare bones budget. So this is if I took out all the bells and whistles of my budget that aren't necessity, and I said, okay, it's rent, it's transportation, it's insurances, it's daycare, all those things that if you hit an emergency situation, maybe you lost your job, maybe there is a diagnosis. Obviously, there'd be certain niceties you'd probably cut away and you'd keep things down to bare bones. So 3 to 6 months is what I'd aim for. If you know you need a car, I'd save up the 3 months, do the car, and then come back and do the 6 months. But if the car is really just something that's a nice-to-have, George, I would go ham on the 6 months since it's just you, and then I would start to save up for the car that you want.

And I would, I would not go, hey, it's either going to be the worst car I've ever seen or the nicest car I've ever seen. Get something reasonable. What is it? What is your income?

My income right now is about $4,500 a year.

$45,000? Yeah, $45,000. Thank God. I was like, goodness gracious, man, what are they paying you over there? Okay, so $45 grand a year. You're single? Yes. Is this the only thing with wheels and motors in your life? Is this one car?

Yeah, I don't have a car currently.

Okay, cool. So you want no more than $20K, and for a guy your age, I think $20K is even the upper upper upper limit. I might shoot for something more like in the $15,000 range. That'll just get you from A to B. It's decent. It's used. Do not go buy a new car. Don't go to the dealership because they're going to try to get you into a giant payment and go, "Man, you can get the brand new one for just a little bit more. What kind of payment you looking for?" You're paying cash. You're buying used. I like the idea of a $10,000 emergency fund, for sure.

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Well, George, it's been fun, but it's It's also over. Aw. I'm sorry. Hey, remember, there's ultimately only one way to financial peace, and that is to walk daily with the Prince of Peace, Christ Jesus.