"I have 350k Of Debt And Haven't Filed Taxes In 8 Years"

brought to you by the every dollar app start budgeting for free today normal is broken common sense is weird so we're here to help you transform your life from the Ramsey network in the Fairwinds Credit Union studio this is the Ramsey show I'm Dave Ramsey Ken Coleman number one best-selling author a Ramsey network star of front row seat is my co-host today open phones at triple 8 8 2 5 5 2 2 5 Teresa is in Providence Rhode Island hi Teresa how are you I am good gentlemen how are you better than we deserve what's up excellent are you in a good mood that's the first question because I need you to sit back and think I want you to count to three before you answer my question wow okay I can't wait I will say is this call host I just spoke with him for about five minutes I think he's in a fabulous mood I don't know if that helps you well no I don't know don't give me Wow this is interesting okay weather forecast for we bring the question we do okay here we go stormy I have an ex-husband I have two children my ex has a girlfriend and a son and we are all great friends we give white trash new meaning without a doubt every Saturday we go to brunch together and then we have a misery and we do something together that's miserable that's why we call it the misery trip but my point here is neither one of my children who are 23 and 21 financially sound out of school in good careers no debt bank in their coin like you read about can't buy houses so we're thinking of a family compound we're thinking of do we put it in a trust do we have each person have a quarter say in it what happens when one of them wants to leave this compound do we have to have a vote so that they can go out but they have to have equity to go with them so they could buy their own house not that I think anyone would ever leave the compound but just to throw it out there is a possibility so we want to do it the right way but we all want to have our own little independent houses on this land can it be done without I don't know shotgunning each other and you should know in our family dynamics we have very expensive purses and very expensive guns and I will agree with you two guns to a purse is absolutely correct I will say this sounds like a great idea for a reality show oh yeah we could put Kardashians out of business no doubt in my mind wow well y'all are a lot of fun so my my problem is both kids want to do houses but they can't afford it yes they can only yes they can well they can in five years well so what they'll still be in there 20s people buy a house in the first time it's not in the world all right well we can't right fair enough we would we were all talking about if we did it and we kind of put a trust together yeah I'm on the hill coming down I don't want anything in my name I think there's more downside than upside here this is one of those things that all of the variables would have to work perfectly for everyone to come out intact and as we all know all the variables never work out perfectly so there's just so many negative things that can happen from this that outweigh the few positives that I wouldn't do it okay you could get stuck yeah this weird relationship you've got could go sideways again you know it could be you know the kid could get stuck in there and or Mary's a girl who doesn't want anything to do with this compound and then he stuck and then we have to have a communal vote like it's communism or something that this just no I'm against it yeah maybe all by houses on the same block that'd be fine or if you bought a piece of property and everyone had a had their own parcel that was marketable and everybody's not pissed if they sell it later you know then that's an option then to get a larger piece of land where it can be parceled out to each of us but again again as long as everybody's cool when I sell my house and move at that point I don't write the older ones will like I said I'm on the hill down so I never mean I was looking not to put anything in my name necessarily well I'm not that that you know it doesn't matter just whoever has a piece of property they have their own life and they have boundaries and they have legal rights and they have relational rights to at some day at some point someday sell this house because about the only thing I'm sure of is there are no forever homes except heaven and so at some point your son is a grandfather and he wants to move away where his kids are in Phoenix and somebody's gonna be pissed if with the whole things based on well you're the one that broke it all up you know and I don't I don't need that thing I just don't need any of that so our kids our three kids live within a mile of each other and within 25 minutes of sharing an eye but everybody has owns their own thing and everybody's allowed to buy or sell and we talk about it sometimes as just you know family relations cheer and one of one of ours and bought it sold a home and moved up considerably the other day and we were cheering them on and we have a discussion about it but we don't get to say no you can't do that or we're mad at you yeah that that freaked me out just listening to that and I would say this you got to know when you've got to win and take the win and be okay with the win and I think the weekly brunch where you guys are all happy in this crazy scenario is a win I think you should leave it there that's a miracle in and of itself so enjoy the weekly brunch don't try to make this whole living thing this controlled community it just feels weird and if someone's gonna be let down yeah good question good question and you know it's kind of a theme I've been on for the last two weeks Ken and I'll circle back on it too because the one of the driving motivations was a 23 year old can't buy a house yeah okay our 26 year old can't buy a house in Orlando Florida well a they can but be they can't have been first victimized by the large banks the car companies and the student loan machine and so if you're 26 and you have a $1,200 car payment because you got screwed by Lexus Motor Credit believing you were building up your FICO score and then you ran up a bunch of visa debt because you're building up points that matter not to anyone anything and then you went and got a degree for $180,000 from a university that some somehow supposed to make you successful in a degree feel like left-handed puppetry or German polka history and then you can't figure out why you can't get a good job and you're $180,000 in debt and then you know and you just keep going where these big banks these car companies the FICO program the student loan program has trapped the Gen Z's and the millennials now the millennials and the Gen Z signed up for it I went broke in my 20s because I was such an idiot I signed up with these types of people and they took my head off but when people start talking about a 23 year old 26 year old it's not affordable now it's because they first and foremost have been screwed and they're trapped in all these other debt payments and that makes them think they can't buy a house no they got to get out of that mess and quit playing footsie with these big banks because let me tell you City Bank runs washed up actors on there saying what's in your wallet Bradley Cooper does not really live in a lobby boys and girls I'm just saying you know and at some point y'all got to go I'm not gonna get screwed by you people anymore I'm not gonna take it anymore I'm not gonna do business with people who piss on me all the time I quit and when Gen Z and millennials start doing that they get out of that the affordability crisis in air quotes will really start to go away you you know one of the first things I discovered working in the financial world is how absolutely devastating it is when the breadwinner of a family dies and there's too little life insurance or none at all grieving families are suddenly left behind scrambling to pay bills and trying to make ends meet I also discovered that there are a lot of ripoffs in the life insurance world like that whole life crap posing as an investment opportunity what you need is level term life insurance usually 10 to 12 times your income which is the smartest most affordable way to protect your family the key is finding an independent broker who represents a ton of companies and works for you not for the insurance company this is exactly what my friend Jeff Zander and his team at Zander insurance are all about they shop the term life companies to find you the best options and they've been around for over 95 years so you know they'll be there when you need them Zander is the real deal and that's why they've handled all my personal insurance for over 25 years I trust them and you can too visit zander.com for instant online quotes or for a more personal touch give them a call at 800 356 4282 Carlos is with us in San Francisco. Hey Carlos, how are you doing well? Thank you for having me. Sure. How can we help? So I kind of did what you probably did a long time ago. I started a business and it was booming made my first million in a couple of years and it just kind of went it just my financial life just spiraled out of control and now I don't know if I should go bankrupt and figure out a way how to get back on track. I haven't done any any payroll taxes and I owe since 2017-2018. I also haven't filed taxes since I was in 2017-2018 and credit cards I have over $70,000 in credit card debt. I have a commercial line of credit which is another 30,000 I owe the bank. I took an SBA loan out which is the emergency funding this is during the PPP time. Sorry I might have it's the one for COVID. I qualify for that because I didn't file my 2021 or 2022 taxes so I had to actually get a loan out to keep my employees on board with me and that's $132,500 there so altogether it's well over $350,000 in debt. Is your business still open? It is. I just had to let go of all of my employees and I had to minimize all of my accounts. Currently I think I have like four or five accounts that I drive to every single night. My industry is janitorial business so yeah it's tough. So what are you making with the 34 accounts? So it's $9,777 that's per month and I did the math on all my expenses they equal out to about $7,877 a month. Are you married? I'm engaged. Okay when do you plan to get married? Oh Jesus not anytime soon. Okay all right what does she make? I'd probably say around the $3,000 a month. Okay how old are you? 20 no 38 sorry 38. All right well this is a really really scary situation and it didn't happen suddenly it's happened pretty gradually. Absolutely. So really really bad news for you that apparently you're not aware of. 941 payroll taxes are not bankruptible and neither and neither is the IRS so all of your taxes are going to be there if you file bankruptcy. I'm not sure if this SBA loan is bankruptible because it's COVID related it might be. Certainly the credit cards in the line of credit are bankruptible but you're not the you know the problem doesn't go away with bankruptcy is my point. You still got a massive problem and so the first thing I need you to do before we even talk about bankruptcy is when you get off the phone I want you to go to ramseysolutions.com and click on tax ELPs endorsed local providers find the tax person in your area that we are as Ramsey trusted and I want you to sit down with them and develop a strategy to get caught up on your filings. Typically when you have not filed this far back they'll take three years tax returns you don't have to go all the way to 2017 and and then you'll of course owe those taxes and I don't know what they'll do with the potential owing from those others. The 941s however you withheld taxes on your employees right right and then didn't pay it correct yeah that's a trust account and those live forever that's and that's the IRS puts that in the extremely serious bucket yeah that one is like really scary so you need to develop a strategy with a tax person on the 941s and on getting your returns caught up because here's what's scaring me apparently you didn't realize not paying income taxes is not a criminal offense not filing is a criminal offense correct 2,561 people went to jail last year they put people in jail for not filing okay and you have not filed a lot so I want you but but I've never in 35 years of doing this seen someone actually get prison time or get criminally charged if they come forward but if the IRS comes and finds you you're going to be screwed so you need to take care of this proactively tomorrow you need to meet with a tax tax person and start developing a game plan on your back taxes and your back 941s then you can start looking at whether or not we you know what I would do is just not pay the credit card and cut it up I would not pay the commercial line of credit and I would not pay the SBA which by the way is what happens if you file bankruptcy right yeah they don't get paid so I would not pay them and I would take all of the cash flow above living expenses and start dumping it first and foremost on the 941s and then secondly on whatever back IRS taxes you have and if one of these others comes after you and tries to shut you down or foreclose on something or whatever that might force you into bankruptcy but we're going to address the non the things that are not bankruptible