Transcript of If You Want Wealth Do What Wealthy People Do

Brought to you by the EveryDollar app. Start budgeting for free today. Normal is broke and common sense is weird, so we're here to help you transform your life. From the Ramsey Network and the Fairwinds Credit Union studios, this is the Ramsey Show. Rachel Cruz, Ramsey personality, number one bestselling author, co-host of Smart Money Happy Hour. My daughter is my co-host today. The phone number here is 888-825-5225. Robert is in Houston. Hey Robert, how are you?

Hi Robert, uh, hi Dave. I'm doing good. How are you doing?

Better than I deserve, sir. What's up in your world?

Well, me and my wife are $250,000 in debt basically on our business. Oh, we were thinking on shut down our business because we've been so frustrated. We don't have enough sales, and we're kind of scared because we basically— we're borrowing money from my wife's father, and we're scared that if we close our business, we won't have any money for next month.

What kind of business is it, Robert?

Uh, well, we own a food trailer dealership. So basically, my, my wife's father, uh, manufactures them, and we, we Uh, we are just the dealership. We just sell them to the, to the people that want to start their own business.

Okay. And who do you owe the $250,000 for?

So basically $200,000 are for, uh, inventory, basically trailers that my father-in-law has built for, for us. And just, um, we wouldn't be able to pay it back. And then, uh, the other $50,000 has been just $30,000 in car loan and $20,000 in personal and credit card debt.

Okay. So that's not business. That was just a car you couldn't afford.

Yeah. Basically the car that we have is, uh, it's a truck that we use to, to tow those trailers and deliver them because we thought that will be profitable if we do ourselves the deliveries.

How many trailers do you have on the lot right now?

I have 2 right now and I have another extra 2 that are getting built.

Are they being built custom for someone?

Yes, they are already sold.

Okay, and the 2 that are on the lot are not sold?

Uh, not.

So you've got $100,000 apiece in those 2?

Um, I'll say about 60 a piece. Uh, both, both of them.

One of them is, uh, it's, uh, so where does 200 come from if you have two at 60? I don't understand.

Uh, I, I, I think maybe we've been living on a life that we couldn't afford.

I mean, who loaned you the money?

My wife's father. So basically he's been putting the money from his pocket to build them.

Did he start building them before you had the dealership?

Ah, yes, yes.

How was he selling them back then?

He was working with another company that was selling them for another, for another dealership.

But if you sold off, if you, if you complete the 2 transactions you've got on the line and you sell off the 2 that you've got he gets most of his money back.

Yes, but I—

and then you don't have a job.

Yeah, I have to also get some money to equip them, to those trailers. So I'll say on profit, I'll probably will be getting around $40,000 on the 4 trailers that I have. Basically on inventory.

Yeah, but let's pretend that we're just trying to get your father-in-law whole by selling the 4 trailers off, the 2 in production and the 2 on the lot, and he gets all of his money that way. You don't get any money out of those, and then you sell off the truck and you get a job. He's gotten out, you're out of the business. You're not making money in this business, you're losing money, right?

Yes, correct.

So why would you keep doing it?

Oh, I think that me and my wife, it's the only thing that we've been doing.

Yeah, but you're not making money. Yeah. Whatever you've been doing that isn't working doesn't matter.

It's basically that theory of you're just, you're comfortable where you are because it's all you know. And even though it's not smart, it's just you continue to stay because it's the only thing you know, right, Robert? So it is, it's the uncomfortable reality of you're going to have to go learn and do something new. In order to make money. Yeah, because as we continue pushing on this, it's just—

it may be worth sitting down with your father-in-law and asking him if he sees a better way to run your business, because I don't know what you're doing wrong. I don't know if there's enough volume in food truck trailers or not. I don't know enough about that business. It doesn't sound like you're moving enough units to make a living though.

Correct.

Yeah, and I don't—

I don't—

and just because he needs a dealer doesn't mean you need to be in business losing money. And just because you've you've only done this and you don't know how to do anything else yet doesn't mean you need to be in business losing money. You could be at FedEx stacking boxes and making more money than losing money and not have all this debt. Yeah. And then figure out what you want to do from there.

Well, right now, uh, we wanted to get rid of our inventory. We were discussing that, uh, and just stop, stop our business. And, and we wanted to also get rid of, uh, our, of the, of, of the truck. Yeah, because it's almost $1,000.

If you sell the 4 trailers at a profit and, and you use all of that money to clear the debt with your father-in-law and you sell the truck, you're back at even about, aren't you?

Uh, right now the truck is worth around $11,000 because I put a lot of miles on it. A lot.

Okay, well then you're probably not gonna be, be even on that. But dude, you have to go get get a career now, or you're gonna make money. And you got to be thinking about what that's gonna be, because this business is not operating at a profit. Businesses have to operate at a profit, or they don't get to hang around. That's a cold, hard reality. And you're just not— there's— I don't know enough about that to tell you how to fix it, but it doesn't sound like you don't think it's gonna be fixed. So you can't just sit there and rearrange the deck chairs on the Titanic, dude. I mean, you've got to do something else. And so we gotta figure out what we're doing and let your father-in-law know I'm gonna give you all the money from these 4 trailers to get you out as whole as I possibly, get you as close to what I owe you as possible. And then I'm gonna go get a job and get rid of this stupid truck that has eaten my lunch. And you know, then I'm gonna start making money for my family and moving on.

That's where I would be. But it sounds like you've got— the big thing is this, okay? There's two real problems you're facing, and I know because I've been there myself. I closed a business and went bankrupt in my 20s, alright? Number one, your dream is dying. You had this dream that this was gonna be this wonderful thing, you're gonna own your own business, America the Beautiful, the free enterprise system, and you were gonna get rich, and that dream has died, and it hurts. And you need to grieve the death of the business. Number 2, you're embarrassed in front of your father-in-law, 'cause he's over there making trailers and you can't make a living selling 'em. And he feels like he's a good business guy and he's helped you and, you know, he's barely even gonna get all of his money back. Even if he doesn't get it all back, it's gonna be close. That's embarrassing. And those are feelings that I have had. They're not fun feelings. But riding the Titanic all the way to the bottom of the ocean is also worse. So make a call, dude. When I started, I had great ideas and I knew how to serve people, but I didn't have systems in place yet.

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Monique is in Philadelphia. Hi, Monique.

Hi, Mike, how are you?

Hi, how are you?

Better than I deserve.

What's up? Hi, so I'm new to Baby Steps 4, 5, and 6. I feel like it's taken me quite some time to get here. And so I'm super excited. However, I have a baby due next month and doing Baby Step 4, Um, with the 15% of my retirement and everything, it seems really scary with, um, upcoming expenses that I know will take effect, um, once my maternity leave is up. So I guess I'm just looking, I don't know if I'm, my mindset is wrong or my budget is incorrect, but I just need some encouragement or someone to walk me through.

Are you going to be paid while you're on maternity leave, Monique?

Yes, yes, yes.

But you're just talking about like after maternity leave, the daycare kicks in and whoa.

Yeah. Yes.

Yeah.

Yeah. And just, um, affording that 15% along with, you know, the rest of my, um, budget.

Yeah.

Well, I mean, just lay your budget out. You can look at it. You know what the daycare is going to cost already, don't you?

Yes.

Okay.

And you've got it, you know, if you have no payments but a house payment, you should be able to do daycare and 15%. In most budgets.

I have, I have 2 other children as well that are in daycare. Yeah, I still have 3 kids in daycare.

And while you had that, you were already reducing debt. How much debt have you paid off?

Um, I've been debt-free for a little over a year now. Well, a year and a half, but I paid off like $80,000.

Good for you. Are you single?

I'm engaged.

Okay, when are you getting married?

Um, we plan on getting married next year.

Why?

Why? Um, so it's, it's more so me. I'm— I was married before.

Um, but you have a baby and everything. I'm sorry, you have a baby? Yeah, I assume with him. Yeah, I mean, you kind of already made these decisions.

Yes. Um, so my fiancé wants an actual wedding and— when? Yeah.

And so we're grown-ups with 3 kids.

Um, so the wedding is coming, but we plan for it to be early next year.

I would do a party early next year and get married the next 20 minutes. You are in an extremely legal and financially vulnerable situation, my good friend. I am scared for you. And you're worried about putting 15% away in retirement and you're not even married and you have 3 kids. Yeah, this is very, very important that you guys get this solidified. I would be in the pastor's or the judge's office this weekend and we'll have a party next spring. I don't want you hanging out there over the edge of this cliff anymore. You're scaring me to death.

I understand, because he is the guy you want to marry, correct?

Yes.

Yeah, you're making babies with him.

I got back from deployment and I found out I was pregnant within like 2 or 3 weeks after that, so it was a shock to me.

Um, and wait, I'm just curious, how much do you make a year, Monique?

So I make, I have 3 streams of income, but my main job is $81,000, um, because I'm part-time military. Okay. I make $12,000 a year from that. And then I do receive child support, um, as well. And that comes out to being like $24,000 a year.

Okay. And let me ask, does that include the 15% that is strained in your budget? That is your money only. You're not including him.

Correct. The 15%—

no wonder you're strained. Yeah, you're a single mom with 3 kids. Yeah, that would be straining.

How much does he make a year?

He makes, um, well, when he did his taxes, it came out to being like $36,000 or so.

What does he do?

So he works for a junk removal company. He's like the sole employee. Um, but she's about to take over. Um, okay. It's, it's very lucrative business where we live.

Well, not for him.

What will it be when he takes over?

Yeah.

What will he be making?

Um, so it would be over, well, they've made a little over $200,000. I'm not sure what his boss brings home. All we know is like he's gone on vacation every week.

So I can only assume. So here's the thing, hun. Here's the thing, okay? Yeah. You call me worried about ability to put away 15% because you're in an untenable situation and you're very vulnerable and hanging over the edge of a cliff. This all is solved the day you get married and you combine your incomes, which is what should happen for this child. It's what should happen for you, and it's what should happen by Saturday. And then all of a sudden you have an income up over $100,000. The two of us are doing a budget together because we're already playing house. House. So the house, you know, nothing else changes. And so we're now doing a budget together like grown-up married people instead of two roommates. And you've got all the responsibility of three kids, one of which is his, right?

Correct.

