Don’t Chase Your Dreams So Hard That They Become Nightmares
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This is the Ramsey Show where we help you win with your money, win in your work, and win with your relationships. Phone number is 888-825-5225, 888-825-5225.

825-5225. I'm Ken Coleman. George Campbell joins me, and we're here together for you. George will take the lead as our resident money expert today, and I'll be helping you on making more income. How do you make more income? Do you need to make a professional move? Do you need to start something? We'll take on those calls as well so that you can get through the baby steps faster and get to that peace of mind.

in a great, great way. All right, let's do it. George, you ready to go? I'm stoked. You warmed up? Stoked is the only word. Did you gargle? I did, actually. Okay. Thank you for asking. I mouthwashed before the show, as you know. Trust me, I know. I walked in on it. It's a very awkward scene. I've got it out of my memory, and we're now ready to go. Larry is going to join us in Gulfport, Mississippi. Larry, how can we help today? Hey, I got a question for you, I reckon. I'm trying to determine...

When the stress from my job isn't worth the money I'm being paid to do it anymore. Well, only you get to determine that. We can certainly weigh in on it. My general answer would be if you are going downhill emotionally, mentally, and physically,

And it's really taking a toll on you. You can see it. It's a downward, we're going down. It's not a roller coaster, like it's a good day. Maybe there's two good days and then there's a really bad day. I mean, it is just a nonstop, everything is getting worse. I think that's the moment. However,

Unless you have the financial wherewithal to just walk from that, I'm the guy that's going to tell you to grit yourself through it and find something quickly. How is this affecting you right now? Well, mainly just mentally, not really sleeping that well, stressed out all the time. What kind of work is it? I'm a diesel mechanic.

And is it that you're just not able to get all the work done during the day, and so you're having to work longer hours? Yes. So what happens is you go home. When you finally get home, you realize— My mind don't shut off. That's right, because of what all you've got to do the next day, correct? Yes, sir. All right. And so do you work for yourself, or do you work for someone else? I work for somebody else. All right. And if you were to walk today, what kind of a bind would they be in?

A substantial one. Okay. And what's your relationship like with your boss? We get along really well. Okay. I think you've got some leverage here.

Have you had the conversation to say, hey, we've got to get another mechanic or we are going to have to slow down the amount of work that you're relying on me to do because it's really starting to affect me in a really bad way. I can't turn my brain off. I'm not sleeping at night. That's going to cause bigger issues, not just for you, the company, but me as well. Have you had that conversation? Yes, about two months ago. And?

It lasted about three days. What happened in the three days? Well, it's not necessarily his fault. It's a pretty big company, and just when things go downhill, we have five, ten projects going on at a time. Everything's got equipment or trucks running to it, and when three or four go down on different spots, it's a lot. It's an all-hands-on-deck, we've got to get these trucks back out there working.

Yes, sir. Okay. And does he have the ability to hire? If you were in charge, what would you say the fix is? What's the solution if you were given all power to fix it? I don't know. Sure you do. Well, you see, I'm the manager right this moment, and I've been hiring people, but work ethic from some people sort of puts me further behind than it should put me forward. Right. I know, but what I'm saying is just I'm taking you somewhere.

If you knew you could find the right talent with the right work ethic, what's the fix to this problem? I don't know. Sure you do. It's hiring more mechanics. Hiring more Larrys that are really good at what they do, who have the work ethic. If you could reproduce yourself times two or three, would that get you to a place where no matter when a truck breaks down or how many, we can handle it?

Yeah, absolutely. All right. The reason I'm walking you into this, Larry, is to give you some sense of hope because as a manager, you're going to have to come to the table with a solution. You've already said your boss, it's not his fault. Well, it sort of is. It's somebody's fault. And it sounds like the simple solution is if I found three more of me, then we could get there. And so I'm the type of guy that goes, I'm going to have to be the one that solves this.

So if I like my job when it's not crazy and I've got a good relationship with my boss and I make good money, and I'm assuming you do, is that right? Yes, sir. And it's a real pain in the you-know-what to replace this job. Is that true? Yes, sir. Yeah, man. So I'm getting solution-focused before I decide to pull the ripcord and parachute out. So what I'm saying is I've coached a lot of leaders on this, that you've got to go find people that are wired like you.

And you know where those people are. They may be in high schools. They may be in tech schools, community colleges. Where there's a will, there's a way. And you've got to find people who like fixing the problems because left to your own devices, if you're not stressed out, you enjoy doing the mechanic work, true or false? True. So go find those people. They don't ever want to wear a white-collar shirt the rest of their life. The idea of putting on a tie makes them break out in hives. Larry, am I talking to you?

Yes, sir. Go find Larry's. Go find them. They're out there. Because you're giving them a path to prosperity. They're going to make really good money. Now, I also say all this to say you're going to have to have your leader and the leaders above them agree that if you go find the people, and it sounds like they've given you the carte blanche to do that, you just haven't found the right people yet. Guess whose fault that is? Mine. Come on, Larry.

George, that gives me hope because if it's in Larry's power, Larry can do something about it. Yeah, because he knows what he needs. No one, Larry, knows as much about this gig as you do. And so you've got to go find young people who you can train and who say, you know what, I want to work hard. And we get the right amount of people in there. They were not stressed out. So I say all that to say I'm trying to encourage you because if you walk from this, then know that you are saying,

All right, I don't think that I could solve this anymore, and I'm not sure that you're at that place. So all that to say, I'm trying to help you win in this role. If you decide that it's too much, then go replace your income before you walk because the stress of not having the income is way worse than the stress of having too much work. You agree with that, George? Are you in good financial standing, Larry? I'm okay. What are you making?

About $120 a year. Where is it going? Well, I'm just bad at financing, but I'm working on that. Well, that's one step. If you want that kind of freedom and margin and options, we've got to start taking control of this amazing income you have. That might be paying off debt. Let's get the emergency fund in place, start investing for the future. And in the meantime, on the work side, you've got your work cut out for you from Ken over here. We've got to go hire some good folks. But it's doable, Larry, but you've got to go find them. I'm talking to shop teachers, teachers,

I'm talking to community colleges, tech schools, mechanic schools. You go find these people and ask the questions that you know you're supposed to ask to figure out if somebody's actually got some work ethic. This is actually a very solvable problem. Get after it. All right, don't move. George is going to gargle some more during the break. I will watch him, and we'll be back to take more of your calls. This is The Ramsey Show.

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Welcome back to the Ramsey Show. I'm Ken Coleman. George Camel is with me. 888-825-7000.

5-2-2-5 is the phone number. We'd love to answer your money questions, your income questions. I'm here to help out on some of those. How do we get some more income? And speaking of, it's like everybody's kind of getting back into the regular mode, George. That's true. Depending on where you're at in the country, a lot of people are going back to school. A lot of kids go back to school after Labor Day. Certainly in the Southeast, a lot of kids have been in school now for a bit.