which is the IRS in this case before we bother with a stupid line of credit or credit card yeah and then you go to working as hard as you can work and you properly pay and file your taxes every day for the rest of your life from this day forward oh yeah that has affected your ability to do business because it's a monster in the closet absolutely yeah and you wake up in the middle of the night and you don't know why I know it's called stress and you're hurting you're hurting and you're scared yeah it's terrifying so that's what I would do are you in a good church by chance I don't go to church I do believe in I just don't have the time to I work yeah you don't have the time not to now you need a you need a relationship that is above and beyond hard work you're not afraid of hard work you've just made a mess and you need some people in your life that love you regardless of how messy you are and that's the place to get it so I'm gonna I'm gonna suggest you plug into that because it's the the answer to being terrified is to be in community and have friends lonely people are super terrified more than people who have friends in their corner make sense absolutely yeah so get get some people in your corner I have a homework assignment for you Carlos we don't have time to unpack it but what I would have loved to have sat with you on is to identify what was going right in other words what was working when you were really killing it you started the call saying we had some great success I think you mentioned over a million dollars of revenue I think you need to at some point spend enough time to write it down and say what was working what was I doing right when we were doing when we were crushing it and in times of failure where businesses can go up and down one of the great exercises is to identify that now here's the reason for that go back to doing that that's right what has to change what do I need to do in order to start doing that again because that was a formula that worked and I think right now you're in a desperate situation so if you can get some clarity through that exercise and start to repeat that again that's your best chance to make more money and dig yourself out of this so Carlos when you're working really really really hard and you're managing the money we're going to buy food lights and water shelter transportation and pay taxes back taxes in your case and that's all you need to be doing right now complete focus on that and complete focus on any new accounts you can add and start growing the business back again with a proper accounting system that keeps you caught up on these things because where you are is terrifying I'm sorry man you call me back if we can be more helpful as you're fighting through this we'll help you any way we can Hey guys you know those too good to pass up holiday promos well they can be great but with every spin of the digital wheel the newsletter sign up the coupon code you're giving away your data you think that info just stays with the store I doubt it it goes into the corners of cyberspace where data brokers grab it repackage it and sell it to spammer scammers and generally bad people the FTC just reported consumers lost over 12.5 billion dollars to fraud last year and that's not just a number that's your money your time and your privacy and that's why I recommend delete me your digital cleanup crew the delete me privacy pros dig through hundreds of these data broker sites they scrub your info and they keep it gone which means fewer weird robo calls fewer spam texts and it's the gift that keeps on giving because it's an annual subscription and Ramsey listeners can get 20% off those annual plans at join delete me dot com slash Ramsey with code Ramsey at checkout do it today that's joined delete me dot com slash Ramsey code Ramsey half a point drop in the Fed what's that gonna do to mortgage rates probably going down some more what's that gonna do to the housing market probably gonna heat up a little bit so Merry Christmas if you're buying or selling a home it's a big deal and with the click bait and the headlines and all the data out there saying that you can't do it it's awful it's horrible it's not it's not great but it's not to the point you can't do it you can do it home prices have held steady steady all through the winter they're hovering right around 424,000 median sales price in America mortgage rates are at five and a half and probably going on down with this they generally follow the Fed as we all know they're not directly tied but generally follow it if you want to learn more about the housing market trends and get free tools to help you buy or sell with confidence go to RamseySolutions.com slash market and always remember that there are Ramsey trusted real estate pros that you can get connected to at RamseySolutions.com as well Darrell is in Orlando hi Darrell how are you hi Dave hey Ken how are you guys great man what's up oh just got a question for you um luckily it's kind of a good question but really I want your y'all's opinion on this um I'll throw out the question and then we'll fill in the details after for you to formulate your your thoughts so the question is my wife and I are both recently 61 so she's retired I've got nine more years so what I'm thinking what we're considering would it be reasonable for us to cut back on our 401 on my 401k contributions to free up some fun money for us how much are you putting into your 401k percentage wise uh percentage wise 16 percent which right now is about 33 34 000 it's the uh the max plus the catch up so you make two you make 200 a year about 220 yep and and so 34 from 200 is 167 166 and you can't have any fun on 166 oh no we're having fun now but we're thinking we could have maybe a little more fun do a little more giving that kind of thing mm-hmm okay we're we're empty nesters kids are why do I have a feeling I'm going to hear a ridiculously large number in this 401k right now it's I wouldn't call it ridiculously large well a little bit of background and and thanks to your teachings Dave uh our net worth is about 2.1 um 1.3 of that is invest cash investments the other 800 in real estate so um my my thought is the if I don't even touch the money that's there they should probably double over that nine year period a little more than double over the nine years yeah it'll double on about seven assuming you're invested in good mutual funds um yeah yeah they're doing well yeah is your wife work outside the home no no no she's uh oh you said you said that earlier okay so what are you talking about reducing this cutting it back for maybe uh 16 percent to like 10 percent and free up about uh about 12,000 a year about about a thousand a month which is you know I kind of look at that as maybe an extra cruise okay well you're certainly okay and yeah yeah you're right you're 1.2 in mutual funds would be 2.4 you know when you're 68 and when you're 75 uh it's going to be 5 million and that's if you don't touch it and you just let it grow and I got a feeling you're going to be able to do that house is paid off right I think so yep okay zero real estate's paid off zero debt no debt yeah okay well I mean kind of what we're doing is sometimes the way people view retirement is suddenly okay like you save save save save save save save then you retire and you live off the savings okay right and so what we're doing is kind of going for the last last nine years we're just kind of going to go in the middle we're going to save a little less yeah we're going to save a little less and use that money now rather than later and you're is it going to hurt you not substantially um yeah I probably would do this yeah but I I'm just I'm just curious if you told me you had a half a million dollars in saving in your investments I would say no yeah I get that okay and I dare I have no problem with what Dave said I I always lean that direction and live life but I am curious with your income and and no debt and just how responsible you've been this is all about $12,000 yeah could Dave and I not find $12,000 in your existing budget oh we could but um it's just like like I said we we do things now I mean you know we go on trips with our friends but you know this would be a little extra here again to not only maybe do an extra trip or two but also give you know some more to our local charities and that kind of thing which we do quite a bit of now but uh this would just I mean the way I look at it it's about a hundred thousand hundred and eight thousand dollars of spending now to versus um I did did the math it's a difference of about 180,000 at the 16 versus 10 percent yeah so well not and you're not counting what it's going to grow to over that nine years but still that's that's okay you it's not none of this is going to put you anywhere near anything except really wealthy and so yeah you're fine you're fine and I think I would do that and in your situation it's what your desire is so there's one of the things that um we get a lot of can and this is not that call but it's like I've saved and now I don't know how to have fun right you know I've got this big old pile of money now how do I reprogram my brain from being frugal all the time to actually enjoying some of it and so um uh you know Darrell didn't have that trouble no no but Darrell's okay he's done a good job and you've got you know you're a multi-millionaire at 61 years old congratulations sir the American dream is alive and well there are Darrells out there everywhere boys and girls your communist college professor was wrong they're everywhere this this is the greatest land the world has ever known the greatest opportunity for someone who has nothing to become wealthy in the history of mankind there are Darrells everywhere and we've got the data to prove it yeah pick up baby steps millionaires the book the latest uh not the latest one of the latest bestsellers I've had and the study on millionaires is the white paper in the back of it you can look at all the research it's there it's there's a lot of Darrells out there and he's done a great job oh yeah and I want to make sure people caught this he's still talking about working nine more years and as Dave pointed out that 2.1 or whatever it was million he's going to double more than double in that nine-year period and then through their 70s it's going to double again and if they live in their 80s so I mean long term the amount of money he's got already is going to be way more than enough as it just does compound interest Amanda is in Columbus Mississippi hi Amanda how are you hi Dave thank you for taking my call sure so um my question is how do my husband and I navigate money and in laws during the holidays so we are we'll officially be out of debt in 18 months we have about 105 thousand dollars left with a combined salary of 162 thousand we both decided not to travel while we were in the process of paying off debt because we're broke so we can even you know afford to travel good however our my in-laws are wanting to come see us um we don't have the greatest relationship uh the biggest issue is that they both have an alcohol problem my father-in-law is very violent and unpredictable when drunk he's like tried to attack my husband he's attacked his daughter um they verbally attack me um what's that got to do with travel well they they're basically saying that we want to come see you well that's fine come see us get out to us well we told them that but the issue is is that they drink and so even if they're visiting if anybody's visiting your home against violent they just have to leave but they have a hotel yes they will have a hotel so we did make it clear that we you know we didn't want them to stay with us um i mean this has nothing to do with you being on baby step two this has to do with how you're gonna how you and your husband are going to make a decision of someone coming into your home potentially drunk and potentially violent that's all this is has nothing to do with travel has nothing to do with baby step two it's just how am i what kind of boundaries am i going to put up what kind of communication am i going to have i wish dr john doloney was here but i mean you're done you don't want him to come and you don't want to be near him so i think again i can't do anything do with baby step two but if you if your husband wants to have him come to the hotel and visit come by as long as you guys are so burned not violent you're welcome to come by but don't bring the drunk and don't bring this violence with you or it won't work out you know that's all that is this is dav ramsey we all want to know that the money we give to charity is doing something that matters that it's making a real change giving someone lasting hope and here's one way to make sure of that give to pre-born they're the real deal proven transparent and changing lives every day i trust pre-born and you can too they're on the front lines of the battle for life partnering with clinics to offer free ultrasounds to mothers in crisis because when a mom sees her baby on that screen something changes it's not just a decision anymore it's a person an 80 of the time when a mom sees that ultrasound she chooses life your twenty eight dollar gift provides one of those ultrasounds just 28 bucks to be the reason someone chooses life and at every clinic the gospel