Okay, so he needs to marry you Friday. I'm gonna come get him. I'm serious. This is not good for you, my daughter. You ever heard of a shotgun wedding? I got a shotgun. Okay, so here's what we're gonna do. We're gonna, we're gonna line this up. This is serious time. This is really, really good. It's the right thing for everyone involved. There is no excuse for "I want a big wedding." That ship sailed when you were 19, kid, okay? You're not playing in that world anymore. Now you're playing in the real grown-up world where we have taxes and we have trying to hand over— Take care. —business from your boss. You got daycare coming out your ears. And no wonder you can't save 15%. So no, yeah, you need to take your child support, your income, and his new fabulous income, put it all together, and make an EveryDollar budget because you got married Friday together. And then let's go build a life together because that's what all the data tells us is how you win. The data tells us that if you persist in this methodology, you're going to have one-tenth of the net worth of your married friend.

1/10. Okay, it doesn't work. That's why I'm, for your sake, passionate about this. And I want you to win. I want you to have a good life. And the data says those that shack up, the lady has 1/10 at 35 years old of the net worth of her married friend.

And all the risk.

I mean, honestly, she's the one at risk.

The one that's gonna be walking out, if that's the case, is usually the other.

He's just running in and out, making babies. This has gotta— you guys gotta get this lined up. All lined up, man, it's just— it's the best thing for everybody involved.

So, with the assumption that he is the man you want to marry and spend the rest of your life with and all the things. So, you're not going—

if you don't, he shouldn't be your fiancé, right?

That's what I'm saying.

And if you don't— but people—

but I think that— but I think the mindset today is it's, we can get engaged and we'll figure out the wedding later. It's almost like a— do you know what I'm saying, though? That's the mindset, though.

I, I think there's a child that needs a dad. I don't think you get to make this up. You know, you gotta get— I know this baby needs a family.

Yes, I agree. And in a perfect scenario, that would be the case. That's my hope for Monica. But also, I don't want her to walk through a divorce. Yeah. Yeah. And that he's a horrible guy. Like, you know what I mean?

Like, a horrible guy wouldn't be doing any of this.

Right.

That's what I'm saying. We shouldn't even have been having this conversation.

Protecting. Yeah. And making sure that this is it for her. But if it is to the point that, yeah, we have to start making grown-up decisions.

Well, she didn't say she was delaying the marriage till the spring because he was a horrible guy and she didn't know if she should marry him. She says, "Because he wanted to party." I know.

Whee! I'm just thinking of everyone out there listening, because this has been a trend that we see over and over again.

There's another trend. Half the calls on this show are me telling people to get married these days. So, because the data is there. It's like so simple. You should get married.

I'm such a boomer. You are a boomer, and you should get where you can like facilitate— what's it called? When you ordain a wedding. You should be ordained.

That's right. I need to get ordained and just start doing Ramsey weddings on the debt-free stage, right here in the lobby.

Every Valentine's Day, It should be a wedding show. And Dave just marries all the people that he tells stories about.

All at one time, like some kind of cult or something. Yeah, that would be great.

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This is a weird show. I started doing this show as a talk radio show almost 40 years ago, and people would call in off a talk radio on it when Rush Limbaugh was a big deal. Dr. Laura was a big deal. Dave Ramsey was a big deal. That was all on that AM band and a few FM talkers, and I'm still on 640 talk radio stations. We're still the second largest talk radio show in America. So that's kind of the genesis of this thing, is where it started. But it started back then, all— and still to this day, talk radio is generally two things. It's generally politics, mainly Republican, and it's generally sports. And that's pretty much it. And then there's this weird thing called The Ramsey Show that drops in the middle of this. And The Ramsey Show is where we teach you what we have learned. Some of it we learned the hard way. I have a PhD in DUMB. I've done plenty of stupid stuff, and I can show you where the potholes are. Don't run into them. Uh, some of it, now that we've made a lot of money over the years, we have a research department.

We have 1,000 team members here at Ramsey doing all kinds of things other than this show, but that includes research on millionaires, research on everything, especially around the money piece. We've got other shows and podcasts that are vastly popular, like Rachel does, uh, Smart Money Happy Hour. Dr. John Delony's show is massively popular. Best-selling books of all kinds and across those things. So that— the whole premise of the whole thing though is to teach you God's and Grandma's ways of doing things because they work. It's called common sense, and common sense is so rare in America that it's like having a superpower. And you can just start with the idea that even if I'm getting in your face, or one of us is, it's because we love you and we want you to win. And that formula has propelled us to be one of the biggest brands in the entire marketplace. It's a simple formula. And so when we're coming up with something, sometimes something is our opinion, sometimes it's data-based, based in data, and sometimes it's based in 35 years of doing this. I got socks older than some of you. So I know what the flip I'm doing.

This is not my first ride on the cabbage truck. So some of it's based in that, and some of it's based on the research that we've done and observable trends, and some things we have shifted, and some things are based on principle, and we don't shift them based on principle. This whole marriage thing never came up in the first 20 years of doing the show. It was not a big deal. But in case you didn't know, if you're an old fogey like me, listen, I'm not just bringing this stuff up because I'm an old fogey and I'm an out-of-touch boomer or something like that, although those things might be true. But that's not the basis for the argument. The basis for the argument is I love you, number one, and number two, it is the data tells us this, and there's all kinds of data now on this. It's hardcore. Today, if you didn't know, more people live together that aren't married than live together who are married. And that line crossed about 11, 12 years ago. And I remember the first time I read it, it kind of blew my mind because I'm an old school, the dinosaurs used to play in my backyard.

I mean, it was, you know, I'm that guy. But here's the actual, here's a couple of the pieces of the data. There's a thing that's been around since the '60s and Bill Clinton, when he was president, had a whole nother set of research done that was detailed and very good research done. Called the Success Sequence. Listen to this: if you can teach your children, or if you are still young enough that you can do these 3 things, do them in this order. If you first graduate from high school, then get a full-time job, then get married, then have kids. High school, high school before babies, marriage before babies, full-time job before marriage and before babies. Real simple. Doesn't say what kind of job. You don't have to be a doctor or a lawyer. If you graduate from high school and then get a full-time job and then get married and only then do you have children, 97% of millennials who completed all 3 steps in that order were at middle income or higher by their mid-30s. Only 3% were in poverty. All the people living in poverty violated that success sequence. 97% who followed that success sequence are not in poverty.

That's a huge number. That's everybody. When you statistically adjust, 3% goes away. Okay, within a 3% margin of error, which means it's all of them. Okay, now, median net worth of married households is greater at all age levels. Married householders at 35 years old had 13.8 times— 13, 14 times the wealth of an unmarried female and almost 5 times the wealth of an unmarried male. So more than 15 times our last caller is off on net worth if she doesn't follow the sequence or get back in line in the sequence as fast as she can the way I was telling her to do. Married Americans in their 50s have more than twice as much net worth of divorced and never married Americans. And we're just gonna live together and act like we're married our entire life and it's because we're all hippies. The data says you suck. That's what the data says. You failed epically. That's what it says. We did our own Ramsey study of millionaires, the largest study of millionaires ever done. 46% of Americans are married. 80% of the millionaires are married. Married men earn 26% more income than unmarried men. Apparently she has a stick and she beats your butt out the back door to go get a job.

Married couples also benefit from dual income. They reach goals faster, they have tax advantages— married filing jointly— they have more retirement contributions with spousal IRAs, etc. So they end up with more money. Hello! Married men live 8 to 9 years longer than unmarried men. Apparently women keep them from doing stupid stuff. You're not gonna drive that, are you? You're not gonna eat that, are you? You're not gonna climb out there, are you? Women live 4 to 6 years longer. Ours is shorter, ladies. Ladies don't get as much health benefit.

We're keeping—

we're— better recovery from health. We just give our lives away. If you have a major health thing, you have a 20% better survival rate from cancer if you're married. This is actual data. Lower rates of depression, anxiety, suicide, fatigue syndrome, especially in men and in women in their 50s. This is data. All the data reports that married people have more sex and better sex. That's what all the surveys tell us, and all the data comes in. When the research is properly done and controlled for. There is a huge advantage to doing this stuff right. And so you can call me names and you can put all your crap and bullcrap on Reddit about Dave Ramsey's out of touch or whatever, but you just don't have any data to back up your stupid butt opinion. That's your problem. And we do. And so we're gonna tell you the truth. And some of you are not gonna like it. Oh well, you'll have to listen to something else. 'Cause this is called The Ramsey Show, which means it's like our opinion, not yours. So, and ours is based in the fact that we love you, we want you to win, and it's based in the data and the 30 years of experience of doing this.

10 million families have been through Financial Peace University. You don't agree with the Baby Steps? Shut the hell up! You don't know what you're talking about. 10 million people say you're an idiot. I'm serious. You know, it's like the funny— the hilarious one, it used to bother me.

Have you been on Reddit recently? This is so funny.

It's so bad. Reddit is awful. I know, get off of it.

Get off of it.

Don't read it. I don't get in it. Okay, good. I try to stay out of it for that reason, but it's just— it's just people are so stupid. So here's a funny one, okay? I have to go back and look at it, but there's something like Like 60,000 people have left ratings on the Total Money Makeover book. I've sold almost 20 million of them, okay? The book has a 4.75 stars out of 5, which means almost all 5 stars. And yet, after thousands, tens of thousands of people leave 5 stars, some genius comes on and says, "I'm gonna leave a 1 star." Obviously you're wrong. They can! No, you can, but you're obviously just stating how stupid you are based on the survey, the data that's in front of you, not based on the book, not based on me.

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If you want to get on the same page with your spouse, or you want to just be able to feel in control with your money, you have to have a plan. If you manage money for a company called You Incorporated and you manage money for You Incorporated the way you manage money for you now, would you fire you? Well, then don't expect to prosper. Hello? So sit down, lay out a game plan in detail, address the issues on paper on purpose before the month begins. The way to do that in a digital world is the world's best budgeting app, EveryDollar, and it will hold your hand and coach you the Ramsey way all the way through. You can download the EveryDollar budgeting app for free in the App Store or Google Play, and I suggest you do that immediately. Sophia is in Greenville, South Carolina. Hi, Sophia, how are you? I'm good, how are you? Better than I deserve.