And, you know, it's time to kind of get out of summer mode and let's get serious. All of our sort of lackadaisical spending is now like, oh gosh, we've got to face this head on. That's right. So we have got a great opportunity for those of you who want to tighten things up. Rachel Cruz and the EveryDollar team is doing a free live training Wednesday, August 28th at 1 Eastern, 12 Central. That's Wednesday, August 28th. So it's a power launch, if you will.

1 Eastern, 12 Central. Register for free at everydollar.com slash webinar. Everydollar.com slash webinar. Over 100,000 people have registered for this free live training in the past, and so we're doing another one. It's the number one way to eliminate debt. It's to budget. The number one way to build wealth is to budget. The number one way to get on the same page with your spouse about money is to budget. The number one way to eliminate stress in your financial life is to...

Thank you, George, for paying attention. Again, check it out, everydollar.com slash webinar. It's coming up Wednesday, August the 28th, 1 Eastern, everydollar.com slash webinar. Rachel Cruz will be leading that. Should be a lot of fun. Bringing back Power Lunch. Yeah. It's been a long time since I heard that reference. Yeah. Got a lot of unnecessary information stored up here in the little noggin. It's amazing. As you know all too well, it pops out at

The opportune or inopportune time. Yeah, your vocabulary never ceases to impress. Yeah, well, thank you very much. Glenn is up next in Denver, Colorado. Glenn, how can we help today? Hi, George. Hi, Cam. Big fan. Thank you guys for taking my call. Thank you. What's going on?

So I have an interesting question. So my father's getting older and his health isn't in the greatest, but he's still doing fine. And he was recently talking to me about he wanted to leave his home to me and he wanted to do he wanted to add me to the title of his home.

And I wasn't sure, one, if that was the smartest idea. And two, I don't really know what the tax implications of that would be or any of that. It's a property I would never plan to sell, but I still don't want to hurt myself in the process. How old is your father? He is 64. Okay. Still got a lot of life left in him. And how old are you?

I am 30. I'll be 32 this year. Okay. And what's the sort of urgency to get you on the deed of this house? His health has just not been great. He's had a lot of stints in and out of the hospital as of recent. So he's a little bit unsure of just kind of where his health is going to end up in the near future, if I had to guess, maybe 10 years or so. So why not just have the house pass to you when he passes?

Well, and that was something that I was trying to wonder, trying to figure out. I don't know. I think he had talked to somebody about it, and they had told him that this would be an easier process than that. Well, the problem you'll run into, and you probably heard these terms, is cost basis.

And so if your father gifts you the house during his lifetime while he's alive, you would inherit his cost basis, which is the original purchase price plus the improvements he's made. And so if you later sell, you'd be facing some big capital gains tax on that, on the appreciation since the purchase. Correct. The way to avoid that would be you inherit the house after his death, and you'd get a step up in basis. So now if you sell, well, you'd get it at the current value at the time he passed instead of the original purchase price.

Okay. So as far as taxes go, that's the better way to do it, the smarter way. Okay. And then to add on to that, would it be smarter to go through a will or through a trust? I mean, a simple will will do the job unless he has substantial assets and there's, you know, some strategy he's working with to pass these on a different way through a living trust. A simple will will do the trick.

Okay. And if you want more, I would get in touch with a good estate attorney on this to look at your father's situation, the totality of his estate, all of his assets. Does he have a lot of wealth? Not necessarily. The majority of his wealth is in his home. Okay. Yeah. In that case, I think a simple will would do the trick. Again, I would still talk to an estate attorney and get their take. A trust is, it can be a great tool, but they are much more expensive. Yeah.

Okay. And so depending on the involvement, you know, going through probate with a will, it's not as crazy as everyone makes it out to be. It's not as expensive as everyone makes it out to be and as long. It can be a pretty simple process. But make sure that his wishes are made very clear. Okay. So does he have a will today? He does currently. I don't know exactly what's on it because I haven't seen it, but he does have one. Do you have siblings? I do. Okay. That's where things get messy.

His dad passes and they go, whoa, whoa, you're going to get the house. And so that's where I think it's wise for him to have a conversation with the family and go, here's what's going to happen when I pass. Here's what's going to happen. And I think with his health issues, this is not too early to have this conversation.

Okay. So you've got some homework there to make sure the will's in place, make sure the whole family's clear on what it is, and get with an estate attorney to talk through the implications of this house being transferred. But I would not do it while he's alive. Yeah. Good advice. Not fun to think about. It's not. It's not. But I agree with your advice 100%. It's just so much easier. And getting it done through the will, then all the feelings can be feelings, but everything is going by the book.

And I think that's great advice. Let's go to Josh now in Spokane, Washington. Josh, how can we help today? Hi, good afternoon. Good afternoon. What's going on? My wife and I have been looking at potentially cashing out her IRA to pay down on our house to try to pay it off within the next five years rather than, I think we have a little over 11 years left. How old are you two? 35 and 36. Oh, boy. Okay.

You know what happens when you cash out that IRA, right? I do. I will pay the taxes and then the penalty, but I will double the savings in my interest. We would save about $20,000 and we'd be paying about $10,000 for the... Hold the phone right in front of your mouth, Josh. We're having a hard time hearing you.

Sorry. Is that better? I don't think there's going to be any savings here. You're essentially borrowing that money at 30%, 35% interest while unplugging all of the future growth of that Roth IRA. So if you plug that number into an investment calculator from 35 to 65, that's all the money you're giving up. It's not just the money today plus taxes. It's also the future growth.

Yeah. We also have, I have a pension through my work and I have 390,000 in my company sponsored 401k. Where's the urgency to knock out this mortgage at the expense of your retirement?

Because we want to be able to enjoy traveling with our kids who are younger now. We're going to have money. We dropped our house to a 15-year about four years ago, and it's caused more stress than what we wanted just because...

inflation and everything. So, I mean, we're still able to pay our bills and we have no other debts besides our house. Well, it sounds like you have an income problem then. If dropping to a 15-year caused you to have this much downward pressure on your finances, I don't think inflation is to blame here. What's your mortgage compared to your monthly take-home pay? Our mortgage just went up to like $24.50.

And I think our take home is $7,300. That's a lot. I think you guys, truthfully, what happened was you guys got too much house and the 15-year mortgage just exposed that. And so I would not rob the retirement. I would downsize in-house if you really want more freedom and margin, but I would not do this move under any circumstance.

I hate to be bad cop here, Ken. No, I think you're absolutely right. Again, why sacrifice the future on the altar of the immediate? Kind of this lifestyle, we want to do this and this. We've got to be thinking about the long term here. Find a different way to do it than robbing a retirement. Yeah, I agree. I think that's just leave it alone. That's why we call that that investment for the future. So I know it's not what you wanted to hear, but that's what we think is best. Thanks for the call. All right, don't move. More of your calls coming up. This is The Ramsey Show.