is shared giving moms the chance to choose life and find real hope in christ 28 dollars one ultrasound one heartbeat one mom who realizes she's not alone that's the kind of life changing impact your giving makes through pre-born go now to pre-born.com slash ramsey or call 855-601-2229 that's pre-born.com slash ramsey Andrews in los angeles hi andrew how are you i'm good mr. and thank you for taking my call sure what's up i have a question um so about 10 years ago my dad passed away um and so my mom she she uh took on a lot of the life insurance money and so she downsized her house about three years ago and used half of it to pay for the house and use the other half to show his income well she's been nickling and dining that for the past three years and she's out of money so i remember if she downsized her house why did she need to use the insurance money um she sold it and so she used it was half of the insurance money and half of the equity that she made from her previous house oh i see and so how much insurance money did she receive uh i want to say roughly 300 000 okay so she used 150 seven years after he passes yeah no i'm sorry she used so she received about 300 from there and then received another 250 from the last previous house that we had um so she she got she used equity to pretty much pay for this new house three years ago how much was it so she's been they now it's 240 000 it's owed oh she owes money on the house yes and so my question is um what should we do uh me and my fiance are planning to buy a house in the next year i'm suggesting maybe she sell the house and she can help me invest in a house and so she has a place to live with us where my brother is suggesting that she ran out the house and used that to pay for itself and might i also mention she has zero debt also just other than the house so the house that she currently lives in she owes 250 on yeah 240 yes and what is it worth roughly five okay and so why does she she for for 10 years he's been gone is she not work she knows she was not working how old is she she's 57 okay well there's the problem huh it's not the house that she needs to get a job she thought 300 000 was 3 million it's not and now she needs a job so what should our plan be should there's not our plans her plan should be she gets a job your plan should be you get married and start a life and no you don't move in with her and no you don't use any of her money and she needs her money and no we we don't have a plan she needs a plan she needs to get a job and quit burning through this cash and you need to get married and have a life and just love wave over there at your mom and say i love you yeah i'm scared for her i'm scared for her too because her habits are horrible we cannot believe somebody's gone she's 47 years old when he died and she's developed zero income since then 57 she's been unemployed for maybe five years no she's 57 now you said yes yeah so he died 10 years ago roughly yeah 47 that's how that works yeah so yeah and so now i mean she's not working dude yeah yeah it's not your problem what we're trying to help you see is is that while you have the emotions and you can have the emotions for her and feel bad for her and be scared for her but also have to live your own life yeah i'm scared for your mom you need to get a job matter of fact you needed to get a job five years ago when you lost the other one or whatever happened five years ago so she worked five of the 10 years but um otherwise you're going to lose this house because you're going to burn through this money this is not there's not enough money here to support you have you not figured the math out on that mom and uh i love you i'm cheering for you i sure hope you go get a job and i hope you quit burning through this money because that's what really really really desperately needs to happen and i'll you know i'll introduce y'all this ramsey stuff and they'll help you because we'd love to help her that'd be i'd be happy to do that but um wow but yeah you don't you you're not in a position to rescue her and you're using some of her money to buy you a house that she lives in yeah that's a little self-serving no thank you now i'll pass on that one too let you know you guys need to just love her for where she is and coach her and cheer for her and hopefully she'll follow some of that and that's where i would go josh is with us joss in orlando florida hi josh how are you doing good sir how are you better than i deserve what's up yeah so it's a struggling to pay off a mountain of credit card debt and helping with my spouse sticking to a budget how does putting together how does putting together the budget work at your house how involved is your spouse putting it together uh i'm the one so we're getting the budget yeah they don't have she's having trouble sticking to your budget that she didn't have a vo down no shock yeah it's uh problem is it was up to me to create the budget she would do not want to be involved yeah that's fine but she has to get involved once it's created and look at it and have a vote because we two adults need to accomplish our common goals that we have in this marriage which is survive and prosper yeah so honey we got to sit down look at this together this is what i think it looks like now i need you to look at it and make your changes and then we are going to both agree to stick to after we make the changes because we actually have to be adults devise a plan and follow it children do what feels good and we both have to be adults in this and gosh i need your help i need your vote i need your set of eyes i need your wisdom and i need your input and i need your buy-in and all those things come together so but you you can't do a budget and then come in like moses coming down from the mountain with two tablets and go this is what god says it doesn't work yes and one struggle is we come from two different perspectives on budgeting and money all is raised more on the randy method and she comes from a hispanic household and they more of the freely spend and the bill is that's not a hispanic disease dude that's just a disease everybody's got it gringo's got it too man so you know that's just no that's hillbillies cajuns italians we all got that same disease man so no that's uh uh it's it's called growing up and i'm going to live on less than i make i'm not in the u.s congress and so we need to sit down together but it's about her being a grown woman instead of a little girl who's being taken care of by her man that's bull crap so the two y'all sit down together and work on this together ken when people work together like that it's it increases communication cooperation you're agreeing on your dreams you're agreeing on your fears it changes everything yeah it does and i think in this case it's less about obviously the uh the race of somebody but it is the environment that they grew up in and so your household was very different with how they approached money and her house was different so now we've got to get on the same page and i think i would be asking more questions of your of your wife and i would be asking her is it the principle of every dollar knowing where it's going uh or is it the process that you just don't like and it seems and i would ask these questions you may already know the answer but to get her in a conversation she's not on the witness stand you know you're not attacking you're just going hey help me understand what about the budgeting process you don't agree with or don't like because i need your help yes but the more you can get understanding of why she thinks or acts the way she does about money the better chance you have at getting on the same page and so this is a conversation it might end up in counseling in a good way not a crisis but a hey we need a professional to help us communicate our fears our desires around money so we get on the same page but davie you're absolutely right we when we listen to death free screams it's most obvious when you hear the story no matter which spouse brought the idea home or day's book or whatever has happened once they fully get on the same page it's unbelievable momentum and we hear it all the time and by the way it's not just money momentum relationship momentum across the table yeah the typical death free screams says it changed our marriage that's right we started working together it increased communication increased cooperation it's just so much easier but i would just frame it in i need your help we gotta be two grown-ups and we gotta do this together your vote counts the holidays can come with a lot of pressure to spend family friends secret santa at the office all the things but y'all this season should be about peace not payments that's a big reason why i love fair winds credit union they share the ramsey values of helping you reach your money goals without debt and with the fair winds smart bundle ramsey fans get a no fee checking account a high yield savings to grow your emergency fund and the exclusive ramsey be weird debit card it says debt is normal be weird right there on the front so every time you use it it's a reminder that you're doing your money differently so this christmas skip the credit cards and celebrate progress not payments spend with peace of mind knowing that you're sticking to your budget and staying debt free and check out the fair winds smart bundle today at fair winds dot org slash ramsey and open up the smart bundle and grab your exclusive ramsey be weird debit card that's fair winds dot org slash ramsey fair winds is federally insured by the ncu a welcome back to the ramsey show in the fair winds credit union studios ken colman ramsey personality number one best-selling author and host of the front row seat on that ramsey networks he's my co-host today jenna's in boston hi jenna how are you hi dude thank you for taking my call sure what's up yeah i think i really need your wisdom today i've been following you now for almost a year i'm a single model of two boys both teenagers now by solely with myself but i'm about to i'm indeed and about to get married middle next year he's a very good man very hardworking but i think he's dealing with financial situation he has multiple debts and lots of things that are just in right with him and most of his means to them tell me i got to find out over the course of our dating for about a year um because i was able to step in we've put in some structure but i'm a little bit worried about what happens when we get married and how do we match their finances what do i do how much debt does he have um about 100 000 dollars okay and what does he make about 58 okay and what kind of debt is it um 80 000 is student loan which he abandoned until i made him pick up again um and so he started making payments on that and then there was uh between credit card debts and different and debts that have been defaulted okay did you say that he didn't tell you about these debts and you had to find them no he didn't tell me except for the student loan okay why i don't know so when i stumbled on it i asked questions and i went straight to the government side um i did the case look up and i saw it series of about three or so debt and he claimed that i mean he knew about some of them i don't even know he didn't make any sense no answer but why didn't you tell me he said he was worried he was scared that i would you know feel bad about him or not trust him but he's willing to start making payments and so he together were able to put a structure as we print out seven days this is introducing to davrancy and well the big the big question is not the debts the big question is is this guy going to lie to you every time he's ashamed that's what i'm worried about and so i don't know how to make progress with you know settling down and do you make finances do it separate those things yeah i think i think you guys need some good pre-marriage counseling because trust was broken and um you're you're uncomfortable with a lack of trust yeah i agree i there's a good sign that when you brought up the student loan uh that he said okay i'm going to pick it back up i think he wants to uh please you but he's got to get healthy himself so i think dav's right some premarital counseling and maybe some one-on-one counseling for him i would press pause if you were my sister or cousin or family member and you told me this i'd say i would press pause and i'm going to tell you that today until you get until you can answer as a question and looking in the mirror and say i completely trust this man you really shouldn't put a ring on something that you don't trust it's a bad idea um because that's gonna that that that parlays into a whole bunch of things then yeah and so well he was ashamed okay i i get why he hit it and it's perfectly logical but it there's one person on the planet that you have to trust and that's got to be your spouse and if you can't um then that's either sign of the relationship is struggling or broken or you know one or both parties how we're interacting and sometimes that is a everyone should spend time on premarital counseling by the way the data says that the likelihood of your marriage surviving is greatly increased with in-depth premarital counseling because you not only learn how to talk to each other you learn how to deal with all the rest of the family in that