What's up? Okay, so I'm calling to see if I should sell my house or keep it. And I'm questioning if I should sell it maybe just to try to like build wealth faster and maybe pay off the home sooner. Um, I just recently did a new build in December 2024, and it was a total of $361,670, and I put a down payment of $36,167, which left me with a loan of $325,503 for a monthly payment of $2,454.98. Now Um, the thing though is I just recently started listening to you guys and the $2,500 of my monthly payment is technically almost 50% of my income. I'm bringing in $5,200 a month.

Does the $5,200 a month have health insurance taken out before you get it? Yes. Does it have 401k taken out before you get it? Correct. Okay. That is not the number that we're talking about. Oh, okay. Your take-home pay that we're talking about is just net of taxes only. Okay, I see. So if you add back the health insurance and your 401 contributions, that's the percentage we would want to be lower. What's your income? You said $5,000 a month, so that's $60,000. So you're making $75,000 or $80,000?

Yeah, I'm like at $83,000.

Okay, are you getting a tax refund?

Um, I did this year, my first— well, not my first year, but only because I think of my mortgage insurance, and that was my first time itemizing.

And so how much was your tax refund? Um, it was like $1,500. Okay, all right. So that's another, uh, $100 a month plus— $125 a month plus that you would add back in because you're taking— having too much taxes taken out of your check. Yes. You follow me? So if we add $125,000 plus health insurance plus 401, this doesn't sound quite so dire anymore, I suspect.

What do you think it's more at than 40%, Sophia, if you had to guess?

Yeah, because I think so. For my 401, I do— technically it's $207.50 a check, so I get paid twice a month, almost like $400 a month. I do $68 in, that's my medical insurance, but my HSA is, um, $75 a check.

Okay. So that's like $640 you could add back in. So it wouldn't be super significant from a percentage standpoint.

Yeah, and the reason I also ask is because I do have a deteriorating eye condition, and so at some point I could lose my vision completely. Um, there's not like an estimate of time of when it could happen because it varies by person, and so that's just kind of like one of my fears. Well, what if it, you know, it could be 5 years, it could be 25 years. How old are you? I'm 41. Okay, all right.

Well, I mean, you have— you don't have enough house payment that I am panicked with the thing, with the adjustments that we've just made, but it is a little bit tight. And is your income been going up pretty steadily?

Yeah, luckily I do get, um, about like 2% cost of living raise a year. Not much then. Yeah, not a lot.

That's not going to bail you out anytime soon. All right. Okay. Well, just the warning that you have to give yourself is no, you don't have to panic and put a for sale sign in the yard today. But there's two problems. One is you don't have enough margin to be able to build and invest like you need to. And two is without any margin to save, everything that comes up is going to be a potential debt in the future. Are you carrying any debt other than the house?

No. Um, and I'm able to save about like $1,000 a month after, like, you know, my utilities and food and stuff.

You're a very precise person.

Okay, well, I think you're gonna be okay. You got to just make sure the next car is cash, the heat and air goes out, it's cash, you've got your emergency fund in place, it's cash.

And I would say though, if you look up in 6 months, Sophia, and you're still strained and life is miserable because of this house— your house is supposed to be a blessing, and when it eats into your income so much, you know, there may be a world that you're like, you know what, it's not worth it. I would rather have half the house, half the mortgage, and enjoy my life a little bit more, right? I mean, being stretched so thin can be exhausting. You're not though. You got $1,000 margin, which is amazing. So give yourself a little bit of time. But I would say if you do look up, your house is not worth stressing and losing sleep over. And so if you wanted to downsize, you gotta factor in, fees and, you know, commissions and everything that goes into the final purchase price. But I wouldn't be mad if you did decide to make that move. Yeah.

The good news about you is you're so precise and detailed in planning that it's not going to sneak up on you. You're going to know a long time. You get stress relief and anxiety relief from details. Well, if you know the details, you're calmer, right? Correct. Yeah, I could tell by the way you're $207.14. Hello. I mean, you know, that kind of stuff, right? So that's the beauty of who you are, and that's going to work to your advantage. Because what happens when you can be strained by the house— we call it house poor— is it sneaks up on people. And then they go, oh, I gotta have a car. Oh, why don't I have any money? Oh, I gotta, I gotta put a heat and air on that thing. Oh, why don't I have any money? And you're gonna know. You're not gonna say, why don't I? You're gonna know exactly where your money is.

Sylvia, do you have Do you have a lot of savings just on the side for an emergency?

Right now, I have about $7,000, and I'm trying to— I would like to do 6 months just because of my vision. Yeah, you need to. It's gonna be harder. You need to. And I don't drive, so it would have to be like a remote job. Yeah.

Okay. Yeah, your $1,000 savings needs to all go in emergency funds right now till you get it up to where you need it to be. Because again, that savings is also gonna give you pad And keeping up with the detail and a big pile of cash is gonna remove stress for you. And then if you can see the thing, the numbers start to go the wrong way, you could sell the house like Rachel said. But for today, as long as you're not feeling so pinched you can't breathe, I would not keep it if it's bothering you. But I don't hear it bothering you. You're just, the only thing you were concerned about was that The Ramsey Show said your ratios were off. And they are off, but they're not way off like we thought when we first started the call. So yeah, you're gonna be fine because you're such a planner, and because of what you're facing medically, I guess you have to be, right? And that's just a really good way to react to your situation overall. And I would apply the same diligence to career options that you could look at and move towards as your sight starts to go.

And, you know, depending on the timeline, like you said, it might be 2 years, it might be 25, you don't know. So we'll pray for the 25 or never, either one of those will be fine, right? But in the meantime, yeah, let's start thinking about what our next thing is that we can make $80,000 doing with even if this medical condition gives us a fit. So I think you're pretty impressive, girl. I think you're sharp. So I think you're gonna be okay, but don't let Don't keep the house if it steals your life. That was Rachel's tune, and I agree with that one. Wow. Real estate is awesome until it's not. When you buy real estate and it makes you broker— that's why they call them brokers. Be careful. Don't buy too much.

This show is sponsored by BetterHelp. Summer is here and whoa, everything changes this time of year. The kids are out of school, routines are out the window, you're traveling more, probably sleeping less, and if you're not careful, you and your family can end up running on fumes.

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Welcome back to The Ramsey Show in the Fairwinds Credit Union studio. Rachel Cruz is my co-host today. Nicole is in Philadelphia. Hi Nicole, how are you?

I'm good, how are you guys doing?

Better than we deserve. What's up?

So I'm about to get married to my fiancé, and we're looking over our budget because we want to be on the same page financially, and I'm realizing that he really prioritizes giving, which is something that I agree with, but it's getting getting to the point where he doesn't want to put anything in savings because he wants to trust in the Lord's provision in our lives. And so I was just wondering if you guys had any advice on that, or how you decide what to tithe and what to save.

Wow, what a great guy.

Honestly, I mean, seriously, I mean, you can find somebody that gives like that and has a heart like that, he's going to be a great husband because he's going to take care of you. He's gonna— you're gonna just— you guys are you're going to prosper. He just needs to fine-tune his doctrinal understanding a little bit because he's off biblically. He's off. Okay. Okay. Because the Bible is very clear. In the house of the wise, Proverbs says, are stores of choice food and oil. And when Solomon wrote that, choice food and oil were signs of wealth. Oil kept the lamps lit in the temple, in the Holy of Holies. Oil was used as a— a craft of oil was used as a medium of exchange in a biblical marketplace. Of course, choice food was only eaten by aristocrats. Everyone else got hummus. This is the Middle East. Okay. Everyone, you know, meat was a rarity. Choice food like you and I eat every day is a sign of wealth. So again, in the house of the wise are stores of choice food and oil. Wise people save money. Okay. They don't cop out and say, I'm going to trust in the Lord's provision, although we all need to trust in the Lord's provision.

Wise farmers plant corn. They don't look at the mud and go, I'm going to trust in the Lord's provision. They sow because they know they're going to reap what they sow. Right. Yes. So there's a cause and effect thing that the Bible is very clear on. The Bible also says that if you don't first take care of your own household, you're worse than an unbeliever. So when you're generous to the point that your own household is at risk, that's not biblical.

How do you decide what puts your household at risk and what Well, I think that's, that's the ultimate discussion between the two of you.

But we certainly have to have needs covered, and that includes saving. That we have to have needs covered, and that includes basic provision for the home. And so we don't give away a million dollars and mom drives a '93 Camry, right? See, that's automatically— we can look at those ratios and go, something's screwed up here.

Yeah. And the thing about about looking at it through a spiritual lens is God gives us a brain. Reason is also a major pillar, especially when you look, you know, within Catholicism, the Orthodox Church. I mean, like, reason is godly as well, right? So, when it just doesn't make sense, it's okay to plug in your common sense and your reason to say, "Huh, that feels a little bit off." It feels like when we live on the edge of a cliff month to month, probably not the wisest thing overall when it comes to our levels of stress and anxiety, right? Like, the warnings about money in Scripture, in Scripture is about a level of trusting so much in something worldly, like wealth. It is— I mean, like, there's major, for sure, warnings about where it's positioned in our lives and our call of, "Are we worshiping it more than something else?" Right? I mean, like, all of that is very real. But living at the edge of that, like, that makes no— that's not sensical, right? And I think God God does understand that he gave us a brain too, Nicole. So, there is like a level to say, it's okay for you to tell him, like, that just doesn't make sense logically too.

A lot of worse things can be said about you at your funeral, though, other than you were generous. For sure. You ever heard the phrase, "He's generous to a fault"? No, but it feels applicable. It's kind of an old-fashioned piece of language, right? "Generous to a fault." And that's what it is. But if you're gonna have a fault, that's a pretty good one to have, you know, because it's such an indication of a wonderful, warm heart, good man, smiles a lot, easy to get along with, he's not stressed out over stuff. I mean, this guy is just a good guy. I already like him. I just want him to tune his biblical knowledge a little bit to make sure his family is cared for while he's living this out.