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Welcome back to The Ramsey Show, where we help you win with your money, win with your work, and win with your relationships. I'm Ken Coleman. George Campbell joins me. The phone number for you to jump in is 888-825-5225, 888-825-5225. All right, so here we go, George. We're about ready to hit Labor Day. And, you

You know, you get on the other side of Labor Day. Traditionally, it's on a presidential election year. That's when everybody kind of in the political business feels like things are heating up. Now everybody starts to pay attention, right?

And so we've been covering some economic issues that are central to the campaign. And we're just saying, we're not telling you how to vote. We never will. We're not telling you how we're voting either. By the way, some of these people, they assume things. Nobody knows. That's true. Nobody knows. I like to keep a little mystique. Yeah, it's nobody's business. But it's not, you know, it's nobody's business. That's not what we're here to do. We're here to talk about how some of this policy could affect your pocketbook. Yes. We're not interested in the policy itself.

We're interested in your pocketbook. But to the extent that the policy will affect your pocketbook, we'll tell you what we think. So there's your disclaimer. And so here we go. Let's talk about...

A new, it's not new, but not new at all. It's been floating around for a few years, but recently it's popped back up. What is that issue? I've been getting all these DMs, Ken. Everyone's freaking out. They're going, oh my gosh, have you seen this? Kamala Harris is proposing a 44% unrealized capital gains tax. You need to talk about this. So I looked into it and went, okay. What'd you find?

There's some truth to it. As with anything that is said on the internet or any headline, you got to look to the fine print to see what this actually is. So...

First, let's talk about what capital gains is, right? You buy an asset like real estate, a stock, a mutual fund. That thing appreciates in value, goes up. You go to sell it. You would then pay capital gains tax. There's short term if it's been less than a year. There's long term if it's longer than that. And the long term is obviously a lower tax rate. So what they're talking about is unrealized capital gains, which means you didn't actually sell the asset and yet they want to tax money you didn't actually make.

So let's think about this with an example. Ken puts $10,000 into a mutual fund. The mutual fund increases to $15,000. So you made $5,000, Ken, but you didn't actually sell the fund yet. That's right. So you didn't actually make that $5,000. That's right. Well, they're saying you should still pay taxes on that $5,000. Right.

Now, you might ask this question. Where is that money going to come from? Because I didn't sell this. Well, you're going to have to find the money elsewhere, Ken, because we want our pound of flesh. They being proponents of this policy. Yes. So this is not a Kamala policy. This is from the Biden administration. That's true. That Kamala has come out and said, hey, we are backing the Biden tax proposals that were set up. Yeah.

So here's the deal. Does this affect you? Well, it may not directly affect you because they're saying this is really the billionaire income tax is what they're calling it. It's for households that have an income of more than or at least assets that are worth more than $100 million. So this affects Dave Ramsey. If you're listening, this affects you. Probably no one else listening right now. This affects. Now, Ken, there are indirect effects that I think we should talk about.

So let's talk about what happens when we add these extra taxes. And right now they're saying there'd be a minimum 20% tax. So it's not 44%. They are proposing that should be the highest marginal tax rate is 44%, which is higher than it is now. Right.

But let's even say 20% on those unrealized capital gains. Let's talk about what this does. For the super wealthy. Yes. So number one, here's what I'm thinking this does. Number one, it's a slippery slope because it's not a far cry where they go, you know what, $100 million? Let's bring that threshold down later on to $10 million or even $1 million just

Just like what they did with income tax back in what, 1913, they proposed an income tax to the top 1%. That's right. Well, guess what? Now most states have an income tax that everybody pays. Right. So that's the slippery slope argument. Except for the great state of Tennessee. That's right. That's why people are moving to Tennessee and away from other states. That's right. So one thing that could happen, Ken, is wealthy investors, they're

They're going to need to sell other assets to pay the tax bill because they didn't actually make the money, which could lead to more frequent trades and big swings in the stock market. So more volatility. They also could be reduced confidence and reduced...

you know, excitement to even invest in the first place. If you know you're going to get dinged heavily, why would you do it? Why would you go in on investing? So that could also slow down the growth of the economy. That's right. Which I want you to talk about here. Sure. Well, this is a reverse trickle-down economics. So a little history lesson here. In the 80s, Reagan was criticized by the other side of that his economic plan was called trickle-down economics. And

and was criticized for this, but this is a reverse of this, because the economic policy of Reagan was to create tax breaks for the wealthy because they reinvest the money. They spend money, thus creating jobs, and everybody wins. This is, by the way, a philosophical disagreement. I can tell you right now, people that are listening to this, either live or later, are going to hammer me on Instagram for what I just said. But this isn't my opinion, right?

You can disagree with that philosophy, but there are two philosophies. There just are. There are two philosophies right now in the major party system. And so what we believe, or I should say, I won't say we, I'm not going to speak for you, George. What I believe on this is that ultimately this is not the best way to raise government revenue.

Can I tell you how much they're talking about raising here? Yeah, it's a penance. $500 billion over 10 years. And what's our national debt at right now? Over $35 trillion. $35 trillion, folks. So again, folks, we're talking about real numbers. You can get mad at us all you want. You can get so mad at me, I don't care. I literally do not care. I won't even read it. I'm going to sleep like a baby tonight. Okay? Don't even care. These are facts and figures. Okay? That amount of money will do nothing.

With the government spending problem. George, if the federal government called in on the line and you took the call and they said, we got $35 trillion in debt, George, what's the first thing you're going to tell them to do? Cut the spending? Cut spending. It's a both and, but taxing the super wealthy seems very popular. But by the way, it is.

It's very popular with a certain amount of voters. Well, it's popular also because they're shaking the fist at wealth inequality. Right. But here's the challenge with that. It's not fair that they have all this money. What they don't understand is you might as well just move somewhere else.

because a capitalistic society thrives when the wealthy reinvest the money they make. It just, that's just how it works. And so, uh, this is again, uh, very popular policy designed to energize the base. I think it's bad policy. It ends up affecting the economy in negative ways. Uh,

And when you see wealthy people who create jobs by investing their money and they pull back out of the economy, it affects every one of us. It will trickle down. Bring this back full circle. It is a reverse trickle down. It will trickle down in the form of pain, not prosperity. Because when wealthy people and investors pull back to protect their money, everybody else loses. They don't lose. They don't lose.

And so it creates this adversarial situation where the government's going, we've got to get more money from those rich people. Instead of going, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Why don't we actually look at our problems? And that's what you would do. We should set up a fake call like that, James, where we have someone call in as the federal government and go, okay, we've got this budget deficit here, here, and you walk them through it. Because in a fun, simple way, it would be the same as someone calling in with half a million dollars in debt going, okay,

We think we don't know what to do. And if you're going to make a change, and I did the math for you, Ken, we're talking about 1.4%.