process and boy that's a thing yeah and so on so yeah you guys need to do that anyway but in this case you could dig this out it might not be anything serious but you can't you're you have doubt and doubt is not how you walk down the aisle not on something as major as trust so yeah you got to get where you say i trust this man i'm committing my life to spending my life with this man that that's a lot of trust and so um yeah and and you're single mom with two kids and he's going to be involved with the kids and you got to be able to trust him and he's got to be able to open up to you you got to be a safe place to say i made a mistake uh a safe place to have a discussion that's uncomfortable and uh maybe you are maybe you aren't i don't know but uh um but i would spend it on that pat's in iowa hi pat what's up hi thanks for taking my call sure how can we help i like i like an i like an opinion whether i can my wife and i can buy a winter home based on our financial situation a winter home where is the winter home yeah florida oh a winter home where it's warm in the winter that's what i was wondering too where are we going it's pretty cool i thought we were going ice fishing for a minute okay too all right and so uh yeah you've already got it in iowa you're in it yeah you already got you already got that figured out okay cool so what does the uh florida home cost well we're thinking around 300 000 do you have 300 000 well yeah we do all we was like a little rundown or where i'm at sure how much what's your net worth well our net worth is about 1.3 and uh net income so starting two pensions is about 85 and our yearly rmd is about 22 and what's your what's your uh age we have both 75 okay all right what's your current home worth current home's worth about 280 and you got family in that area yes okay so you're going to have 300 and 300 in real estate 600 out of 1.2 and the other six or 800 will be in your retirement i assume yes i would do that yes okay if i'm paying cash you have no debt you have no debt right i'm sorry you have no debt right no okay and we rarely really touch the portfolio except for the rmd yeah so how much um time are you already spending in florida four months what are you doing when you're there where what kind of housing are you just running a house yes we're running a house we've been doing this for about eight years and the rent runs about 13 000 for the four months and we figured we could use that to cover the maintenance on something we buy yeah easily and it goes up in value yeah actually that's exactly what i was going to suggest because some people think they want second homes and they've never done it and um but you've been doing it you've got you've you've you've had your practice run you've tried the shoe on it fits so yeah that even ensures even more that i'm doing this way to go man congratulations retire some millionaire yeah so fun and boy oh boy getting out of iowa in the winter time have you ever been to iowa and i bet you have i remember a february it was a speaking gig at one point and i remember getting out of the car to go into the hotel and i couldn't breathe for 15 seconds this blast of cold air hit me and i'm like who lives here and i went around the town interviewing people how do you do this no it's great i love that so that's very that's a classic there are you old enough to wear like you're when you're growing up people had the goal of someday retiring in florida no question yeah okay it was like it was like the retirement state no question when i was a kid that was like you had arrived yeah if you got a place in florida and that's boca del vista or whatever it was on sign fell you this episode is sponsored by better help the holidays are full of traditions some of these traditions we love some we just survive and in addition to the traditions let's be honest this time of year can also be a time of noise and pressure and loneliness here's what i want you to do i want you to ask yourself what really matters to you this year and therapy can give you a space to do just that to think to breathe to ask yourself what do you want this year and to make room for peace that's why i recommend better help better help has over 30 000 licensed therapists that have helped over five million people worldwide with an average rating of 4.9 out of five stars better help is online so it fits around your schedule even during the chaotic holiday times you get online and just answer a few questions and they'll match you with someone who fits your needs and if your therapist is not the right fit you can switch anytime for no extra cost this month start a new tradition by taking care of you visit betterhelp.com slash ramsey to get 10 off your first month that's better help h-e-l-p.com slash ramsey well if you feel like me you're you know i feel like sometimes you're starting from scratch with your money i don't feel that way now but i remember feeling that way it's not because you aren't disciplined it's not because you're not consistent it's because you're emotionally overwhelmed and emotions are part of personal finance managing your money part of it is managing the emotions in our new book what no one tells you about money jade washaw gives you a clear picture a clear guided process that helps you diagnose the emotion and put together a system to actually follow common sense while admitting that there's an emotion involved hello pre-order right now for 24.99 this is an incredible book get over a hundred dollars in free bonus items and enhanced audio book early access to the e-book instant access to an exclusive video your financial checkup with jade an exclusive three-week online book club and live q and a with jade pre-order at ramsey solutions.com or click the link in the show notes and we'll get you started you really should try this one andrew's with us in chicago hi andrew how are you good how are you davin ken better than we deserve what's up so um i just got a quick question basically regarding the investments so my wife and i we've been married for going on three years now we've got a five month old daughter we've worked through the first three baby steps paid off everything except for the house got our three to six months saved and we both invest into our 401k through like our workplaces and we're just looking like where do we go next to get to that like 15 that you guys recommend okay so you maxed your 401ks yes sir i am i match at three percent at my work and my wife is staying with her um employer through her school now max means you put all you can put in not up to three percent sorry i i didn't match my no i'm sorry max uh so have you got a 401k that has a roth option it does not no that i that's what i was going to ask about okay so here's the here's the thing we found out match is best so get all the match you can you've done that with your three percent does your wife have a match i am 90 percent sure it's the same at match at three okay perfect that's easy that means we still need to put 12 percent of our household income away somewhere what is your household income um roughly um probably right around that 90 thousand a year roughly okay all right cool so let's 15 percent is um you know 14 000 and some change right yes and so uh and we're already putting three percent away so let's call that three thousand so let's just say we need to put another 10 or 11 000 away you both can do a roth ira and just go to ramsey solutions.com and click on smart vester pro okay and click on smart vester you'll be introduced to one of our smart vester pros or two or three of them and you can choose which one you want to work with they've got the heart of a teacher they'll sit down teach you about this and then show you how to do it and help you actually create the roth ira in some good growth stock mutual funds and it sounds like you guys need to be putting away somewhere around 10 000 so you could put you know five or six thousand each into a roth ira and have a really good plan going with the three percent over at work and the three percent over at work also needs to be in good growth stock mutual funds if you take your options that you're allowed to invest in down to the smart vester pro when you sit down with them they'll help you pick out your 401k options while they're getting your ira signed up and then if you want to open a 529 for your kids college you can do that there too very easy to do and but it's you know it's like anything the very first time you do it there's a little bit of intimidation but investing is really not that intellectually challenging there's not that much to it and but and so once you get started on it and you start understanding it you're gonna go oh that's all there is to it oh that's it no big deal and and you'll be just fine so that's really good questions sir very well done you're gonna be very wealthy that's cool you're getting started early i love it i love it i love it very good carlos is in austin texas hey carlos how are you hey david it's an honor to talk to you i've been listening to your shows i was 14 i'm 26 now wow yeah my question is um so my wife and i we recently lost our baby and this kind of got us rethinking like you know what are we doing with our lives so i just had the question um is it a good idea to take money out of our investments and pay off our house or should we just leave that money and let it keep compounding and i kind of had hopes of leaving my corporate career and trying to retire and live off of that at 26 yeah um man i'm sorry that she lost your baby um yeah it's heartbreaking but yeah doing doing nothing doing nothing for the rest of your life because your heart is broken um it is a method of hiding from the pain and if you don't want to work in corporate america i don't blame you for that but we need to be doing something well for sure yeah you're too valuable you need to be adding value to our lives out here um yeah i think it's just how do we do the corporate exit you know and my idea was like well i want to sub this year i've been doing uh stock option trading and anyways pretty much quit that good so everything going on yeah it's kind of funny i asked ai i said what would they bring to the stage he knew i was trading option he said something like you're playing with fire in the food busting gasoline so that kind of woke me up hold on let's get it let's get the real man's let's get the real version that's that sounds pretty good i thought i'm going with that i'm curious to know what your current nest egg is if you have one at all by the way you set this question of what is your financial picture as far as investments um the cash like 420 how much in your how much in your retirement accounts uh well that's counting my retirement oh that's your retirement accounts well you've done really well for yeah but dude you're not ready to retire no four and 20s no i don't know it's a return yeah i mean my whole goal your dream i guess was like oh you know if i keep doing the stock option trading i can you know create a new income and leave my corporate job but i think you do need to create a different income not there and i think you do need to leave the corporate job after you have created a different income but i uh but i don't think you need to retire yeah you're you don't have enough money to retire right that's kind of the problem i'm facing here's a fun exercise year but i i'm i'm going to give you my book i'm going to give you my book as a gift find the work your wire to do it has about a 20 minute assessment and it's going to spit out with the help of ai a really good job description where you can use what you do best and do what you love to produce results you care about and i'm going to tell you it's a great exercise in this time of hurt but it's also going to set you up because because i think you know the answer i don't have time to pull it out of you but i think there's a couple ideas that if you could make a smart financial transition from where you are today to where you want to be i think you would pull the trigger on it i think that's the kind of life you're looking for so hang on we'll give you that book but i want you to really lean into the results and ask yourself who are the people i really want to help what problem or desire they have and begin to lock into what your why is as it relates to work and i think you'll find it'll help you heal as you see that uh even though this is a devastating loss you and your wife aren't on the shelf you will recover from this pain in time and i think this pain will inform you both of you and how you live your life going forward and begin to look to the future as you heal yeah i would not um spend my energies trying to escape i would lean into my marriage relationship really hard and because she's hurting as much or more than you are and i would talk about that i would talk about you know what who've we got to see to help us process and work through grief what is the process there because this is a new experience and it's a difficult experience and um not working is not going to make it all feel better that that's the problem and so i think you're barking up the wrong tree on that part well Hey, it's Rachel Cruz. The holidays are here, which means family time and giving back and remembering what the season is all about. And let's be real, it also