And that's why what I hear in you, Nicole, calling, to be like, "I love him," and it's like, great, but also, there's a little of a shakiness there that's not stable that I don't like. Yeah, and I don't want to—

I'm not accusing him of this yet, but if he persists in this, I'll accuse him of it, okay? Because here's the thing, I get people throughout— I mean, I meet these people. I'm a Christian. I've always said this is biblically-based stuff on the Ramsey Show. I've always taught in churches, all this stuff. And so, but I get my brothers and sisters in Christ, some of them are oversaved, and they, you know, they're like, "We're not gonna buy health insurance. We're gonna pray." No, you're an idiot. And don't be an idiot and call yourself a Christian. That's dumb, okay? You need to take care of your family. "No, I'm not gonna have life insurance. God'll take care of—" Yeah, you ain't worried about it. You're gonna be dead. How about your wife and kiddo? They need some money when you dead. So you need life insurance. I mean, this is— So this, like you said, reason. God gave you a brain, use it. And don't blame your stupidity on Christianity. It makes those of us that use our brain that are Christians ashamed of you. Don't do that. Now, your husband's not in that category. I'm not putting him there.

But if he persists in this, I'll put him there. It's because I want him to adjust this beautiful part of who he is to where it includes saving And it— and that is not evil. You're not hoarding. Larry Burkett, the most famous teacher in evangelicalism on Christian money, biblical finance, is where I learned a lot of things from many, many years ago. He's been gone several years. He's been in heaven a long time. But Larry used to say the only difference in saving and hoarding is attitude. It's not an amount. It's why are you doing it? And so you need saving and you need wise You need wise, careful spending, and you need giving. And you need to teach your kids to do all three things. And by the way, you're gonna have wonderful children from this guy. This guy's gonna be a great dad. I mean, generous people are the easiest ones to work with.

If they have money for them too.

They're the easiest ones to work with. They're the easiest ones to work with because they've just got good hearts. Very much so. They're not selfish people. Selfish people are harder to work with.

No, I know, but I want him to be smart. For Nicole's sake, he needs to be smart, though. So, that's why.

God just schooled him up, I agree. You did, yep, yep.

But living life with an open hand is— Oh, it's beautiful. Part of what we talk about. And even the idea of doing the Baby Steps and building wealth, it's not for you just to hold and just to buy more stuff and that's it, right? It is to bless your family, bless those around you, live like no one else, so later you get to live and give like no one else. Giving is a central part of our message because it is a huge piece that defines your character. But again, you can't unplug your brain brain from reality of living in 2026. Great call, great question.

Thank you.

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Have you got the good stuff at a good price? Yeah, we're gonna give you a personalized action plan with clear next steps to It doesn't cost a thing. It's completely free. Go to RamseySolutions.com/checkup to take the coverage checkup and find out the protection that you need. Alex is in Detroit. Hey, Alex, how are you? Hi, Dave.

Hi, Rachel. It's a pleasure to speak with you both.

You too. What's up?

I'd like to get your guys' perspective on whether it makes sense for my wife to leave her highly stressful job and become a stay-at-home mom while homeschooling our children. Children. So we have a 4-year-old and an almost 2-year-old, and our oldest is scheduled to start kindergarten, um, this fall. So does it make financial sense if we drop down to one income, um, and just, yeah, have her become a stay-at-home mom?

I guess a little bit of background— what does the math tell you? Can you live on your income?

Yeah, the math tells us it works. I have everything plugged into every dollar here. But it would mean, right now we're triple paying on our mortgage. So we wouldn't be able to do that anymore. We'd have to drop down on some of the other things as well. But— What do you make? I make $103,000. What does she make? She makes $80,000.

Okay, so you're basically cutting your household income in half. Half, all right, and you're gonna go to $100,000 household income, which is above the national average, by the way, still when you do that. You're right now almost triple the national average. And, hmm.

Triple? Not quite, double. Oh, now, because with like the 180.

I'm sorry. Yeah, the— so I mean, yes, it's the way you formed your sentences It's what you all want to do, both of you. Yeah, it's— you just hate to give up the triple house payment.

Yeah, exactly. You know, you know, we have a fully funded emergency fund. We got $30,000 in there. We got $26,000 in a car fund for when our car goes out. We have a Christmas fund that's fully funded for this year. We got a little bit in a vacation fund. So we have some savings, you know, available.

We're not going to live on that. We're going to live on the $1,300.

Right, right. Um, but our mortgage is $1,300, so dropping that down with the take-home pay of just me would put us at 29% of, uh, you know, our house-to-income ratio. So it's a little higher than I know 25%, um, but I still think it's doable.

Yeah, very much doable.

Yeah, I mean, here's the thing, Alex, is money is not supposed to be the thing that drives you. Money is the tool to create a life that you guys want. And the way you phrased the question is exactly right. It's exactly how I heard it was, you didn't say, "My wife wants to leave this amazing, wonderful, high-paying, fulfilling job to homeschool our kids." It was like, "She wants to leave a very stressful job to be home with our kids." You know what I mean? Like, the way you even presented it means that this is— is this what she wants to do? Does she want to do this?

This? 100%. Okay. Yeah. Yes. So to me, she's on call 24/7. Yes, yes.

And it's hard to be present, be a mom, and do that. That's tough.

What does she do? Um, she's in aviation. She's a trip coordinator in aviation. Oh, good for her clients.

Yeah. Yep. So yeah, I mean, what do you do?

Uh, same thing except I'm on the operations side.

Okay. What's your career trajectory? What do you— what will you be making in 5 Um, that's a good question.

I haven't actually researched that. I'm not entirely sure. What do you think? I will, I will say based on the last 5 years, well, when in 2022 I was making $60K and now I'm at $103K, so I've almost doubled up in 3 years. Um, I don't expect it to go up too much higher, uh, especially in, you know, the next 3 years, but I would say maybe $120K, $130K Mm-hmm. Within the next 5 years?

Well, that would just be cost of living only. You need to be doing better than that. But I don't know anything about your world, what it should pay. I'm just saying that's one of my considerations is we're looking at this at a snapshot rather than a film strip. The snapshot is today, but life is not a snapshot, it's a film strip. So the next frame will be different, the next frame will be different, and 5 years from now you'll be making more. 5 years from now you'll have a 9-year-old 5 years from now, you know, you'll have a 7-year-old. And so, these things start to— the picture starts to change as you go through the film.

Yeah, and Alex, and I just know even with my own group of friends, I've had some that homeschool that still do. I have some that homeschooled for 3 years and then they were like, "Eh, I kinda wanna go back and do this." You know, you guys can make different decisions too. This isn't a decision you have to make that's gonna be your forever. So, you guys have worked hard, you've sacrificed, you've made wise choices to get to this place that it's even an option. If you called us and said, said, "Oh, I make 30 grand and she makes 100 and she wants to quit. I don't think we can live on 30." You wouldn't have an option at that point. You both would have to work. The math would tell you no. That's right. So, everything's a green light to me.

Yeah, I hear green light. If you want to be super sure, and you're a very detailed person, I can also tell that by the way you're asking the questions and answering the questions. You could real simply between now and the time that you're going to pull the plug on this, just practice living on your income. Because it'll be August. You're banking her entire income.

Yeah, next month you guys just do that.

Plus or minus daycare or whatever else is gonna go away when she comes home, right? You'll save on daycare. You'll save some on car gas when she comes home. You'll save some on clothing when she comes home.

Is that true, Alex? What's the childcare situation?

We both work from home and watch our kids here, so we don't have any daycare costs.

Okay. Yeah. Well, yeah, regardless, I mean, I just think, I think it's what you guys want to do. And again, everything else supports it. So I'm a yes. If you wanted to ask if, should my wife, can my wife quit? She can.

Yes. Under the scenario that you just came out with, is there a portion, can she do something? I mean, a different, maybe a half time of what she's doing I think she wants to homeschool. Maybe for a different— I know, but they're both at home now watching the kids. That's new information I just got. So, um, brand new information. Yeah, it is. Bury the lead. But the, um, yeah, it's fine. It's fine mathematically, you know, if you're both going to the office and she won't go to the office anymore and she wants to stay home full-time, that's fine. If she's already doing this from home and she could just cut back by 75% Yeah, and do a little something if she wants. That would be fine. And that all of a sudden, the thing— it may be a toxic environment, that company, I don't know. But it's not too toxic. She's not there. But yeah, the boundary sounds like no boundaries.

It may be—

"Call 24/7," is what he said. So that you could drop that and say, "I'm gonna pick up these pieces of operations in the booking, and I'll work in during— I'll work this many hours a day." And she wants— yeah, if you can find that kind of thing. She's got You've got the ability to do that, because you're already both there. You're already both watching the kids. So yeah. Wow. All right. Open phones at 888-825-5225. Thank you for joining us, America. We're glad you are with us. If you're facing that kind of thing, the EveryDollar budgeting app can help. Rachel said it. He said it. Sit down and just run your budget out as if the other person's income wasn't there. Is there? And then exactly what does it look like? Yeah. And that tells you— and then the pure proof is in the pudding— is let's say she was in an office, and you said, "Okay, other than daycare, we're gonna bank her whole check." In this case, you'd bank her whole check for a couple months and prove to yourself you can live on his check, right? And if you just bank it, just put it over there in a little account for 3 or 4 months, and you can always move it on to another goal later, throw it on the house or whatever else.

You can just set it over there, pay one house payment and bank her check and see what the budget looks like and prove it to yourself. I mean, because if you do that for like 3 months, you'll be going, "Oh, this— yeah, we can do this," or, "Oh, this is awful. I don't want to do this." You know, it'll expose— it'll— it puts all the theory to test.

Let me tell you what I get asked all the time. When should I get term life insurance? How much do I need? Is it affordable? Those are the right questions to be asking. So let's take a quick review. The fact is, term life isn't a baby step. So if anyone is dependent on your income, you need to have 10 to 12 times your income in life insurance now. And most people are surprised by how affordable term life really is, even if you're not in perfect health. Look, I understand the hesitation since most insurance companies make it more of a hassle than it needs to be. Not at Zander Insurance. They're not an insurance company. Company. They're a broker that works for you. That means they'll shop and compare the top term life companies to find the most competitive options on the coverage for your family. For almost 30 years, I've recommended Zander for straight answers, competitive rates, and coverage that actually protects your family. Call 800-356-4282 or go to zander.com for a quick and easy quote. That's zander.com. Haley is in Portland, Oregon. Hey Haley, what's up?