That's the revenue compared to the deficit. It's not going to touch it. One percent. Does it even keep up with the interest on the $35 trillion? The $500 billion doesn't even come close to equaling the interest on the debt. And I'm a big national debt guy. By the way, I think that is a unifying issue that the American people ought to go, you know, what if one election we just all said, forget all the social issues that we all scream at each other about.

And we forget about party lines. And we just went, let's fix the national debt so that our kids and grandchildren may have a shot at an economy that works. What if we all just voted on that? And we said, all right, in the debate in September, the candidates have to tell us how they're going to get rid of the national debt and best plan wins.

Now that's a fun debate. I'd actually watch that. Because it would have to be around facts and figures and an actual plan, not insults and accusations. I'm so sick of it right now. Well, the good news, Ken, is this whole tax proposal, it could be unconstitutional, which means it will never pass in Congress. For the record, let me piss off a lot of people right now. I think the capital gains tax is

unconstitutional. I would love to debate someone on that. Fire your comments away at Instagram and Twitter. I won't even look at them. But I think it's unconstitutional. Capital gains tax. Income tax? Constitutional. Capital gains tax as it's laid out? Not constitutional. We've already paid the taxes. It's time for another throw some tea into the harbor. I'm with you. This is The Ramsey Show.

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Welcome back to the Ramsey Show. Thrilled to have you with us. The phone number is 888-825-5225. I'm Ken Coleman. George Camel joins me, and we're excited that you are here. We're here to take your questions about your money, your income. That's the work side of things. It helps get you through these baby steps a little bit faster. Let's go to Holly, who joins us now in Medford, Oregon. Holly, how can we help today?

Hi. My question is like two pages long, and the last thing you said was keep it short, so I'm going to try to get to that. Wow. Yeah. Give us the SparkNotes, and then we'll ask more questions. How about that? That's what he said. That's what he said. Perfect. Okay. So I've been married a couple decades and some change.

And I basically did the home stuff, the kids homeschooling and let my husband grit and bear through all the finances, which were up and down. And, you know, like through the recession, I lost everything. I never once jumped in for any details. I let him bring cash home and then I could breathe, you know, like we were fine. And then in June, I went and got my hair done and somebody recommended your show. I probably listened to $500 this summer and jumped.

jumped all in on my end and which my husband is yeah he's um he's not he's encouraging he's like I think he's relieved that I'm learning stuff but he's not in alignment with Randy so he's basically like good for you love that for you bless your heart no no not at all he's relieved that I'm like you know

stepping up and, you know, actually like, because up until that point, I was spending the cash we had. I wasn't saving it. I wasn't really budgeting it. We were going like on trips for school, you know, like it was just dollar, you know, not really dollar to dollar, but like, you know, a couple hundred bucks left over before the next few hundred. So he's happy that you reined in the spending, but... So he's kind of, he's happy and he's, I think he's waiting for me to learn more because I still don't even like have...

Enough of a grasp to have like... Yes, but Holly, I'm trying to help you. George is right. We know there's something on the other side of this. Because you can hear it in your voice. What level of education do you need? But what's the tension? Just give us the tension point. Okay, so he feels disrespected when I jump in and question things. I think he feels challenged. Give us an example of when you jumped in and he felt disrespected.

What happened?

And, you know, inquiring in that, he's like, you know what, I'm good, and you got your stuff figured out, and, you know, I've got my stuff taken care of. And I think he felt...

He just kind of felt like, you know, after this long, and, you know, this has been my blood, sweat, and tears. Well, let me dive in. Kind of a thing. Let me jump in real quick. This is just classic male-female stuff, and you're just asking questions. The way you said it, I understand why he's acting that way. I'm not saying anything wrong, but you're basically saying, I'm asking questions about how he's spending his money. No, bad idea. The way to get involved in this is to say, hey, do you do a budget for us?

Does he do a budget? Well, I know he doesn't. Right. So my point is... Well, I guess that's not true. He doesn't like write down, but he has actually went to school and almost got his accounting degree. Like he does actually know what he's doing. Do you guys have combined bank accounts? Oh, yeah. Okay. So how do you know what's going on in the finances?

You know, I never really cared. I don't necessarily. I feel like this is all overwhelming since June. I think that's where the problem is, is all of a sudden you care. Now you're a little investigator going, hey, what's going on over here? What about this? Yeah, that's the thing. I don't know what questions to ask, and I feel like I understand that the way he heard my question, he didn't hear my heart. That's right. That's fair. I want to be more respectful. There you go. And not more respectful because I wasn't disrespecting, but it was...

Sensitive. It's a sensitivity to all of us. Just hearing you talk, you don't seem like the type to yell at him and go, what's going on with the money over here? You seem very sweet, very kind. And so that tells me there's also something on his side that he needs to deal with. And I don't know if that's, hey, he has his own spending issues or he just feels like, hey, I want to have the control and I don't want to relegate it and I don't want to give her a vote because so far I've been doing a bang up job without her.

Do you think that the best way for her to go about it, George, is to say, hey, I've been listening to this show, which he knows, and propose the every dollar. We'll give it to her for free. Let's give her the free every dollar. And let her, I don't know, what do you think? Let's workshop this. I'm going to guess, Holly, that communication in your marriage has never been stellar.

That's true. Also, I was going to say that, you know, he, since we've been married, he's owned a business and he acknowledges that he wouldn't have this business if he didn't take risks. And that is a very personal baby to him. So do you guys have, like you have a goal financially and he's not on board? Like, do you guys have debt that you want to pay off?

Uh, okay. So I, we have very, I've been so blessed. Um, he doesn't believe in like going into a lot of debt. So he has a card that, you know, puts a couple hundred bucks on and pays off. I'm the one that brought on the debt. I talked to him into a car that I've all have paid off in a year. And I just, when I got on there, um, the podcast, I paid it off my eyes, um, 10 months faster than planned because I was like, this just needs to go. It doesn't feel good. Um,

But one, I'm grasping at straws trying to get information into my head. I actually ordered the homeschool curriculum. I don't think it was the right homeschool curriculum, but I ordered it to go through with my kids and hoped it helped me too. Okay, Holly. Holly, I'm going to jump in again. I got a thought here. Okay. Okay.