means shopping. Y'all, if you're anything like me, December gets really busy and really expensive. It's harder to stay intentional with your spending. And that's why I love shopping on Amazon, especially this time of year. Named the lowest priced US online retailer for nine years running by Profitero, a third party analytics and research firm, Amazon's prices are up to 14% lower across top categories and beat competitors by up to 5% in key gift categories. Between amazing deals, stress free shopping and fast shipping, Amazon makes gift giving simpler, the holiday season a little brighter and helps me keep my budget in check. That allows me to get back to enjoying the season. What more could a busy mom ask for? So for more information about Amazon's low prices and easy affordable holiday shopping, head to Amazon today. Our question of the day is brought to you by Y-Refy, defaulted private student loans. Don't just disappear, but you can make them go away. Y-Refy offers low fixed rate refinancing that gives you hope and a path forward, a clear path. Go to YRefy.com slash Ramsey. That's the letter Y, R-E-F-Y dot com slash Ramsey, not in all states. Today's question comes from Bobby in Idaho. My financial advisors tell me I need long term insurance for estate planning purposes. I'm 50 years old and he told me that a term policy may not reach out far enough considering my age and that a whole life policy would be permanent. I'm leaving a home to one of my children and would like to leave the other children my life insurance proceeds. Which type of insurance would you recommend? Well, I'm going to get out of the way because Dave's not said a whole lot about whole life, but in the past, and I feel like this is a perfect time to let you maybe hit a teed up ball down the fairway, but we would always say term life. Tell them why, Dave. So Bobby, you don't have a financial advisor. That's right. You have an insurance agent. Financial advisors don't tell people to buy whole life. None of them. Everybody in the whole financial world thinks whole life is crap, except the people who sell whole life and their life insurance agents to sell whole life. And they're dinosaurs. They're dying off because people have learned to add in modern day America. So, well, here's what I would recommend. I would recommend whatever money you are going to put with your life insurance agent that instead you actually get with an investment advisor and put that money into like a real investment. Life insurance is not an investment. Life insurance does not leave an estate. We're not trying to leave your children wealthy by you buying life insurance. Bad choice. Much better off take what you were going to pay in premiums and just use it to become wealthy and leave that wealth to your kids. If it's not as much as the policy and you die too soon, oh well, your kids are going to have to be on their own. Oh well, weren't most of us? Hello. So you don't leave someone wealthy with life insurance, whether it's term life or whole life. Period. You certainly don't do it whole life. And so, no, you know, the only reason you carry life insurance is if you have a family of children at home and a wife or a husband at home that need to replace your income if you die. You are beyond that and this person is just trying to sell you some crap. And so, you need to do what's known as run away from this person. And I don't think you need life insurance at all, term or anything. I wouldn't tell you to do that based on your question. I would go a different direction completely. Biju is with us. Biju is in Long Island. Hi Biju, what's up? Hi Dave, good to talk to you again. You too. How can we help? When my dad passed away last year, he left my mom $96,000, no problem. She has, she had brain surgery, so she's not all there. So I convinced her to put the money into an auto renewing CD with my brother. And then I told her, oh, so we wouldn't touch it and with your brother? Yes. Yeah. Why? Because she only has two sons, so we thought it would be like an easy split, putting it in a CD. I didn't think of anything else. Okay. I don't know why your brother's on it. That's what I can't figure out. So what happened? How can we help? Oh, yeah. So in October, we had a falling out and he kind of separated himself from us. And who's us? You and your mom? My mom. Yeah. Oh, okay. And after the falling out, my mom was kind of like, you think he took the money? And I was like, my, it's a CD in both our names. He can't. Yes, she can. But it turns out he took it. Yeah. And he took it out in March. So we were like, oh, what do we do? And I'm like, I don't know, my fault for it been suggesting it. And when I went to the bank, they like, you can take it to court. But I was just like, you know, I talked to you before and you know, you're the Christian guy, and I was just wondering, you know, what better advice than I don't want to just be pleaded and get him worse, get him more angry at us, you know, I'm sorry, we're worried about pissing off somebody that stole $96,000 from their widowed mother. I couldn't care less if he's pissed off. I want to put him in front of an 18 wheeler. Yeah, that's like one emotion. What a bomb. Yeah, yeah. Back in March, compared to the fight in October, I was like, well, he kind of playing this. Yeah, and I kind of talk about it and stuff like that. But you know, we're like, it's okay. So have you talked to him since you discovered he stole your mother's money? No, he separated himself. I know you but you don't, you don't have his phone number? Oh, yeah, yeah. But you didn't call him and say, Hey, you stole mom's money? I did that. Oh, what'd he say? I was like, Hey, who's he turned everything back on and saying, Hey, you did this, you can't have everything like a, it's not me, you took mom's money. Yeah. Okay, so you do whatever you want to do. Wow. I don't know because you guys were so dumb, you put his name on it, if it's really stealing or not, ethically and morally it is, I'm not sure it is legally because his name was on the account. Did he fraudulently sign her name or did he just sign his name and took the money out? When I went to the bank, they just told me one person can take everything out. Yeah, okay. So he was just a joint on the account. It wasn't. Yeah. So he technically hadn't done anything legally wrong. Yeah. March, it's been a year. My guess is the bum has spent the money, don't you think? I couldn't even tell you. I mean, like, we think you were gonna guess. Yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah, based on how we know. Yeah. Yeah, he's meant it. So your mom's completely cold broke now? I know she still has income from disability and social security and stuff like that. But I mean, she didn't mean money. Yeah, she has a small checking account, like 14,000 in there. But not in, you know, if she didn't have any plans for the 96, it's supposed to be for the both of us anyway. It was just that he took it all versus half and took it now versus after her passing. Is she ill? How old is she? She's 81. And she had a she had a ring tumor of glial blastoma. They got the majority of it, but it kind of left her worse for there. As sad as this is, Dave, I don't know if it's worth the money and time to try to get nothing. I just don't know if there's anything to get from it. Yeah. I mean, your only option here is to hire an attorney and pay them to go after him. And but you can't attorneys and courts don't make people have money when they don't have money. And if he's spent it all, it's just gone. And even if you won a lawsuit, you can't get blood out of Iraq, right? And so you're going to spend, you're going to spend $10,000 chasing your mom's money. I don't care whether you or your brother got any money. I couldn't care less. Y'all are like grownups and you should be taking care of yourselves. But I do care that he stole from his widowed mother. It's like a new level of scum, you know? And so, you know, on that basis, you have to decide, you have two options. One is you just throw up your hands and say, forget it. It's not worth it. It was a dumb thing to do to put his name on the account, which it was a dumb thing to do. And I'm just going to forget it and I'm going to walk away because there's nothing I can do about it anyway. Or you could spend $10,000 and never get a dime or might get a little of it if you sued him. Maybe. You know, but I, you know, I don't, what would I do? As painful as it would be for me, I would just walk away. Okay. My mom has the same thing because she doesn't want more trouble at this point. She just wants to. Well, this guy's not worth it. I don't care if we have trouble with this guy or not. This is a guy you want trouble with. He needs to go away, way away and stay away. He doesn't want to see me again if I'm you. This is not good. Not because of what he did to you. I couldn't care less what he did to you. But you just, I mean, there's a couple things in the Bible you don't steal from. Okay. Widows and orphans. And when you look that up, the things that happen to people who steal from widows and orphans, it's really nasty. This is, this is a Bible thing you don't want to get across. Okay. And so I don't want to be this guy. He's in, he's in God's crosshairs. It's bad. Wow. Don't let big grocery bills spoil your holiday plans. Shop at Aldi first. They've got USDA choice meats like beef, pork and even your turkey along with fresh produce, holiday desserts and more. And you'll find all of them at the lowest prices of any national grocery store. A family of four can save up to $4,000 a year by shopping at Aldi. You don't need a membership or some loyalty app either. So stop overpaying this holiday season. Go to aldi.us to find a store near you. That's Aldi.us. So with us in Atlanta. Hi, Chip. How are you? Fantastic, Dave. Ken, I hope you're all doing well today. Better than we deserve. How can we help? Well, you know, Dave, I've had the blessing of being married 30 years, no 30 years. So I can't even get it right. Retired 30 years, 20 some odd years, but because my wife introduced me to you many, many years ago, I thought she was having an affair, but it was just Dave Ramsey who's doing it. Who is this Dave guy? I have some round glasses and a goatee. No, I'm just kidding. Just gonna be that way. But we've also been teaching financial peace university for many years and making a difference in people's lives. And we appreciate it and graduated from FCMT this year. So a lot of thank yous for these things. But really my call is on the retirement. So I've been with a big phone company for 30 years. And as you know, the big AI and everybody else kind of pushes us out the door. It was kind of time to go. But I've started a financial coaching business on the side. So still doing some work. Good for you. Just helping people and trying to make a blessing and a difference in their lives. Got an NFL player that was broke to zero and trying to get him out of debt. That's terrible. But what we can do. But the question is, is when it comes to the retirement planning of funds and I've talked to some of your smart Mr. Pros, you know, I feel like I'm in the toothpaste style, Dave, because, you know, people want me to do index funds and ETFs and mutuals and annuities and bonds and oh my, and I feel like I'm here in the middle of hunting season. Who are the people? Well, the different ones are different, different brokers. So you have your major brokers that I'm talking to, they're fiduciaries, but I'm also talking to financial planners through my shirts that are quote unquote, qualified, certified. They may not be Vester pros and none of your pros have sent me in any weird direction. They've given me some good advice. But like I said, it's just a lot of confusion with ETFs, the, you know, mutuals, the bonds, and you know, the biggest one was, you know, one of my financial planners wanted me to put a million and a half in an annuity. And I'm thinking, no, why? And then another one wants me to do at least the old 60 40 rule where he puts about 40% of my money in the bonds, which I'm like, yeah, why am I dead? How old are you? I'll be 60 in April. Okay. And what size is this mistake? We've got 2.2. Okay, good for you. Good for you. Okay. You know, for my wife, she's the one that kicked my rear. Well, you know, the, the, let's just quiet all the noise. I don't do any of the things you're talking about. Yeah, I know. I'm 65. We don't teach it either. I'm 65. So why would you? Yeah, I'm in agreement. Okay. Well, that, that pretty much shuts up everything. This is what we teach. I'm going to have your four buckets. My personal, you know, mutual fund portfolio with my smart Vestra pro is one fourth in aggressive, one fourth in international, one fourth in growth and one fourth in growth and income, all with long track records. I hardly ever change funds. I buy funds that perform as well or better than the funds in their same categories. And they almost always do. And I just don't worry about it. And they just, and they just grow. I mean, the S&P was up 17% this year so far. And my funds are up more than that. It's been a crazy couple of years. Yeah. So I mean, why do I need to do anything else? And then it's, mine's all been converted to Roth over the years. So it's all growing tax-free. It'll all be left tax-free