Hi, um, I have a question or looking for advice. Okay. How, uh, me and my boyfriend have been together for like 2 years, uh, we're house hunting, um, I have money to put down to make an affordable down payment. How do I convey to him I'm not going to continue looking for houses until we get married? What would happen if you just said that? I've said it and it's like not hitting. He continues looking.

I'm interested to hear Rachel's take because my take as the old guy is that women have been saying, "Put a ring on it or you get nuttin', honey," since time began. Right. This is like a normal thing.

So I don't I don't know. Yeah. What was it? Where did the conversation lead to the fact that you guys were actually looking at houses? Or did you change your mind in the middle of it thinking like, uh, I don't think I wanna buy a house with a guy I'm not married to, and you changed your mind? Or did he just randomly start looking at houses? Like, how did it even begin?

No, like we've, it's, it's been like progressive and like worked up to it and, and then looking and me having a inheritance where I could put put a substantial chunk down. And, um, but I own my house outright currently, and I, I, yeah, I, I'm not looking at uprooting my, my kid until I have like that marital commitment and insurance. Um, yeah, so very smart like for you.

Yeah, I mean, it's some version of put a ring on it, honey. I mean, you I mean, it's—

yeah, because I've said I don't just want a ring to do this. I don't know. I mean, get married.

That's my way of saying get married. Yeah, yeah, I'm agreeing with you. Yeah, women have been saying, "Not until we're married," for as long as time has begun. Okay, and so, and a few guys, but not as many.

I already own a business. I don't— I don't want to— how old are you? I want to— I'm 39. Yeah, so you're an established established like adult person.

Yeah, you're not in a needy position at all.

No, it— not at all.

Do you think he will be the one you marry?

I, I would love to marry him. Um, he's a great guy. I just— I'm not into like, yeah, mingling the finances. Yeah, I agree. And I've said it, and, and it's just—

it's very dangerous. I think you're just gonna have to have a very clear no child in the No music playing, no distraction, very clear, define the relationship conversation, and just, "You know, here's what I think. I think I love you, and I think I do want to spend my life with you. I'm not going to, because I've worked so hard to get where we are, and because this is inherited money, my grandmother would roll over in her grave, and—" And it's just not wise right now. "And I just don't feel the wisdom in this, and I'm not gonna do this out of order.". And so I'll be happy to look at a home together and even put my home involved or some of my money involved or whatever, because we're going to combine our lives when we're married. But until we're married, I'm not going to. And you just need to hear that. And if that's a deal breaker for you, then you need to think about that. Okay. I mean, you just got to kind of clarity, right?

I've tried to make it pretty clear, but like, you know, he continues to like look at houses and consider—

well, you can go look at houses, but I'm not like Like, yeah, what's his—

what's his living situation?

He has an apartment and cars and $20,000 to put down on a house, which isn't much for a down payment these days.

And, um, what does he make?

He makes probably like $85,000 a year.

What do you make?

Uh, probably $32,000 a year. How old is he?

How old is he? 40. Okay. Hmm. All right. So you're the same age. That's good news.

And, uh, and you're only making $32,000 a year, Haley, is that what you said? Yeah. Have you combined your finances with him? Are you guys, or are you—

I haven't combined, I haven't combined anything. He has a place.

Oh, you're living on $32,000 a year in Portland with a kid?

Yes. Okay.

That's great. It's amazing. Yeah, well done. Yeah, that's, that's a big string.

Yeah, it's outskirts of there.

Okay, that's okay.

Yeah, yeah.

How much inheritance did you receive?

Uh, which time?

Okay, how much inheritance do you have and who did it come from?

I, uh, my mother, my estranged mother passed away last year and I was left a quarter. There's 4 of us. I was left a quarter of federal retirement, uh, to the tune about $214,000. And I have to, uh, empty that account apparently in like 10 years. And so I'm gonna have to start taking RMDs. And I'm like, well, that'd be a great, you know, to rent this house out and, you know, progress with him and go in on a house together and start putting some RMDs toward that. Um, but again, like, I—

and that's the total inheritance $100,000?

No, I have other accounts and trusts beyond that. How much? Probably, I, I, another $120,000. Okay. All right. Cool.

Well, you've got a really nice nest egg. He has a better income. This sounds like a good situation overall. And, but again, you just need to be aligned. I don't know. Sometimes, I have— because I'm a Southern person, we have a tendency to be too nice to the point that we're not clear. Except for you, Dave. And I learned— I stopped doing that about 20 years ago, and now I'm extremely clear, because I found out that that's actually nice. To be unclear is to be unkind. Okay. And so, be clear. And because it's not fair to him, system for him to have, you know, we're out here looking at houses, and then, "What happened to Hailey? She just jumped off the rails. I thought this— I thought we had all this figured out." No, I think you need to be very clear. And he can— "I'm not gonna go look at houses anymore until it's part of a system that includes a date that we are married before we buy a house. And so, there's no reason for me to go look at houses in that situation.

We can do other things with our time." And when you got the 214, you know, that was a year ago. If you have 10 years, you have 9 more years. And, you know, and realistically, if you guys get married in the next year or two, you know what I mean, like the time—

You can use it.

You can pull it all. Yes, yes.

You can pull it all at once and just pay taxes on it and put it as a down payment. And I would. And I think this sounds like that's probably what you were planning to do. But again, you guys, I'm— yeah, I think he's pushing on the gas and you weren't pushing on the brakes as hard. So bring it to a stop at the red light. Beep beep.

Yeah, and that's wise, Hailey. Like, your gut and what you're leaning towards is right.

So it's the right thing. It's a very, very smart way to do this. And, you know, you've got 300,000 reasons to do this. A baby's a reason to do this. An established 39-year-old woman who's making it on her own "Has her own job and her own business." "You're not some kind of desperate somebody or something here. This is not— you're in great shape." And you got a good head on your shoulders. The way you even posed the question was— there's wisdom and we could feel your spirit is solid, all of that. So trust your gut. You got a good one. But just, you can be kind and very, very, very clear. And that's all I would do. I've not faced that situation, but that's what I've got.

Yeah, and my prayer is that you guys have established a relationship and that he's a great guy, that he'd respect that and say, "Absolutely. Okay, well, let's wait. Let's make some plans." And you know what I mean? If it scares him off, then you probably wouldn't want to be in a relationship with a guy like this.

If it runs him off, he was there for the money. If he books based on this, he wasn't there for the right reason. So, it's a great acid test. In that regard. So he was just trying to sign up for a down payment with some girl he met, you know. Oh, that's real scary, isn't it? I doubt it is though. I don't think that's the case. And the reason— you know why I don't think so? Because I don't think she would have put up with him this long. Mm-hmm. I think she would have run him off for now. She would have smelled that.

We trust you, Haley.

Yeah, I mean, well, I mean, the girl I'm talking to is smart. I mean, I mean, that's, you know, she's got some brains. It's a good thing.

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Hi, I'm good, thank you. Good. What's up? So my big question, like the main question is gonna be, should I get a loan, or should me and my husband, I guess, get a loan to get all of our debt together and pay it off that way, or should we refinance our house first?

Probably neither. How much debt do you have?

Um, without the house, um, it's about $14,172.01.

No, you should not get any kind of loan, and you for sure don't need debt consolidation. What kind of debt is the $14,000?

Um, about $1,600 of it is going to be credit card debt. Um, I have— or my— what I owe on my car is about $4,600. Um, and then the rest is going to be medical.

Okay. And you have health insurance, I assume, so this has been deductibles and copays? Okay. Who's been sick?

Oh, I wasn't really sick. I had a baby. Okay.

So that's what you end up with, $5,000 worth of bills having a baby out of pocket.

It, um, so it's, yeah, pretty, pretty much, um, about 600 of it was for genetic testing while I was still pregnant because I'm adopted. So we wanted a little bit more information of what could possibly happen.

So what is your household income?

Um, right now with me out of work, monthly it's about $3,060. What'd you say about work?

I'm sorry, I misunderstood.

Um, right now, um, I'm only doing like very minimal part-time.

Oh, with you being out of work with the baby? I see. How old is the baby? That's okay, I didn't understand you.

How old's baby? You're fine.

She's 2 months. Oh, wonderful. That's so cool. And your husband makes—

your husband makes $3,000 a month?

So I've been working a little bit, but about $3,000 with both of ours.

Okay. And what, what does he do?

He works at a drug manufacturing company out of town close to us. Mm-hmm. And how old is How old is he? He's 24.

24. Okay. All right, so the bad news is you have $14,000 in debt. The good news is you only have $14,000 in debt. And so Rachel and I are gonna put you on an EveryDollar budget. We're gonna give it to you, and then both of you are gonna pick up side gigs. He's gonna pick up a lot. You're gonna pick up a little. You're gonna look around the house and sell so much stuff the baby thinks he's next. You're gonna stay out of restaurants unless one of you is working there. You're not going on vacation, and you're gonna roll up your sleeves and put $1,000 a month on this by making an extra $1,000 a month, $2,000 a month between the two of you, and you're gonna be 100% debt-free in about a year. Okay. But you're gonna have to add some income to this because your income's already dangerously low. Would you agree?

Yes. Yeah. Yeah. How— when you go back to work, Marta, full-time, what will you be making?

Um, what I was making before I left, I was making about $4,600 a month. Oh, good.

Okay, so you make more than him?

Um, it's pretty close. He makes a little bit more than me.

A little bit more, but yeah, you're— but he's bringing home $3,000 and you bring home $4,000 when you're both working full-time, I thought you said, right?

Okay, I'm so sorry, I was looking at the completely wrong numbers. Oh, you're fine. He makes— I'm so sorry, he makes alone $2,400 a month.

$2,400 a month he makes. Yeah. Okay, but you make $4,000 a month. Is that right?

When you— that would be together after I'm back.

Okay.

Okay. So both of you have got to work on your long-term careers. Both of your jobs suck income-wise. Okay, your long-term career. In the short term, you got to work on some part-time extra work to add income to the household. But that's not that unusual when you're 23 with a baby. Okay, it's not unusual. There's no shame in that. So short-term, we get our income up and we knock out this debt with some part-time jobs. Long-term, we start really focusing on what do we want to be doing when we're 30 that pays 10 times more than we're getting paid now? What are we gonna— what classes do we need to take? What certifications do we need to get? Do we need to get? What new jobs do we need to get? Because you don't want to be 38 and making this kind of money. Mm-hmm. That's the wrong end of the bell curve. You don't want to be over there.