I think you need to start over with him and go, hey, I realize that I'm just insatiable right now, and it's coming from excitement. I didn't do a good job sharing my heart behind all this. I'm actually thrilled to learn I am in no way trying to be an armchair quarterback or second-guess your decisions at all. I still want you to take the lead on all of this.

how can I learn more about our budget and learn more about our spending without making you feel attacked or like I'm second guessing you? I would start with that. Let's let him identify and give him a chance to be heard, to go, well, yeah, when you say it this way, I think if you were to retreat to that,

I think it's probably a good place to restart. George, would you add or change any of that? Well, the one thing I would add is right now we haven't even painted a picture of where we're trying to go and what the goal is. So right now it's just inquisitive with no real end in mind. So that's where I think we need to reset and go, honey, listen, for the last several decades, I feel like I've

I haven't done a good job of making this a team effort. And I know I haven't been pulling my weight and I'm trying to start a new chapter here where we forge a new path together. We hit financial goals together that we never thought were possible. And I'm ready to get more involved in the right way. And so will you go on this journey with me? Can we sit down and make some goals as a couple? Can we pay off this car in six months instead by looking at this budget and seeing where we're actually spending and how we can do better?

Can we actually invest to where we retire with dignity? Right now, you have no clue. Right. He realizes that, and he encourages my education on it, but so far it's been just a podcast. But he doesn't want your involvement. I really think he just felt like I was critiquing him. Yeah, 100%. Then why don't you lay out, hey, will you show me how you've been leading our finances? Just say, I want you to educate me. I am in no way wanting to question what you've done or why you've done it. I just want to learn.

That's good. That's good. And by the way, it's okay to say I'm sorry. And again, I don't think you've done anything. I have a bunch, honestly. I know I didn't have to do a bunch, but I do. Yeah, good for you. You don't have to tiptoe around him.

I just, well, I realized that we communicate differently and my heart does not, uh, relay the words to, um, reach him necessarily. And so I was looking for some words, um, going to eventually get the financial piece for myself. And I read the, I binge read the book and, um,

Right now, you guys aren't reading from the same book, and that's where he needs to get involved and say, you need to say, honey, will you just go through this Financial Peace University stuff with me so that when I talk about it, you understand where I'm coming from? I've got a great recommendation. Hit me. Holly, this is for you. I want you to go buy the book Love Talk by Les and Leslie Parrott.

In that book, it has a brief assessment with it that will teach you your love talk styles. In other words, your husband has a talk style. You have a talk style. And I think that book, you both take it and it's so helpful for you both to go, oh, I

This is my talk style. This is her talk style. And you guys, it'll help you in this conversation. Learn how to talk to each other just based on the way you need to be communicating with. I think it'd be a great book. Easy read. Go get it. I highly recommend it. My wife Stacy and I did it early on and it has helped us throughout our marriage. So that's good. And we'll give you every dollar. So hang on the line. Christian will pick up. We'll gift you every dollar for a year to get you guys on the same page, looking at the same playbook. Good hour, George Camel. Good stuff. This is the Ramsey Show.

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Welcome to the Ramsey Show America. Thrilled you're with us. We're here to help you win with your money, win in your work, and win in your relationships. 888-825-5225 is the phone number for you to jump in. We're here for you. 888-825-5225. I'm Ken Coleman. George Camel is with me. And we're going to start it off this hour with Ryan in Dayton, Ohio. Ryan, how can we help?

Hi, how are you guys doing today? We're doing well. What's going on with you? Oh, not too much. So I am 22 years old. I just recently found out that my girlfriend is pregnant, so we are going to be getting married. Okay. She is expecting in April. The tricky part here is both of us just signed leases for apartments. Mine is up in May. Hers is up in June.

Um, fortunately I don't have any debt. She has about $4,000 in credit card debt and I would assume somewhere around $10,000 in student loan debt. Um, what I'm trying to figure out is what is the best way for us to get a home together? Um, roughly when's the wedding time? Um, what, what we're planning on in just a couple of weeks, um,

just having us two go get married and then have like a ceremony sometime later down the line. How soon, give us as close as a date as possible on when you both signed these leases. On when we signed them originally? Yeah, I thought you started the call by saying we just signed leases. Yep. So it is, it would have been, mine would have been somewhere around June 10th. Okay. Hers would have been July 20th.

Okay. So about a month or two ago. Yeah. So now you're saying we need to get out of one of these leases? What was that? You're saying you need to get out of one or both of these leases? Well, either get out of one or both of the leases and find a place together or...

find a way that I can pay for a place while we're both in the end of our leases and then move directly into there when they're both out. I don't understand the urgency to buy a house right now. Yeah. You got a lot going on. We got debt to clean up. We're about to get married. There's no need to buy a house. Why not just rent somewhere and you two live there? Why the house?

I guess to me in my head it just sounded like the better alternative, having a home that we can call ours rather than renting somewhere. All right, let's talk the numbers here. Let's show you, because I think emotionally that just makes sense to you. Well, I've got a baby on the way. I'm getting married. I'm a family man now. Time to get a home. Yeah, so let's run the numbers. I'm going to dig into these here. So what is your income and what is her income? My income is about $80,000 a year. Okay, what does she make?

About 15. What does she do? She's a server and she's in school full-time. For what? To be a nurse. And have you guys discussed what the school schedule is going to be like with baby on the way? Is she going to pause? Yep, we've been talking about that. No, she's not going to pause. Her school does offer daycare for her and we have some family and friends involved. Okay, so she's not going to pause. Correct. So when will she be done? Hmm.

She will have her associates in nursing next December. That's when she'll be able to get a job. Okay. December 25th. That helps. So in December, George, she's going to be at what would you think her starting salary is going to be? Do you guys know? Does she know? We're guesstimating somewhere around $70,000 to $75,000. Okay. So in the not-too-distant future, looking at $150,000 plus combined income. And in the near future, it's closer to $100,000.

Mm-hmm. So if I'm you guys, as soon as you're married, let's combine finances and let's see if we can knock out this debt and then save up before baby's here. Is that possible? Yeah. How much money do you have? Saved? Yeah. Currently about $3,000. I'm looking at selling my truck, so hopefully have around $12,000. Do you have debt on the truck? Nope. Okay. What are you going to drive instead?

You have another car? Yeah, I have a car with no debt on it as well. Oh, great. Good for you. That's nice. That feels good. So what do you think your chances are getting out of these leases or one of them? You just need to get out of one. Basically, George and I are saying if you can get out of one lease, you guys just have an apartment and get started with that. There's no need to rush on a house. It's going to give you so many more options.

Mm-hmm. What do you think your chances are? I'm really not sure what the chances are. I was going to try to have a meeting with the owner of my place and see if we could work on that. These are totally different apartments? Not the same? Yeah. Okay. What do you know about that, George?

I mean, I've rented many apartments in my day, and what I've found is if you're kind and you work with someone who's actually capable of making a decision over there, probably not going to be the person doing the leases, probably someone above them. They're usually willing to work with you in some capacity, even if it's, hey, I know it's going to cost X, Y, Z to break a lease. Would you be willing to, if I replace myself, would you be willing to waive the fee? Something like that.