in the inheritance. There's no RMDs on Roth. So I'm completely free of tax and free of tax constraints. And I don't touch any of it. I don't need any of it. It's all just growing more and more and more and more. And it's very simple. You do not need bonds. You do not see the bond thing is based on a theory called asset allocation. And the theory of asset allocation is that as you get older, you should take less risk. And the problem is, is that the financial planning community, some of them, have over-indexed on that theory to where they take a 60-year-old and start putting them in bonds. Now, if you don't smoke, you're not obese and you're fairly healthy at 60, the data tells us you're going to live to 90 on average. So that means these morons are putting you in bonds for 30 freaking years. That's stupid. Agreed. Okay, then why are we even entertaining this? As I said, and look at the toothpaste, Al, and I should know better. Yeah. I mean, your teeth are clean and your breath smells good. Just keep using the one you've been using. There you go. Just, you know, I mean, it's that simple. It's, yeah, there's enough opinions out there in the financial world. They're like armpits. Everybody's got one that usually stinks. So, you know, it's like, whoa. Well, I think this is, you know, this is actually an interesting, because it's a great guy. But here's a guy who has taken our financial training, has lived out the principles, gives his wife a lot of credit, and yet he was allowing all of the flashy sales pitches, what he kept calling the toothpaste aisle, to create some doubt. And I think that, I appreciate him calling you, but I think this is important that everybody rewind and listen to what Dave said, because these are facts and how the stock market has performed over decades. And so if you can return to the fundamental facts of the investment strategy that Dave teaches, and that we teach here, it's a nice reminder. So write it down and save it and listen to it when people come at you with all these pitches. And I think it's important to to say that not only is this what we teach, we've taught it for 30 years, but also it's what we do. Correct. I don't have like a Dave plan and then a plan for the little people, right? You know, there was a financial person that was big in the news for years ago and had their portfolio on Money Magazine and they're like, well, that's not what you tell people to do. And the person said, well, well, you know, I'm in a different situation. No, I'm not in a different situation. I'm in the same situation all y'all are in. You eat what you cook. That's it. All the time. I kill it. I drag it home. I eat it. It's that simple. And then I tell y'all exactly where the deer are. Let's go get one. You know what I mean? Come on. This is not, this is not, this is where the ducks are. Go get your duck. I mean, what is it you want? I mean, so it's not a, this is not a thing. It's, by the way, it's also, I mean, there's not, you know, there's no secrets of the rich. No. And I want to point out, it's not a suggestion, Dave, that's kind of worked out for you. It's worked out for everybody who's ever adopted that plan. It is a solid strategy. Those four types of funds. Never had anybody call me and said, did this for 25 years and I hate you. Right. Never had that hate mail. Correct. Most of my hate mail is on people who think something's going to turn out some way and they don't like the suggestion and they've never done it. That they know that and that's where the hate, that's where the trolers come from, the trolls. And so I get to be Billy Goat Gruff, you know. That's correct. And so that, that's it. But the, you know, if you actually do the crap we teach on this show, you actually are going to be where Chip is, $2.2 million at, you know, at 60 years old. Yeah. This is, this is, you know, you're not going to have $40 million in Bitcoin, but you're also not going to be bankrupt. So you get to choose which one, what game do you want to play here, boys and girls? But we eat what we cook. I mean, we cook what we eat, we eat what we cook. We, we are not in here telling you to do something and then we don't go do it because we've got more money or whatever. I didn't hit a certain point and quit doing the stuff. I hit a certain point and did more of the stuff. You know, it's like, well, this is fun. Let's do it again. I mean, it's called touchdown. It's how you score touchdown. I want to score another one. Let's do this again. Let's do this again. Let's do this again over and over and over and over and over again. Yeah. Rinse and repeat. My pastor is making fun of me. He said, Dave, you say the same thing over and over and I said, so do you. Fair point. You know, Dave, I think it'd be awesome. Hit the four funds, hit our core financial strategy for people so they don't have to rewind. This is how much we're going to serve people. A fourth in growth, a fourth in growth and income, a fourth in international and a fourth in aggressive growth, all with the longest possible track record, preferably 10 years or more. If you're buying an independent mutual fund for an IRA from your smart investor pro like a Roth IRA, you definitely can choose funds that are longer than 10 year track record. Inside your 401k, they may or may not, but get good long track records and then, you know, look at them once a year and go, wow, look at this. This is what's happening. And some years they go up, some years they go down, but most years they go up and some years they go way up and like this year. Welcome back to the Ramsey show in the Fairwinds Credit Union Studio. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host, Ken Coleman, Ramsey personality, number one bestselling author, host of front row seat, a long form interview program on Ramsey networks. Absolutely incredible. He's my cohost. Alex is with us in Charlotte, North Carolina. Hey Alex, what's up? Hey, Mr. Dave. How you guys doing? Better than I deserve. What's up? Awesome, man. It is truly an honor to speak to you guys. I just want to say that I hear you every morning too when from work and I just got to say, I think you have changed my life and I haven't even did my debt free screen yet. But I have a quick question. I need some advice. I need to know what to do with a promise that I did my 14-year-old two years ago. She was 12 at the time and I told her that I would do her sweet 15. And her sweet 15 is five months away. It's right around the corner. I was kind of hoping she would kind of forget about it, but that didn't happen. And okay, I am 36. I'm married, four kids. Between me and my wife, we make $175,000 a year. We have a paid for rental home that brings in about $15,000 extra. So that's $190 a year. The only debt we have is our mortgage. We owe $230,000. I have $25,000 in my Lafayaray. My wife has about $60,000. I got to say that I did some not-so- right things three, four years ago before you came into my life. And I think we're in the right track now, but this party is going to cost us around $25,000. And I need to know $25,000? Yes. For what? For a 15-year-old? It's a sweet 15. It's something big that we do in our culture. How we were raised and at the time when I promised it. I'm sorry. I'm so confused. What culture are we talking about? I'm Latino. I'm Hispanic. Let me go deeper real quick. Go back when you were a kid. So 25, 30 years ago, what did this traditional 15-year-old party consist of? Like when you were a kid. As your mom and daddy didn't spend $25,000 on your sister? No. No. They spent closer to $9,000. But that was it. It consists of a venue, a band, decorations. The dress alone was like $3,000, which my brother paid for it already. Your brother paid for your daughter's dress? Yes. She's my brother's, my daughter's godfather. So it kind of falls under him. And he did the purchase of the dress already. You didn't answer my question though. What did it cost when you were a kid? Maybe $7,000 to $9,000. How old are you? You said you're 36. So 20 years ago, you're saying your parents spent $9,000. Yes. And they obviously had some money? No. I can say that we don't have Dave Ramsey in Spanish for us guys or for the guys who don't speak English or don't understand. Well, how do they pay for it? How do they pay for it? They just work. They just work nonstop. That's all. I remember my dad just working nonstop and that's how they did it. Okay. So let me let me move that over into the land of Gringo for a minute to try to relate. Okay. So it's it's normal or traditional in the Anglo community for me to pay for my daughter's wedding. Okay. What is not dictated by the tradition is what we spend. All right. It would be commensurate with common sense and with our income. Okay. So you know, you've got to decide in in context of your world what is reasonable. The reason you're calling me is it feels unreasonable to you. The amount not the tradition. The tradition is very normalized for you. You made that clear. I got it. I got it. I learned something today that I didn't know. Okay. It's very normalized for you and that's fine. I'm getting the tradition of me paying for my daughter's wedding is very normalized for me. I didn't think anything about it, but also didn't spend money I didn't have and I didn't and we didn't go spend money that was crazy as a ratio just because I was guilted into it and this feels very much like the language you're using around describing this you sound like a man who is trapped. I honestly feel like that cornered. That's exactly how I feel. I have trouble as a dad being cornered by my teenager. It's quite the other way around. Yes. Does it I do the cornering. They don't. Yes. So it makes it it makes it hard on me to make that call because she is close to perfect. She helps with straight A kid that does not earn you the right to visit the land of stupid. Yes. That's not what we're doing. So I think you sit down and you say honey, I love you. I'm proud of you and who you are. As per the tradition two years ago, I promised that we were going to do this. Your uncle has bought the dress. We are going to have a very nice party and here is the budget that I am setting for the party. You don't get to set it. You're 15. Yes. You don't get a vote. You just get to come. That's how it works. Okay. And so when Rachel came in and said, you know, once they came in and asked for my permission to marry Rachel, we sat down and said, okay, here's what we're going to put towards the wedding. We didn't say how much do you guys want. And they were like grown ups. They were adults are coming out of college. They weren't 15 year olds. So you know, honey, I'm going to help you with your car. I'm going to decide how much that is. You don't tell me with my money what I'm going to do. And so I don't know what's reasonable here. Maybe 25 is reasonable. But I'm not going to be held hostage by outside forces in my own freaking house or by a 15 year old or even by a tradition. Now I may want to honor the tradition because it's part of who I am and part of my cultural history and makeup. I don't have any problem with that at all. I wanted to honor paying for the wedding. You know, I'd be time to learn what a potluck is. Have the family bring a dish to pass. I mean, I'm okay if you cut it in half. I'm okay if you said or if you said 15. I'm just not okay that someone else is setting the number. Yeah, he just rent. He's like like somebody point a gun at him or something. So you're doing this. No, no. So I'm going to flip the power structure here a little Alex. That's that's where you need to go. And then you can honor your wonderful daughter in context with the culture. When you're tired of feeling stuck with money, there's just one solution. To get different results, you have to do something different. No one accidentally wins with money. You have to have a game plan and that begins with our get started assessment. Go to RamseySolutions.com slash start, answer some questions and we'll show you what steps to take next. Don't stay stuck. Take control of your money starting today. Go with RamseySolutions.com slash start. If you're wondering where all your money went in 2025, that's normal and normal is broke. But next year can be different. Get a head start by downloading every dollar. Every dollar builds you a personalized plan and coaches you to find the extra money and then put it to work to beat debt and build wealth. We're going to show you hand to hand how to work the Ramsey plan exactly. Just answer a few questions and you'll find thousands of dollars on average in just the first 15 minutes. That's extra margin to move your plan forward. And every dollar still has the same great budgeting features to help you tell your money what to do. Hey, don't go another year feeling broken stressed. Start every dollar for free in the App Store or on Google Play. Emily is with us in New York. Hi Emily, how are you? Hi, good. How are you? Better than I deserve. What's up? So my question is about if my husband and I are financially prepared to start a family or if we should wait a little bit longer to be responsible. You're ready? Maybe I should do what you like, the background or is the bad of blanket answer? I'll give, I'll take the background as a courtesy but here's the thing. We don't tell people to not have babies due to debt. We tell