Yeah. And Marta, the medical bill side, that is one industry. If you call the hospital and you guys get some money piled in together, that there's a chance they will settle, they'll come down. There's a lot of stories that we've heard throughout the years, I know, of people calling, and that is one place that you could actually see your bill lower. So, make that part of your part-time job too, is getting, tracking down the insurance company and the hospital and the bills and all of that.

Sophia is in Idaho. Hi Sophia, how are you?

Oh my gosh, hi. I'm doing good, yourself?

Better than I deserve. How can we help?

Hi, so I'm a stay-at-home mom. My husband and I are almost, we will almost complete Baby Step 3. Good. I have an opportunity to clean a friend's business office for $300 a month. A month, cleaning it twice a month, and I want to know how I can do that legally, meaning like with taxes and everything like that.

Okay, well, the easiest thing to do is just keep it as a sole proprietorship, which is what I would do. Open a separate bank account. It's not legally, it's just keeping up with it. Okay, open a separate bank account and just put a business name on it. It's Sophia So-and-so, DBA Doing Business As Sophia's Office Cleaning, or whatever you name it, okay? And use your Social Security number, but also put your husband on the account. But you've got a separate account just for the business, okay? And you don't have to have a tax ID number, you don't have to have anything. You can do it in a sole proprietorship, a DBA account, Doing Business As. Then you put all the income from your side hustle into that, and any expenses, like if you bought cleaning supplies or something like that, any expenses you have around the business business come out of that account. Nothing else goes into that account except business. Nothing comes out of that account except business. And then when you take money out of that account to bring it home and use it, you set aside 1/4 of it for taxes, and you're supposed to file quarterly estimates for your taxes on your business.

And that's based on your profits. And so if you made $3,000 in a quarter, you probably would have set aside $750 for taxes, and that's gonna be pretty close. And when you calculate out your quarterly estimates, they're not hard to calculate, it's based on your profit. If you need some help with all that, you can just get with one of our smart— or one of our Ramsey trusted tax professionals, and they can help you do it. But the big thing, Rachel, is just to keep your business stuff separate.

Yes, well, and the quarterly estimates, that's the one that we get calls, small businesses, that's some of the worst financial calls I feel like we get with small business. Now she won't be doing like tons and tons and tons of revenue, you know, as of right now. She could start to grow it, but—

If you run a 1099 or you run a side hustle and you're not paying your taxes through the year, you're gonna get hit in the back of the head come April. You're gonna get the devil smacked out of you. You're not gonna like it. You're right. It's one of the biggest problems we see. How'd you get a $20,000 IRS lien? Oh, well, I didn't pay my taxes. Oh, what was that? For 2 years or 1 year or whatever it was on that side hustle. And so all income in America is taxable. So sorry, even if it's cash, no matter what it is, if it's income, it is taxable. And if you're telling the truth and you have integrity, you file a tax return, you put down your income minus your expenses, the difference is called profit, and that profit is taxable in America. Welcome to the United States.— and if you start making a lot of money, you'll get the opportunity to pay a lot of taxes and you'll get the opportunity to listen to some communists say you're not paying your fair share, which is absolutely ridiculous. So, when considering that 47% or 48% of Americans last year paid zero federal income tax, hmm, how's that fair?

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Welcome back to the Ramsey Show in the Fairwinds Credit Union studio. I'm Dave Ramsey. Dave Ramsey, your host. Rachel Cruz, Ramsey Personality, my daughter, is my co-host today. Connor is in Boston, Mass.

Hey Connor, what's up? Hey Dave, how— uh, hey Rachel, how's it going? Good, how you doing, man? I'm doing well. Um, my question today is about investing. So I'm 25 years old, I'm living at home, I make around $56,000 a year, and cash flow in college. So recently I started investing in a brokerage account, and I was wondering, is it wrong to primarily invest into a brokerage account?

Just in general, for what purpose? I don't understand your— why would you only do that?

Yes, so Recently I was thinking more about it. I should put money into the retirement accounts, of course, but I was kind of wondering, is it wrong to put more money into the brokerage account versus retirement accounts for the purpose of saving for like a down payment on a house or being able to use that money before the age of 59?

Yeah. Well, the first thing we would tell you to do is be debt-free. Are you? I am. Good. And then we would tell you to have an emergency fund of 3 to 6 months of expenses. Do you? I do. Great. You're way ahead of the game. You're 25 and you're in college.

What are you studying, sir? Uh, business administration. Cool. And when will you graduate? Uh, this fall, but I'm thinking about going for a master's degree.

Why?

I haven't been able to find an opportunity, uh, in the field I'd like to pursue. What field is that? Uh, merchandising. You don't, you don't need a master's degree.

Okay. No, that's not what's keeping you, holding you back. Um, are you working full-time now? I am. What do you make now?

Uh, $56,000. Oh, you told me that.

I'm sorry, you told me that. All right, so 25 years old, you're making $56,000.

What are you doing now, Connor, for a job?

I'm a deli manager at a grocery market.

Great. Okay, well, I would start pursuing your merchandising career now while you finish up your— are you finishing a 4-year degree or a 2-year? 4-year. Okay, good for you. Okay, excellent. Yeah, you got some pretty good basic business tools in your belt academically, all you would need for merchandising for sure. For sure. And what you need to do though is get in with a good company that lets you mentor and be apprenticed by some fabulous people that have been in the business a while, and you can kind of walk alongside them and learn from them, be discipled or mentored, so to speak. That's what I'd be looking for, and I'd be looking for that hardcore and just working it like crazy. I'm gonna send you a copy of Ken Coleman's book, The Proximity Principle, which will outline a good way to land that kind of position. Which is where— that's what I would focus on. Now, having said all that, back to your question. You're debt-free, you have an emergency fund, way to go. When you've settled in on your permanent career, maybe by this time next year, we would say that you are at Baby Step 3B.

And people do two things at Baby Step 3B. That 3B is before they start putting 15% away for retirement. They can— they sometimes take a gap period of time and pile up money for a down payment. And you could use a brokerage account to do that. Okay, sometimes they put zero in retirement, sometimes they put a little in retirement, sometimes they put the whole 15% of Baby Step 4 in retirement while they're working on their down payment. If you've got the margin to do both, save a good strong down payment and start putting your 15% away at your new big-time job that you've landed by next spring and you're loading up that Roth 401, I would love that for you. But if you want to take a couple of years and do no retirement and just stack cash for your down payment, that's fine. And then, you know, you do need to get the Roth long-term working in your benefit because from age— let's say from age 25 to age 65, the amount of money that is in the account account that is growth is about 90% of the money. So let's say you had $2 million in there, then somewhere around $1.8 million of the $2 million is growth.

That means it's all taxable. You're gonna pay taxes on $1.8 million if you've got it in a brokerage account. If you've got it in a Roth 401, zero taxes on that $1.8 million. And taxes on $1.8 million sounds an awful lot like $600,000 or $700,000. So, long-term, you don't want to only have a brokerage account. Long-term, you also want to have the tax savings of a Roth 401, Roth IRA.

And the question you're asking is fair to say, "Hey, do I want money tied up till I'm 59 and a half?" Yes, some of it. And so that's it. So, I would front-load your retirement, take care of the Roth IRA, take care of the 401, Okay, and then anything beyond that that you want to be able to save in a brokerage account, you know, get some index funds, whatever that is for you, that's great. Then you can take it. But I would do that second to all the retirement. Go ahead and get all that funded.

I think third behind buying a house. That's right. That's right. Exactly. So yeah, sometimes, Connor, we get the question like a 40-year-old is worried about, okay, I might want to retire in 10 years at 50, and I can't get to anything till I'm 59 and a and in that case you do what Rachel's talking about. That's a third step, what we call bridge investing, and you'd have some— a brokerage account, you know, an S&P 500 account, whatever you want to put it in, and you build some wealth there that you can use for those in-between years until you get to the Roth, the tax-free. But don't avoid the tax-free growth. That's a million-dollar mistake minimum for someone your age. Age. That would be a huge mistake. So long-term, it has to be part of your decision-making, but it doesn't have to be the whole thing. And today, if I'm you, I'm landing that big job and I'm gonna stack cash for at least 18 months, maybe 2 years, and get me a nice house. And then you can start loading 15% in and get the house paid off. Work the Baby Steps, and I think you're gonna be in great shape if you just do those things.

Shelly is in Detroit. Hi, Shelly, how are How are you?

Good, how are you? Thank you for taking my call.

Sure, how can we help?

So I will be 43 next year. I have had a salon for the last like 8 years, and I'm actually looking to close it and possibly then just kind of stay home with my kids. Great.

Are you able to do that financially?

Well, that's what I'm like hoping to see. We have 2 homes, um, we just have the mortgage on our first home. So again, I know this is like first world problems, problems. Um, my husband has always said, hey, like, stay home, um, like, I'll handle it. And I think having my shop has helped just to keep things going and keep things afloat. Um, but I think I could.

I— well, what does he make?

I could, um, I would say between the two of us we're about—

no, I asked what he makes. You're quitting.

What he makes, he about like $100,000. Can you live on that? Um, yeah, I have like other money coming, like that has come in.

You don't know. You're dodging all over the place. You need to sit down in detail and do a detailed budget on every dollar. And you and him need to sit down and look at, if my income's not here, what does our house look like? And if you like the way it looks and you want to quit, quit.

Maybe you sell one of the houses in order to make it work.

Yeah. Might have to sell that other house, pay off your mortgage. If you're a business owner who's serious about growth, you've got to be at EntreLeadership Summit 2027. Summit is our world-class leadership conference where you will learn from the people who have influenced the way we lead at Ramsey. You'll also connect with like-minded business owners who are facing the same challenges as you. To get your tickets for May 2027, go to entreleadership.com/summit. Summit. Man, real estate is crazy. Buying or selling a home is a big Decision. Median home prices went up to $425,000 nationally last month, which is typical in the spring market. We generally see little moves. If you want to keep up the housing trends and see what weekly mortgage rates are doing and get free tools to help you buy or sell with confidence, go to RamseySolutions.com/market or click the link in the show notes. Alex is with us. Hi, Alex, how are you?

Hi, Dave, how are How you doing?