And so just work with them. And then if they, you know, say kick rocks and pound sand, go work with hers and say, would you be willing to work with us? We've got a baby on the way. We're getting married. We could not plan for all of this life change happening, and we need to get out of this lease. That's what I would do if I was in your shoes. You with this, Ryan? Yep. Okay. Do you have questions about that? Are you just processing? What's going on over there? Well, I'm wondering. Here's the thing. You don't have money to buy a house. So let's just –

Put it out of your conscience. No house. So I'm wondering if neither of our places are exactly optimal for having a baby in them. You guys having a baby wasn't optimal, so optimal's out the window. We've got to figure out. What do you mean? Why can't a baby live in an apartment? Why aren't they optimal? Well, no, no, no. Not that an apartment isn't optimal, just ours specifically. Why? Bedroom-wise. What do you mean? How many bedrooms? Animal having...

Well, I have two bedrooms, but we have two dogs as well. The dogs can freaking sleep on the couch in the living room. Baby sleeps in the other bedroom. Are you out of your mind? You're going to put the dogs in the bedroom?

No, not the dogs in the bedroom. I just figured the square footage would be a little small for all that. What? The baby's tiny. So I wondered if maybe getting a bigger apartment, like we get out of one week, get a bigger apartment for us. Okay, as the dad of a one-year-old, let me tell you, the baby sleeps in a little bassinet next to your bed for the first like six months. Yeah. So you don't need a nursery.

Ryan, we're not trying to be unkind. I'm sorry. I'm 50 and I've been through all this. Ken's a curmudgeon. I have no patience for this kind of thinking. It's not you. It's me. But here's the deal, Ryan. You don't need something bigger. You just need a basic apartment. It's a little teeny tiny baby. You could be in that apartment for two or three years, even with the dogs. We're trying to save you money. And maybe down the line, you talk to the apartment and say, hey, is there a two bedroom available that's in our budget? And can we upgrade to that with no fees? Yeah.

So this is where we get creative, but the conclusion is not, well, we got to go buy a house even though we're broke. That's not the solution. We got to make sure we have money stacked so that baby and mom are home safe. Then we can push play on the baby steps, knock out the rest of the debt, get the emergency fund. And I think you can do all that. Making $100,000 with very little debt, let's knock it out and get some savings ready. Can I tell you why I'm so ornery about this? Tell me. My mom and dad told me recently that they...

When I was born, we lived in a one-bedroom, 900-square-foot apartment. That's right. Over a pharmacy. And look at Ken. Exactly. You're an uphill, both ways kind of guy. I like that about you. Just saying. Oh my gosh. This is a Ramsey show. Listen, the housing market is crazy. And if you've been on the internet, here's the sentiment. Affording a home is impossible and you're doomed to be a renter for the rest of your life. Right? Wrong. George Campbell here. Listen,

Listen, finding a home you love within your budget is possible, and I'm excited to help you get there with our brand new course, How to Buy a Home You Can Actually Afford. From saving a down payment that fits your budget to making an offer that sellers can't resist, we'll cover it all. So if you're ready to seal the deal on the right home for you, take the course at ramsaysolutions.com slash course. That's ramsaysolutions.com slash course.

This is The Ramsey Show, where we help you win with your money, win in your work, and win with your relationships. I'm Ken Coleman. George Camel joins me. The phone number is 888-825-5225. The Ramsey Show question of the day is brought to you by YRefi. If you're in default with private student loans, you need to contact YRefi. Now, obviously, we don't encourage...

letting your loans get into default. We teach responsibility, but these amounts have some of you struggling, and this is a way forward. WhyRefi was created for people in your situation, so go to whyrefi.com slash Ramsey. That's why, R-E-F-Y dot com slash Ramsey. May not be available in all states. Today's question comes from Rachel in Iowa.

I'm a newly single mom after 15 years of marriage to a cheating alcoholic. Is it worth going $25,000 into debt to get a master's in accounting in order to have a career? For the last 10 years, I've worked small jobs only for extra cash, so I never had a career. I'm in my early 40s and my kids are both under 12. I want time with them and I want financial security. I'm

I'm tired of working outside the home and having my parents raise my kids while we live paycheck to paycheck. As an accountant, I think I could build a career out of my own home. Is this worth pursuing? I'm going to say not now.

down the road, maybe. This is one where going back and forth with someone on the phone, George, would be helpful to kind of see, all right, give us the projected income. Where do you think this is going? She knows her industry better than I do. But at this point, if what she's looking for, and there's a heavy dose of, I'm tired of working outside the home. I want my kids around. I think in today's world, she could really build a nice bookkeeping business. And

And a bookkeeping business with her accounting skills is just one idea to where she could start it on the side, keep her day job, get her bookkeeping business going. And if she can get it to the point where the bookkeeping business is paying her what she's making in her day job, then and only then does she move over and then she can work from home. She can work from anywhere doing bookkeeping for small businesses, small, medium-sized businesses, etc.

some specialty boutique accounting needs, if she's got some kind of niche ideas and ways she can help. That would be the direction I would recommend to her based on what she has submitted in this question. Absolutely. So she doesn't need the master's.

in accounting to provide that service. And the other piece of this, is it worth going $25,000 into debt to do it? Absolutely not. Don't do that. Only do it when you can cash flow it. And that might mean taking Ken's advice and putting money aside every single month. And that might mean, hey,

You know, two grand a month for 12 months, I'll be able to cash flow it. Or a grand a month for two years, now I'm able to cash flow it. And so we need to get the income up in the meantime, but don't shortcut it right now. Yeah, I absolutely agree with that. All right. Do my eyes deceive me, George? Or is Chris calling in from Brisbane or Brisbane, Brisbane, Australia? We'll see how you're supposed to say it. Chris, Aussie, Aussie, Aussie.

How you going? Good. How are you? Did I say that right? Is it Brisbane or Brisbane? Brisbane, I think. Yeah, about an hour out of Brisbane. An hour west away from the coast of Brisbane, yeah. I love this already. Very good. I love it. I could hear you read children's stories to me. It would be fantastic. How can we help you? Hey, I was just wondering if you got any advice for me. I'm self-employed. I'm just...

I'm very driven by goals and dreams. And I've tackled my first goal, and I'm struggling on my second one. What was your first goal? My first goal, so I'm in business. My first goal was to make $1,000 a day of turnover of the company.

And then to make $1,000 a profit and then $1,000 a wage per day, I hit all them targets. That goal was set in 2011. Fantastic. Whoa. You've been at this a long time. And I've been sitting here just...

Yeah, I've been sitting here dormant, not really knowing what to do, and I've set a new goal here a month ago to hit a million dollars, as a million dollars paid to me for the year. Okay. What did you... I'm struggling. I'm struggling to keep a dream alive here. Okay, tell me, what do you mean by, I'm struggling?