them to not have huge numbers of babies but you know your first baby start a family is a wonderful thing. It's the best thing you'll ever do while you're alive. And we don't tell people to not do that because of a certain dollar figure around it. But let's hear it and I can give you some reassurance. How much debt do you guys have? Okay, so we actually just have 30k student loans that are completely interest free between the two of us. Okay, cool. And what do you guys, is that your only debt? That's our only debt. And what is your household income? So our, that's the issue is that, so our household income is 120,000 dollars as a base salary with 50,000 dollars in equity and that's equity. What's equity mean? Equity means, so it's basically just registered stock units paid out quarterly because my husband works for a large company and that's part of their compensation package. So he can cash those out how often? He can cash them out whenever after they vest, like there's a vesting period. How long do they take for them to vest? That's what I'm asking. This year it'll vest at the end of the year and then after that it's quarterly. Oh wow. Okay, so he makes 170,000 dollars a year including his stock bonuses. Yes, but not this. He won't make that this year because he just started with that company. We're also both 24. So there's a few considerations. We just recently got married, but we're living in New York City and our rent is crazy. We don't have a car where our budget despite the salary is pretty tight. We don't have a lot of free cash every month and we are invested. Are you working? That's the problem is that we actually had to move to the States for this job for my husband. So I had saved, him and I together had saved about 150K before we moved here and then I had to give up my job thinking I'd be able to get another job, but the immigration restrictions on what jobs I'm allowed to work have been so tight that it's been a few months and I have nothing. So before we moved here in our home country, I was making about 80K and now I'm making nothing and I feel like I'm just kind of sitting around at home and I've always wanted to get a mom and I've always wanted to stay at home mom and we're like do we just start a few years earlier than we thought we would or should I start a job? He's not on a green card. What's he on HB1? No, he's on a TN visa which is because we're from Canada. Okay, both of you are from Canada so you're on a green card? No, so we'll work towards the green card process eventually if we want to stay in the US long term, but right now he's just on TN and I'm on a dependent special visa. Okay, so what is the plan? Are you planning to stay or not? Um, we'll see what his business requires. As it's more of a following a passion for work thing that is the immigrating somewhere specific. So if the company requires him here, we'll stay here. If they require him in Canada, we'll go to Canada. What can you do right now? That's another factor. What kind of work can you do? What kind of work can you do that is immigration allowed? Let me let me let me rephrase. You told us there were a ton of restrictions so I'm wondering what kind of work can you do that's not restricted? Yeah, so to try to explain so basically you can get a visa if your work aligns with exactly what you did your undergraduate degree in and I did my undergraduate degree in a science and then I had been working in consulting and project management and a business role before we moved here and none of those qualify for a visa in the United States. This has to be a very specific technical job like my husband's an engineer, but project management does not qualify but I don't have any technical fines experience despite my degree. So I'm having a really hard time finding a job that I'm legally allowed to work because I never planned to move to the States. No, I get it. In this situation does he have health insurance? Yeah, he has really good health insurance. Okay, all right and it will probably transfer where you to go back to Canada and have great health insurance there, right? Yeah, yeah, so we'd be fine and with all the health care stuff it's more just I don't I hear all the time. Okay, so here's the thing. Three years from today you will not be in this situation. Correct. Once if we get a green card something's gonna happen you're either gonna get a green card or you're gonna go back to Canada, right? Yeah, yeah, so so this is a temporary this income is a temporary thing based on all the story that you've told us and if I woke up in your shoes and you guys both want a child and God wants you to have a child I would go have a child. That's what I would do and there's you know but do I want to be irresponsible and say neither one of us are working? No, I don't want to do that or do I want to be irresponsible and have you know 10 kids and we make $30,000 a year and can't figure out a way to feed them that's irresponsible to wouldn't want to do that but to have a child when you're making $120,000 and you've got an uncertain immigration process looking in front of you in the next five years I would definitely live my life. I wouldn't put my life on hold for his company which is in a sense what we're doing and so no I wouldn't do that. And I think you can afford it and I think you can make it and you know you've got labor delivery covered and you know babies are not as expensive as they're by acts like it's not the end of the world and I think you guys can pull this off. You do whatever you want to do but that's what we would do at our house. I just am so frustrated for I just banged my head against the wall metaphorically as I'm listening to this you know here's a law abiding Canadian she wants to work and the goofball rules that the government comes up with sometimes makes me want to just scream. Yeah you know because this is an opportunity to work and if I understood her correctly Dave she can't do anything like she can't even go to Walmart and work. Right right she enlisted something to do with her degree right her degree field that's what she said I don't all right I'm not I'm not knowledgeable about anything. I am not either but wow but it's um it is frustrating but either way bottom line is she ends up at home and that makes her say I want to be a mom. Yeah. So maybe that may be a blessing. I would tell them to get into every dollar learn how to budget because I know that my parents they scrapped by I don't know what your parent situation was but they hardly had any money when I was born and they figured it out and in some ways it's a you know that's a great way to get really responsible. Yeah yeah it just it makes you pay attention and and every dollar is a good way to pay attention you're exactly right you're gonna make every dollar behave you know and you need to anyway but especially wakes up when you got another human you're supposed to be responsible for and that that's a that that extra responsibility gives us that adults devise a plan and follow it children do what feels good so we're gonna do this so and I you know I think she's been very responsible asking the question I kind of poke fun and said yes just go I baby but but you know but the but I think it's a responsible question which means they're gonna be okay yeah well you know I loved is she told us how much money they saved before coming to the state this is a couple that has learned how to be disciplined a lot of money they saved $150,000 yeah yeah and he's making 170 they can make it on that this stuff fast you can cash out don't hold that stock and stack it up and starve to death you know cash that stock and take care of that baby you'll you'll be okay let's just go on everything's gonna be all right so it's one of the best times of the year but it's also the time of year when people let their money get totally out of control everywhere you look it's just buy buy buy so you start swiping the credit card and suddenly it's January and you got a mess on your hands don't let that happen tell your money where to go instead of wondering where it went with our budgeting app every dollar every dollar not only helps you stay on budget and in control of your spending this holiday season it also helps you find extra margin in your budget thousands of dollars of it and every day will coach you to build better money habits and attack your goals faster than ever so while most people will be starting in January with the taste of regret in their mouth you'll already be winning start every dollar for free by downloading the app today so in the lobby of ramsey solutions on the debt free stage britain and all are with us merry christmas guys merry christmas good to have you guys where do you all live so we're small town outside of savannah richmond hill georgia oh yeah very nice beautiful area cool well welcome to nashville thanks for having all the way here to do a debt-free scream how much you paid off you want to do 127 000 i want to get it down to the penny 197 dollars and eight cents i love it how long did it take to pay that off 27 months wow and your range of income during that two and a we started around 120 000 and we're knocking the door to 12 wow that's a big jump in that period of time what do y'all do for a living i'm a commercial insurance underwriter and i just sell fertilizer to golf courses and landscape companies all good time to be doing that well done i just yeah good for you so what kind of debt was the 127 000 dave we had the the millennial package um we had uh from car loans to debt consolidation loans we um elok yeah that was a good one credit card credit cards uh what else do we have in there um personal like family loan yeah student loan oh yeah oh yeah both of us yeah absolutely iris iris even the iris we put a cherry on top all right there we go so yeah we had them all at the full package absolutely the deluxe package all right so what happened uh two and a half years ago because how long y'all been married eleven years eleven years all right and what happened two and a half years ago that gave this uh a little wake-up call here and you say okay things are about to change um well for me um we were he was just turning 40 i was about to turn 40 it was around tax season and i was i looked at how much we made and i was like this is crazy why do we have no money um and then he kind of had the same wake-up call around the same time whenever we got the helok and so i was just in goodwill one day and i saw the total money makeover and i was like hmm i think i'm just gonna i think i'm just gonna get this you saw the total money makeover in good with you did that is awesome that's the best part of the story i love it yeah he read it in about two days and then he told me i had to read it so i read it in about two days and it just kicked off everything yeah we were done day if we uh our septic system went out uh and we had to take a helok out to fix that um so that was it for me um and she was we were there at the same time we both been there a couple you know apart at different times yeah we hit that moment together and you know through god found you guys and you just flipped the switch and went hard hard absolutely day one both of you together there was no one catching up no one to let no one not at all just the timing was perfect for both of you sure was wow that's that's unusual but it's very cool yeah it took a few tries and this one this one is yeah what was there a moment in this process where you guys begin to very much experience the momentum you know we talk about the dead snowball and i'm just curious as a couple who did this do you remember when you felt that momentum like okay this is starting to pay off we can see this you're gonna love this one so we had uh i had a whole life policy um that i was convinced to buy in my 20s we cashed that bad boy out paid off the irs yeah and then a couple of the small credit cards and we saw that number in the margin you know the margin started to show up and so that got the ball rolling the snowball i guess we could say yeah so it just kind of went from there but you know just accepting that mistake um i didn't even figure out how much i had spent on that policy leading into this moment i just said you know what this is a blessing that that money's there and it got us started and from there it's it's been a long 27 months but it's going pretty fast too at the same time if that makes sense what was the hardest thing y'all did during that 27 months you got like teenage daughters right i mean this well i should say we might need to get them on stage to that question yeah our 17 year old um day was kind of a custword in our household for a little bit yeah i've heard you say that before and it was kind of true keep dad out of goodwill buying books right there was no more eating out um so that was that was probably the hardest was getting the kids on board um or just getting the muse to it but now like our nine-year-old will say for in the store she'll say hey is this in the budget mom so it's she's there now so and our 17 year old is determined now to go to college without student loans so we got there all right definitely so that's a breakthrough well done okay so you did change your family tree we did absolutely they're watching and they're participating sometimes grudgingly but they got it it did