Better than I deserve.

What's up? Um, so I'm just calling because, uh, um, I was following your plan and, um, I was doing so well and, um, a few things came up and I unfortunately fell back into the credit card habit. Um, and I guess I'm trying to reframe my mindset to get out of the habit of using the credit card, and I've kind of been struggling with that a little bit. I really want to get out of debt, but I'm— cool.

How much credit card debt have you got, Alex?

With everything in total, $23,000.

It's all credit cards?

Yeah, just one specific one.

How much do you owe on your car?

Um, I don't have a car that— well, I do owe a car, but it's to a family member. How much do you owe on your car? $7,000. Okay, cool.

Is that part of the $23,000?

Um, yes, correct. Okay. Oh, it is?

Okay. All right. Yeah. And so we're talking about $16,000 in credit card debt and $7,000 on the car? Yes, to be exact. Yeah.

And, and what do you make, sir? Between $3,000 to $4,000 per month. Okay, how old are you? I am 30— 30 dollars, I'm sorry, 30 years old.

That's okay. What do you do for a living?

I do factory work and on the side I do a little bit of food delivery.

Okay, so you said you were going along fine and some things came up and threw you off the wagon. What came up?

Yeah, so my car broke down, which is why I ended up borrowing money from a family member to get another vehicle.

Otherwise I would be carless. What else? What was the credit card debt? The $16,000 you said you keep going back in, what causes that?

What was that? Yeah, um, I was struggling to make ends meet, um, and, uh, yeah, paying bills and stuff like that.

So what— we've outlined your bills. What bills you got trouble paying?

Um, groceries. Um, gas.

Uh, well, you make enough to pay that. What's your rent?

Um, I live with family, so I, I just help with the bills.

Um, what does that mean?

Yeah, so I help with electricity, water.

Yeah, what's your bills?

How, how much of that goes to bills of that $3,000 to $4,000?

I would say about $250 a Okay, she got $250 a month for that. I don't know, put in $300 for gasoline, or $250 more, that's $500. You buy a little bit of food. That's a long way from $3,000 or $4,000. Why are you having trouble making your bills? You're partying a lot.

No, I'm actually not. Where are you spending your money? For food, I spend about $600 every 2 weeks. $850. Why? On one guy? Um, because that's what I contribute in the household. That's basically what I help out since I don't have to pay rent.

Oh, I thought you said you had $250 you had to help out with. Now you're saying it's $850. No, now you're saying it's $2,000. $600 is $1,200 plus $250 is $1,500 as your rent to live with family. That's no deal. Yeah, so 600 times 2 is 1,200 plus 250 is 1,450. That's your rent. Mm-hmm. The equivalent of— because you're buying food at home and you're buying food out also, aren't you? Yes, I am. Okay, so here's what's happening. I think I might be wrong. I'm just listening to you trying to diagnose over the phone here. Okay? But I think you're disorganized and you do not have a detailed EveryDollar plan because you have margin in the budget you gave us. There is room in these numbers.

Yeah, and the problem too is, Alex, that the credit card keeps catching your slack. So you're a little bit of the sloppiness and the not, you know, not having like really strict boundaries with your money. The credit card is what sneaks in there and you end up racking up $16,000. So here's the deal. If the credit card wasn't around, you wouldn't have that option. So I think, Alex, you, I think you cut up your credit card right now.

Where is it?

Yeah, so I actually did cut it up. And the mistake I did make, you know how most phones have like, you can add your credit card? Apple Pay. Take it off.

Okay, take it off Apple Pay. It's not as exciting as cutting up a physical card.

As soon as you hang up, you reach over to Apple Pay and delete it.

Leading. Yes. Yeah, but that's the— I mean, that's, that's the step that starts to— no, I was just going to say that, that's to put boundaries up for yourself. Yes, that's the stuff that starts to change your behavior because it's not an option anymore.

And go on Amazon and unplug your card. Yeah, yeah. If you want an Amazon account, it has to be on a debit card. Okay, get your credit card on number off there. As soon as you hang up, do away with Apple Pay completely. Delete it. You do not need it. As soon as you hang up, take your debit card and replace it on your Amazon account, or close your Amazon account altogether.

Okay. Yeah, yeah, I can— I definitely plan on doing that.

And anything else that you use regularly that has your credit card number on it, put your debit card number on it and take your credit card off. If you're paying utilities or anything else, take it off. Get rid of of it. Get rid of any sign that you ever owned a credit card. If I came and investigated you, I don't want to be able to find anything. For your sake, you got to get rid of it because it keeps sneaking back. And, you know, and had one guy memorize the number. I don't know how to erase that. But anyway, you know, it's like, you know, you got— you still got to— you got to put up some boundaries. But the biggest thing is you don't need it if you would get organized and stick to the organization. You make enough to pay the bills that you have easily and begin to get out of debt. And if you add up what you're paying to live there, you ain't got a deal. So you need to look at that too and start thinking about a single guy for $1,450.

'Cause the food thing, I mean, you're not eating all of that.

You're not eating $1,200 worth. No. If you do, you got another problem.

Problem. Yep. So relooking at some of that, Alex, I think is gonna help. And if you start putting some things in place—

it might be that getting out on your own with a roommate might help with a bunch of this. It might, because you have more reality of what it is you actually need to spend for you to exist. And I don't think it's as much as you're paying to live there. So doesn't sound like it to me. But you can look at all all that. It'd probably be good for you anyway. And so let's consider that idea. And then, you know, chop up the card. You've already done that. Let's cut it off of all the— anywhere digitally that it's stored, get rid of it.

Welcome to 2026. It used to be like, get your scissors out and cut up the card.

Now they're like, no, it's on— it's— now we have to take a sledgehammer to your iPhone. Yeah, get your iPhone out, lay it down, hit it with a hammer. It'll probably help you in a lot of ways. Probably a lot of things get better in your life when you did that. Oh my gosh. Yeah, Alex, that's the thing. So, and the other thing I used to do when I was starting all this stuff, Alex, a thousand years ago, was I would pretend. I would say, okay, what if I had to pay off $2,000 next month, or something terrible was gonna happen to a family member? And it isn't, but I would just pretend that. Like, if I had to save a child's life, could I I do it? Well, yeah, I could get organized. I could get intense if I had to save a child's life. If I had to save— do something, something that emotional, right? Visceral. And you go, okay, if I had to do that, then I could do it. That means I can do it. Now I just have to do it. Instead of like, well, I think I'm gonna be Dave Ramsey disciplined.

That doesn't work. Dave Ramsey watching over you. You got to go do it. And that's the beauty of this. You fix the person in your mirror while you transform your finances. Mm-hmm. 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 decision or just want something explained, Ask Ramsey is here to help. It's fast, simple, and free to use. Go to RamseySolutions.com and try Ask Ramsey today. That's RamseySolutions.com. Today's Ramsey Show Question of the Day is brought to you by Yrefi. Defaulted private student loans can derail your money plans, but Yrefi helps borrowers explore refinancing options designed to get them on track again. Learn more at Yrefy.com/Ramsey. That's the letter Y, R-E-F-Y.com/Ramsey. Might not be in all states.

Today's question comes from Courtney in Minnesota. I own my, I own my home free and clear and have no other debt. My ex-husband moved an hour away and it would be easier for me and the kids if I move closer to him since we share custody. Can I purchase a home with cash before my current home sells. I have a realtor and know that what we can list my house for and what I can afford once it's sold. We've talked about contingency offers as well as taking out a mortgage, paying it off once my current house is sold. What is the best way to buy a house in cash considering my situation? I mean, the contingency is probably the easiest— yep— um, element there. So I mean, it would be that. And I mean, honestly, right now it is a, it's more of a buyer's market. You're not, you know, stuck in 2022 when it was just insane. And no one took even contingency offers. So now I would say you have a best-case scenario with where the market is for you to be able to pull something like this off.

So mechanically, the way that would work is you could do two things. You, the straight contingency, you go find the neighborhood that you think you want to move into. There's 6 houses on the market. You look at them, you pick out your favorite one, and you make an offer subject to the sale and simultaneous closing of your home. Most markets, the way that's done— and it does, it is a little bit regional— but most people in most areas of the country, the way that's done is they'll put a 72-hour clause in there that says they keep the house on the— they accept your contract, you have terms. If yours sells, you simply close on it. Very easy. If yours hasn't sold, their house— the other house that you're trying to buy is still on the market. If they get another offer that they want to accept, you have 72 hours to decide if you want to close or not. And you wouldn't. You would walk away if your house hasn't sold, because the only other thing you can do is go in debt to do that, and I'm not going to tell you to do that in this situation.

Situation. So the other thing you can do, that's if you can't get someone on the house you like to do a contingency with a 72-hour out, which is a fairly standard thing in the business, okay. But if you can't get someone to do that, what we did, Sharon and I did this, is we figured out the neighborhood we wanted to be in. And we looked at about 6 or 8 houses out there while our house was on the market. And then when our house sold, we went and bought one. It was that simple. And we were ready. And actually, one of the houses we had looked at, we weren't able to get it. It sold. It got away from us while our house was on the market. But our house sold, we went and bought one of them. And we were okay with that. Because we're not really like freaking out about a house or something. We can— how— there's houses on every corner, you can get another one. So it's not like we're getting married, we're just buying a house. So you can move again if you need to. So the third option is sell your house and go rent, and then look for a house with the cash in your hand and just buy one.

So any one of those three will work, and any one of those three will work without you borrowing money. So no, in no case would I tell you to go get a mortgage to make your ex-husband happy. No case.

Yeah, I mean, not to make him happy, but well, it would be nice if we could be closer to each other. He should have moved.

No, no, no, no, he's the one moved away. Hello. All right, Abby's in Portland, Oregon.

Hey Abby, what's up? Hey, thanks for taking my call. Sure. Um, I recently was appointed a power of attorney for an elderly family member who's not a parent. Um, as I've gotten into her finances, I realized that She's got no money. Her IRA has been completely drained. She's got two savings accounts that have just basically pennies in them. Where did it go? Um, she had someone that she had hired to assist her. And, um, in the last six months prior to me becoming POA, several hundred thousand dollars went up missing. Um, which is interesting for conversation. That's a different conversation. We are, we are, we're on it.

I'm angry with you and for her. Okay. All right. Yes. I, it just makes me shake.