My problem is, again, is like I've got an electrical business, so I'm a tradesman, a contractor, and I need about $482,000 a year now from that. I play with farms, with property.

um, or ranches or whatever you'd call it. And, um, I've got money there, but I can't touch any money. Like I'm making about 497 a year in, in property going up. So I keep developing them. Um, but I just got no money. Well, we're all making all this money, but I've got no money. Where is it going? How would you even spend that much?

We've got a lot of debt. So I've currently got a million dollars in debt in property and I've got off my head around about $400,000 in debt in machinery. I've just started with your baby steps and I plan to be there debt-free in 6.6 years as the current steps here.

But, yeah, I'm wondering, do I need to change my dream there, or do I just go get a job and make my life a little less stressful? You're doing great on the income side. You're making good money. You just made some decisions along the way that eventually caught up to you. All right, let me jump in really fast here. George will walk you through the debt thing, but I want to jump in a little bit on this equipment thing. So the equipment is what you use for your electrician business.

Oh, yeah. So if I were to sell everything in electrical, I would walk away with $500,000. So I'm not upside down in anything. Right. So let me ask a question. $500,000 in assets on electrical. So could you, but could you rent the same equipment and build that into the cost of your jobs? Not really. No. We finance, so our cars that we're running, our cars are financed there, and we'd write down, look,

Most of these electrical, I'll be in baby step two is in machinery. I'm 18 months off being debt free. And then it's tackling property after that. Okay. I'm not sure you answered my question. Sorry. Yeah. It's okay. So this equipment that you have, which you're into debt for.

And you could sell it. So my biggest, if I could just quickly run you past it, I've got a few pickup, one I only owe five grand on it, another seven, another one at 40, another one at 50. So these are cars that you're using for the business?

Yeah. And so the big ones for sale right now, and hopefully that will ease up a bit of pressure here. Yeah. So that's a $70,000 sale that we're trying to sell at the moment. And that will get rid of the $50,000 loan. My wife's SUV, it's financed at 60 grand. It's worth $150,000, $155,000. Woof.

You're spending like the American Congress, man. There's nothing wrong with your dream. This is nothing wrong with your dream. You just have a discipline problem, and I would sell that property if I could make money on that property. One of my dreams, my exit plan immediately if I had to, one property, I owe $535,000 on it.

And it just had a valuation there last month at $2.22 million. Wow. So I could sell that. I've owned it for four years. I paid $550,000. Yeah, but George, what's going to change if he sells that property, if he doesn't change his discipline? Well, that's where I'm guilty, Ken. I'll give you a confession. My plan was to sell that property.

You know what your problem is? You're so focused on dreams that you create nightmares for yourself. All of this is all you.

It's all you. It is. By the way, it's all easily unwrappable, isn't it, George? Yes. You've got 40 seconds. Give me a locker room talk. Chris, I think you need to change your goal from making a million. Let's say I'm going to be debt-free a year from now. And that might mean making a million. It might mean selling property.

It might mean selling all this crap. And then you're going to restart and go, now I'm going to restart debt-free. I'm going to move at the speed of cash, only buy property when I have the cash to do it in full, only buy the truck when I have the cash to do it in full. You're really good at making money. The problem is you're even better at spending it. And I think both we can get under control, my friend. Well said. You need a whistle and a hat. Just love Chris. More Australian callers. Please call us, guys. Yeah, wasn't that great? So lovely. Man, I wish I had that accent.

You'd be more likable. That's for sure. Is that right? Yeah. All right. I'll work on it. This is the Ramsey Show. You know my philosophy on planning and preparing. Being proactive is always better than being reactive. We have a provider we recommend that can help you stay prepared for unexpected medical situations. I have a medical emergency kit from the doctors at the wellness company. And guys, let me tell you, you really should check this out. This is a medical emergency kit.

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That's promo code Ramsey at UrgentCareKit.com slash Ramsey. Hey guys, Rachel Cruz here. You know, some people think budgeting means they can't have any fun with money. And I know this because that was me.

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Welcome back to The Ramsey Show. I'm Ken Coleman. George Camel is alongside, and we are here for you. 888-825-5225. We want to help you win with your money, win in your work, and win with your relationships. I'll bet you didn't know something, George. I'll bet you didn't know what I'm about to tell you. Hit me. Do you know who billionaire Howard Hughes is? No?

Are you not old enough? I don't know all the billionaires. Okay. Howard Hughes, one of the most eccentric billionaires of all time. Interestingly enough, Leonardo DiCaprio played him. Maybe one of the best acting jobs Leo has ever done. But he was known as one of the richest men in the world. And when he died in April of 1976, would you believe, George, that he died without a will?

I cannot imagine a billionaire. One of the richest men in the world dies without a will. Now, here's what happened. Yikes. Over 600 people came forward claiming to have an interest in the fortune. In the end, a judge decided the $2.5 billion fortune would be split between 22 of Hughes' legal cousins. What I wouldn't get to be one of Hughes' cousins. Yeah, and this happened in 1983, so it drug out that long. Here's the point, because I know you're wondering, where in the world are you going with this, Ken?

Don't be Howard Hughes. Don't let the government decide. Don't let a judge decide where your inheritance goes when you can leave it to the people and do it with order. We want to challenge you to create your will in the month of August.

It takes less than five minutes. You can find out how to do the will online at ramsaysolutions.com slash willsquiz. An online will could work for you. You may need something more complex. That's why we want you to just take this quick little quiz, ramsaysolutions.com slash willsquiz. If, in fact, you can simply do it online, you can click the link in the description.

If you're listening on YouTube or podcast, if you do find that the online will fit your situation, you can get 25% off when you use the promo code WILLMONTH, one word, WILLMONTH, at checkout during the month of August. So there you go. Get it done. Get it done. And for most people, for most, an online will will do the job. It worked for me. It'll do the job. That's exactly where I got it done. All right, let's go to Detroit, Michigan, where Anna awaits. Anna, how can we help? Hello. Hi. Hi.

Hi, how are you guys? We're having a blast. What's going on with you?

So I just have a question about savings. Can you save too much? And I guess what should we do with some of the extra money that my husband and I make? So we have like an 18-month emergency fund, which I know is probably overkill. Do you know something we don't? Is the apocalypse nigh? Just tell us. No, I just think we're, I don't know, afraid to spend money a little bit. At least definitely I am. Okay.

And then, you know, we also have, we save for retirement. We have no debt. And then we have like another like $65,000 that's not the emergency fund. And that just keeps accumulating money every month. I guess I'm not sure like what we should do. You know, we have kind of some dreams of maybe finishing our basement, you

I would put the money to work. I think savings is a great spot for your emergency fund, but anything above and beyond that, either invest it in the market so that you're beating inflation or put it to your next goal, your next project, something that excites you, spend a little bit. There's only a few things you can do with money. Spend it, save it, or give it. And I think right now you're really good at saving it and you're not great at spending it, and I assume you're probably not great at giving it.