click we stopped for jigsaw twice on the way up here and didn't have to sweat about it so that's a good a good change everybody got a combo absolutely even an ice cream you know oh you guys really are debt free be one for the ice cream how did it affect your marriage the easiest way to say it was such a stressor for both of us you know and the money money money stress led to just little arguments that that we don't have to have anymore they're still stressed and there's still life but taking that money stress out of the equation it's helped us it's also helped us see that you know we can accomplish if we put it together we can accomplish you know whatever we want to do it definitely as a couple for sure yeah yeah definitely it makes you believe that in that unity and the power of it absolutely yeah it's pretty cool very very cool well congratulations thank you guys thank you i mean y'all y'all are amazing this is a power deal i'm so proud of you we're excited to be here for sure who was uh who was cheering you on in this process we had a pretty good group of cheerleaders um actually through this process we took fpu at our church oh god and then what church are you in uh it's life bridge church in savannah george yeah okay um since then we've taught one college fpu and two adult fpu classes wow thank you that helped us stay accountable through the process yeah teaching teaching it you have to do it yeah absolutely kind of kind of hypocritical if you don't exactly um they were cheerleaders our parents our parents our kids were they were part of the time yeah absolutely good all right so well very cool very cool all right so someone's listening and um they just had to get a he lock to cover an emergency at the house and they're pissed off and they're wondering if they can really do it tell them what is the main thing that you learned in this process that you have to do if you want to get out of that you know that just stop doing what you've been doing and start start today um you know you can you can talk about it yeah and budget absolutely um that actually budget don't just uh talk about a budget actually do the budget but yeah just start i mean really that's the you know we talked about it and talked about it and and we decided it was just time to start um we were done and second tired of being sick and tired yeah absolutely so that's it just just go just you can do it it doesn't matter what where you're at just start all right very proud of you guys bring your daughters up and let's introduce them get their names and ages and let them since they had to participate in all the pain they can participate in the debt free screen absolutely absolutely all right so this is Addison she's 15 we just had birthday so forgive me if i get these right this is Carson she is nine and this is Maddie she is 17 all right very cool that's a beautiful family congratulations you guys thank you proud of you very well done Paul and Britain Maddie Addison and Carson Savannah Georgia 127 thousand dollars paid off in 27 months making 120 to 212 and it all begins with the total money makeover from Goodwill counted down let's hear a debt free scream three two one we're debt free low trips in Nashville very exciting you know it's hard to get three teenage well two teenagers and free teen to get excited about doing anything with their parents those girls bought in let's go you could tell i mean they were really that wasn't like oh i gotta have to do this they no i roll they got on the program and i love that very very cool well what happens is a family tree's really changed you could change it with the actual math because you have a huge amount amount of money later and they will have a huge amount of money later but also it doesn't change unless the people in the family tree are also transformed so it all ends here we're not doing this in this branch of the tree ever again ever ever never it ends when you do that it changes it's a big deal you guys it's a big deal you do you want to keep more money in your pocket and not uncle sam's then listen up there are tax deductions and credits you could maximize before the end of the year by connecting with an experienced tax professional like a ramsey trusted tax pro they know the tax code inside and out so you don't have to and they can help you file when tax season rolls around get a trusted tax pro by going to ramsey solutions dot com slash tax pro ramsey solutions dot com slash tax pro our scripture of the day john 15 1 and 2 i am the true vine and my father is the gardener he cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful tom brady said to be successful at anything the truth is you don't have to be special you just have to be what most people aren't consistent determined and willing to work for it amen seventh round draft pick just a reminder yeah absolutely and you know definitely one of the goats for sure all right and sandra is in houston hey sandra what's up hey but my name is randy hi how are you better than i deserve what's up i'm just excited to actually talk to you said we're watching for so long thank you um i have a problem um i'm a widow my husband has to leave here in the house ago and uh he was my main source of income in our household and i was working at a teacher assistant making like 24 000 a year and he was making like 80 000 and you know we were okay but i wasn't that and i always wanted to get one of these friends that you have but he was never on the same page with me so i couldn't do it alone and it's true is to say you have to be on board both they all so we never really did any kind of budgeting i handle all the girls but never had to help mess with you know from him just painless here and uh so he passed away suddenly within three months uh he had colon cancer and uh and now he's gone and i'm left with all this and now before he passed away he did tell me he apologized he said i know you were right you know the girls are in in a difficult situation i want you to sell the house but i know nothing about that i we have a home we've had it for 21 years um it's value of four and 20 000 and my balance is 113 000 um people tell me go get a heat lock but i just think that a make me in a bigger hole um my question to you is do you think it's wise to sell my house and use equity too because there's like i don't have a lot of credit card debts but i do have like my lot next to his lot which he just paid off because we had life insurance through his job um but i mean he had life insurance through his job how much life insurance did you get it was 50 000 and you used that to pay off some debts this is a lot 30 000 and yes we we fell behind in our house because the three months he was in the hospital i didn't worry there was no money coming in so i had to pay like almost seven thousand for um mortgage yeah to get caught back up that was smart yeah but then the home association i was behind on that i'm still behind us we speak and i fell behind getting my house i have uh three of those kids but one does not live anymore just two daughters sitting with me but they were a mess up there their father passed away um once a full-time student about to graduate the other one already graduated she just started out what what do you make now sandra i still like 24 000 it's not what do you do i'm a teacher assistant um and i also how old are you i'm 60 60 years old 60 years old okay and how much other debt other than the house do you have uh credit card started like 10 000 a car we just purchased that i was my other car was the transition bill how much do you owe in the car but we got it 11 000 that was 16 000 how i don't know it's the interest and i only made one payment on it and i just found out that when i made one paying 420 420 only 30 dollars both through the principal because of very that's not that's not the point okay so you owe 10 and you owe 16 and what else do you owe uh credit cards oh i just bet um my lot is going to cost me like 20 000 your lot my lots next to this yes you own a lot next door to the house no no a lot i'm sorry it's a cemetery lot great call in yeah we bought a double because i want to be very next to him and the license to care of his it's going to cost it's going to cost how much 28 000 28 000 dollars yes yes it's very expensive yeah it's a little ridiculous it's very expensive die you know i i mean and i just you know i i i want to sell my house i've never done that before i don't know how it works i have no clue my oldest daughter said mom on mom board with his she just got a job she said i would do where you want to sell the house and just start over all right so you start over but you still have a 24 000 income that's still going to be troublesome so regardless of what we do you need to work we've got to do something to work on getting your income up i'm also a big reseller making like 2500 dollars a month that's another 30 things that means you have a 55 000 income yeah i'm in his social security um i would call it fossil i get like 20 20 300 a month okay that's another 30 000 that's a little different than 24 so i'm not sure why can't you pay these bills if you got that much money coming in because we're i'm behind on my house uh the house payment is 1500 and it's an adjustable rate mortgage how far behind are you uh two months okay because you have because you have 24 plus 60 coming in you have 84 000 dollars coming in a year you should be able to pay a 1500 house payment yeah where's the money been going well i don't know this crazy car i bought it's 420 dollars a month 125 so you paid the car instead of the house uh no no no i just got the car i just got it because i had another one i had paid cash for but it was breaking apart and i had to get one and drive times just tricked me into getting this crazy car in 2014 and you know 420 dollars might sound good but i just found out that it's just all inches you know and uh i wish i could pay it off sooner but and i don't even know how my income every time we file for an context we'd always get a refund so this time i want to get whatever i get i want to pay it towards uh i get the house right i because i'm i've been here for 21 years and it's uh it's emotionally hard to give it up uh i had close to another second to see anything as it is right now there's nothing you don't refer anything we think that would give you like 320 000 cash i don't want to go and put it no that's not that's not necessary you know if you're gonna do it get a real estate agent at ramsey solutions it's ramsey trusted go to ramsey solutions dot com and put the house on the market for full retail but i don't think you need to sell the house i think you need to get in control you may need to sell the car or even throw the keys back at them and let them take it back uh but the the house is not the problem you're out of control because you got 84 000 dollars coming in between the disability the 24 our his is social the 24 and your ebay business and so hun you got to have enough to pay these bills so what i'm going to do is i'm going to put you on hold and we're going to put you with a ramsey coach and have him come sit down with you and see if we can't get you straightened out because one of the things our book tells us is to take care of widows so we're going to go by the book okay and um you hang on christian will pick up and we'll get you set up with that because i don't think the math i mean when all i had was 24 it's one thing but 24 is not all i've got here so um there's a lot more and and i and i think it's just um you're discombobulated after the loss of your husband and it's hard to get organized to get focused but i think if we didn't do anything but catch this house up you catch it up pretty quick and if we didn't do anything i mean you stop the credit card stop the car and just let's get the house let's save the house and then let's keep the house current and keep lights on and food and then we'll worry about what we're going to drive and later on we'll worry about the credit cards but let's get this stuff in the right order you're paying the wrong things if you have to choose so pay the house and lights and water and food and then we'll figure out the rest of it but i think you got enough to pay at all yeah you're just going to get on a real tight budget and learn how to run every dollar and learn how to make this money behave but i think she can do it can yeah and i think the encouragement is our coach is going to help you let's get her into every dollar let's let's get in there for a year because this is going to walk with you daily it's like being on the area with david and one of the personalities you have the means to do it and i think that's what we want you to hear you got to come up with okay what are my next steps you can do this and i agree i would not sell the house i think that's an unnecessary move yeah and you got a hundred and twelve thousand dollar mortgage that's a small that's a really you know a very reasonable thing to go into old age with here try to get that cleared up yeah and the how that you got stung on the car and whoever's trying to suggest and you buy that you sell your four hundred and twenty thousand dollar house for three hundred well that's not somebody's your friend we don't do that so that puts us out 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