But there's, I'm not going to see a penny of that.

It's probably gone. I don't disagree.

Now she owns free and clear, no mortgage, a condo and a house. She also has a piece of commercial property that I can ultimately liquidate to fund her care needs. She's in an extended care facility now, but there's going to be some time, right, before I can get my hands on any of those dollars.

How much, how much time do you need? I mean, how long will it take?

Well, I didn't— what's the condo worth? Uh, it's currently like, if I were to look it up on Zillow, it's like $300,000.

Is it the cheaper of the three? It is the cheapest of the three.

Yeah, sacrifice it. Okay.

And get some cash in the bank to take care of her. Right.

But still, even, even if, you know, I'm just thinking like if I got an offer tomorrow, which I won't because my my, my, yeah, because I can't list it tomorrow. I could probably list it next week, um, because I got to get it cleaned out.

But that would still be— not if you're sacrificing it. You're going to list it and you can list it and sell it by the morning and close it by Friday to an investor and sell it, sell it for 2.25, dump it. Okay, if she has zero cash and she needs money this moment, correct? Yes, that's what I was understanding. Okay. Yes. And then the other two properties you got patience on because you did this. Yes. Okay. Otherwise you're gonna have a person in a nursing home who's out of her right mind and you are the POA, and now you've gone and gotten a loan. Oh, gross. Yeah, that's icky. That's so icky. I'd rather give up $75,000 of her equity and sell that other condo for 2.25 as is and you shovel it out, Mr. Investor. Investor. Okay, let some guy that took a TikTok course come give you some money.

Okay, okay, that makes sense. I mean, it, it absolutely does, and it's very clean and very, very quick.

I used to be that guy 30 years ago. I used to buy real estate like that, and one of the things we, you know, we're gonna not gonna give you a lot, but we'll close it Friday.

Okay, would you do one of those, one of those billboards that you see, we buy your home for cash?

Or shop around? You know, the first thing I would, first thing I would do is just go to Ramsey Solutions and hit the Ramsey Trusted and call the real estate agent that are two that were in the area where that condo is that are Ramsey Trusted and tell them, what have I got to do to move this? Do you have a couple of investors in your pocket that buy stuff at a deal? Because I got to move this thing by and close it for Friday and see if it— how any of them respond. That's probably the easiest way to do it. And they'll take care— tell her, tell them what's going on and they'll help take care of you. And, you know, you take the least beating on it as possible. But I'm, I'm thinking $200,000. I'm thinking $50,000, $75,000 off of $300,000 is probably gonna get you anybody you want. Okay. And yeah, and there's— you're 100— there's there any— there's nothing else you can move that'll buy you a month? I mean, is there a car you could dump that would buy you a month? She has a 2012 Volkswagen Jetta.

That might be— get me $1,000.

No, it'll get you $500, but it's not gonna get you— what is the bill?

What's the bill and who's it owed to?

Well, she has her bill for assisted living, which, um, I, I covered her first month in deposit. That was $7,500. And that— but then she She has a couple of credit cards. She has some medical bills from hospitalizations and annual checkups.

I don't have to pay any of those for 60 days. They can sit. Okay. The only thing I gotta do is take care of her. Right. If the JEDO— what's the monthly bill on the assisted living? It'll be around $5,000. If the JEDO will cover your month, dump it to Carvana or something. Somebody, and that might buy you a little bit more time, and you don't have to sacrifice the condo quite so deep to get it moved the next month and then systematically work through the other two properties. Maybe we don't have to be quite so desperate, but just kind of work through your cash flow analysis that way. You're doing a great job, and thank you for taking care of her.

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Our Scripture of the Day, John 14:6. Jesus answered, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. John Maxwell said, "A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way." Classic John. Nice alliteration there, John. Well done. Scott is in Washington, D.C. Hey, Scott, how are you?

I'm great, Dave. Thank you both for taking my call.

Sure, how can we help?

I was married for 15 years. We've been divorced for 20 years. We had two daughters. They're in the mid to late 20s now, both very good people, never in trouble, not weedheads, they have professional careers. We just never had a relationship, sadly. Or, you know, I've always said it is what it is. You can't make things happen sometimes. But I get an occasional, you know, random text, "Hey, how are you?" But nothing structured like at Christmas or Easter or Thanksgiving or Father's Day or birthday, never a card, getting over a call. Just, you know, the drop of a hat, you might get something random. My mom even will send, you know, $50 on a birthday, and there's no gratitude. I mean, when I was that age, I was writing thank you notes because you couldn't afford long-distance calls. And yeah, it's just, it was second nature. And, um, you know, doing my final documents now, I'm getting ready to rewrite the will. I'm like, they're not in it currently. And I'm starting to rethink it, you know. Is their distance caused by something out of my control? Maybe they had somebody in their ear. I don't know.

I don't want to ask those questions. It just seems intrusive and a lot of water over the dam. And as I'm about to rewrite everything, how do you include what you know, you know, the behavior into into your will and your estate plan. Yeah, you've always said, uh, you know, a wise man leaves an inheritance to his children's children. And, and, you know, I, I'm at a loss with where to go from here.

Yeah, well, the sad thing is, is when there's that much pain, there's not a clear answer. Um, you're not morally obligated to give anyone money, legally obligated, or spiritually obligated to give anyone money. And when you leave— a wise man or a good man, a godly man leaves an inheritance to his children's children is a proverb. But that inheritance is— sometimes pastors will teach that as a spiritual inheritance, not a money inheritance, and I think it's both, personally. But if you're prohibited from doing that because you don't have a relationship with the grandchildren's parents, then you can't do that. So you're prohibited in terms of having an influence with them. And so you're under no obligations, and there's a lot of pain, and it's very difficult to weed through all of that and find something. The only thing I— I would throw in is just, I have never— I mean, when you write this down, it's as if it's done, okay, until you change it again, okay? If you die before you change it, it's going to be done. And so in a sense, when I write down something on my will or in my estate plan, I consider it done until I change it.

So I have to be willing to, quote, die with it, not I've got to live with it, right? So in that sense, one of my things, and I do this with team members that are leaving, I do it with anything that's a situation like this, I have never regretted generosity. And generosity is a form of grace, and that is undeserved, that's what grace is. It's undeserved. Your daughters don't deserve this money based on the fact that they have not reached out, have not created a relationship in their— as adults, they're old enough to have gotten away from people in their ear, to have healed from whatever happened 30 years ago or whatever else, and establish some kind of relationship. They're not in a deserving role. But deserved hasn't got anything to do with generosity or grace. I'm— I, you know, if you did something in the name of generosity or grace in your will, you would be doing it for you. It makes sense. Not for them. And that's a good thing. And if you did something for the grandbabies, you'd be doing it for you because you don't even know them.

Oh, they haven't hit the ground yet.

Oh, we don't even have any yet. Okay. Well, if there's grandkids— I'm sorry, if there's grandkids, and that's that's the children's children, right? So, or if you left something in trust for future grandkids, that would be, you know, you could do that. And, you know, it's more about you addressing all of the stuff that's in your stomach and in your heart while you're dealing with all this and has very little to do with what's in your head.

Yeah, it's definitely a humility play, Scott, not an ego play, right, of this, "I've raised great kids and I get to leave them this," you know what I mean? Feels good, right? This is the, this is the other end of the spectrum. So it would, it would, yeah, it would be out of—

sad. I'm sorry.

Out of a level of just humility and that you love them because of, just for the sake that they are your children and not on any level of condition of a relationship, which is sad. Really, really sad. But that's where that's, that's the posture that it would come from, is just as their dad.

You might be asking how old you are. 60, be 63 be, uh, this later this year. Okay. Are you ill? No, no. Okay. I've taught your goddaughter at the U of O for a time.

Okay, thank you. I appreciate that. All right. Well, finally. Yeah, so we're the same age.

I mean, I'm 65. Scott, can I be nosy and ask how much, how much will you be leaving just in general if it's not to them or to them?

But right now the net worth about $2.5 million. Okay. And, you know, I'm not a spender by any means.

Where would you leave it if it wasn't to the— to your daughters? I'm just curious.

Right now it's a couple different charities. Okay. Uh, you know, orphanage, battered women's shelter, and a church.

Yeah, I would do some of both because of you, not because of them.

And makes good sense.

And, um, and you can decide the proportion. Portions and whatever. And if you want to go really deep into it, you could leave some into a trust for future grandchildren as well. Now you've got to figure out who the trustee is in this mess, bless their heart. But, but that's, you know, that's the 3 things you could do: nothing, something, and/or something for the grandkids. And I, I would It would be hard for Dave, even though I try to live my life on the other thing I just taught you, it'd be hard for Dave to leave a bunch of money to somebody who hadn't spoken to me. Like, almost impossible. I couldn't do it. I'd leave something, probably. But I leave a tip when the service is bad, because it says something about me, not about the service. And that's gonna be their freaking Dave Ramsey story. So, there you go. That thing too. But that's not gonna do with this discussion, but—

Yeah. Yeah, I mean, that's a— It's a hard, sad thing. Well, it is. And you know, and the hope, Scott, obviously, is that between now and then, that there's some level of reconciliation. And you know what I mean? And things can change. Relationships can change. And you know, that's the ultimate prayer regardless of the money, but for the financial side, Yeah, it just would take a deep level of humility, because you're getting nothing from it, right? To leave you something, because you gave me something, there's like a condition there. Yeah, but that's not— it's not really conditional.

It's just— well, it makes sense, I know.

But, you know, and it's not like the girls, because he said his daughters are not, you know, irresponsible or crazy. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's hard.

That's tough. I'm sorry. I'm sorry you're fighting with your dad. Facing that. Yeah. Oh, man. Yeah, sometimes generosity and forgiveness and grace have more to do with what it does for me than it does the person that it's directed toward. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

There almost could be a level of healing in it. I don't know if that's true or not, but I don't know. There's kind of this like extra extension. Or what you're leaving it to is beautiful too, Scott, the legacy that can pass on if you choose not to, what you've just lined out. Yep. Incredible, incredible work in your city.

That puts this hour of The Ramsey Show in the books. We'll be back with you before you know it. In the meantime, remember, there's ultimately only one way to financial peace, and that's to walk daily with the Prince of Peace, Christ Jesus.