Yeah, that could use some work too. And so that's where the budget... Do you guys do a budget right now? Yeah, we do. We do the every dollar budget every month. What's driving this fear? I don't really know. I mean, we kind of, both my husband and I grew up, you know, more so my husband, we grew up with...

no money, like no presents on Christmas and things like that. So I don't know if it somehow comes from there. That would do it. A scarcity mindset. He's never actually faced that. And it's just, you know, we're just so, I'm a stay-at-home mom. I left my job to be a mom. So I think that's also a fear of mine is that, you know, we only have one income. Have you two, since you've been married, ever done anything mind-numbingly stupid with money?

No. Have you gotten anywhere within about a mile of mind-numbingly stupid? No. What do you think the chances are that you and your husband are going to do something mind-numbingly stupid with money? Zero. Okay. Maybe we should start to act like it.

What was that? Start acting like it. Start acting like you're not a moron with money because you're not and you're never going to do anything moronic at all. So what I was trying to do is have a little bit of fun to help you see how your fear is irrational. That if you're going to spend some, it's not going to spin you out of control.

Right. So I guess like how much do you know? I mean, besides like the emergency fund that you talked about. I think having six months in the emergency fund is great. Anything above and beyond that, I don't think you need unless you have an immediate goal. Let's say a one year goal ahead of you where you want, you know, you want to renovate the basement. Let's set aside 50 grand for that and let's get it done. Let's get some bids. Let's jump on it. Otherwise, if it's a three or four or five plus year goal, I would be investing that in the market, either in retirement or in a non-retirement account.

Okay. But Anna, you're familiar with our baby steps, aren't you? Yep. Okay. So what do we tell you? Three to six months in baby step three, then baby step four, which by the way, you're well beyond that. George just laid that out. Baby step four is what? Um, 15%, 15%. It's been so long. Yeah. It's okay. How much are you investing right now as a household? What's the percentage? Um,

It's like 24% towards retirement accounts. My husband just changed jobs. Actually, that is something I guess we did. He was at a more stressful job, higher paying job, and we just transitioned to be home more. It was a pay cut, but... But that's the kind of freedom that you can buy when you follow the plan. Do you guys have a mortgage or do you pay that off? Yeah, we paid that off three years ago. Amazing. So you're doing all the right things. I just think we need to hit the accelerator on some fun and some giving. Yeah.

Yeah. Which, by the way, is really fun. So this is what I would do. I would as a tactical exercise, you and your husband sit down with the every dollar budget and you're going to increase Anna's fund money and he's going to increase his fund money. We're going to set a goal to go on a vacation that would have hurt to go on a while ago because you're like ten thousand dollars for a vacation. We don't need that. You're right. But you guys have worked so hard that you've actually earned it.

Yeah, okay. And then on the giving side, there's probably not a lot in the giving line item. So let's add a spontaneous one. Hey, we see an opportunity. We're just going to give. We're going to fund the single mom to get her car fixed. We're going to start giving to a nonprofit we're excited about. If you go to a local church, we're going to start tithing. I think we need to get that flat tire filled up. But I want to dig here, Anna. Everything George said made total sense to you. And then you still said, it's just, finish that sentence. It's just what? It's just what?

Um, I don't know. I'm not sure. I guess my husband and I, we've, you know, we talked about, he has vacation picks coming up and I'm like, we need to go to a vacation and like, we need to just go somewhere like to Florida. I don't know, go somewhere warm in the winter and go on a vacation. And then it's just,

I don't know. It just feels wrong to like take the money out of our account to buy the vacation. Wait, wait, wait, wait. Do both of you, when you start talking, so this conversation, let's go to Florida and have a great vacation. Does one of you start the whole, oh gosh, this feels so bad to pull the money out. Or is it both of you?

No, I think my husband, he's afraid of flying. And so I think that we have a year old baby that we just had. And so I think maybe that's where his hesitation comes from. No, you just changed all of them. He's the one that's like, go buy a new pair of shoes. You need new shoes. Go do that. And I'm like, oh, but they can last. So I think my husband. It's both of you. No, it's both of you. And by the way, you didn't even answer the question because I said, what's the deal? And you went, well, it's because he doesn't like to fly. Well, you guys can drive.

I think you both are in that mindset. You're just terrified to spend any money because you think that the big bad money monster is going to just come out of the sky and squash you. I think it's that crazy. And I say that with love to say, you guys have got to baby step into it a little bit. It's almost like maybe you guys should just...

have the grandparents watch the baby one night and you go away for one night and maybe it's not a five-star hotel but maybe a four and you've done nothing wrong you haven't stolen this money don't feel bad using it money is just a tool it is amoral and if you're using it for anything other than a tool you're doing it wrong it is not a god to be worshipped you're not trying to build a temple of dollars that you can pass down to your kids enjoy the money

That's all we're saying. And that's going to take a while. It's going to hurt. It's going to hurt to write a few of those checks, and then you'll get used to it, and that will start to unlock some things. Does anybody write checks anymore? I do. It feels good. Do you really? I feel old school, old timey. I want to see you write a check. I need to see that to believe it. This is The Ramsey Show. Hey, guys. Dave Ramsey here, and I got a big announcement. I'm coming to a city near you live on the Money and Relationships Tour with Don

with Dr. John Deloney. This is the most interactive event we've ever done. You get to decide what we talk about. You do not want to miss this. We'll be coming to Louisville, Durham, Atlanta, Phoenix, Fort Worth, and Kansas City in April and May of 2025. Get your tickets and more information at ramsaysolutions.com slash tour.

Welcome back to The Ramsey Show. I'm Ken Coleman. George Campbell joins me. We're so excited that you are with us. And we're going to get right back to the phones, 888-825-5225. Tracy is joining us now near Wichita, Kansas. Tracy, how can we help? Yeah, I was just curious if you recommend financing my business for growth potential. Probably. What do you think we're going to say? I would say no. Yeah, tell us about the business.

It's a personal training business. I've been in it for 14 years. I'm debt-free, and I've applied everything that you guys have

spoken of, and I've applied that to my personal business. Great. But if I continue at my rate, I cannot save enough at my current savings rate in order to do what I wanted to do in business. Which is what? Until it's time to retire. I get into sports science and provide a broader service to the community. And so the financing would be for what? Building and equipment? The finance...

Financing to start with would be a market analysis to identify the growth potential and to identify the plan to go forward. How much? That would be $10,000. I would never in a million years finance $10,000 to grow any business because if you can't scrape that together, you shouldn't even be thinking about it.

Well, I can scrape it together, but I don't know if I should take that leap. Then you probably shouldn't be considering doing this thing because it's like, if I'm not willing to put my money into the $10,000 study, I probably shouldn't borrow someone else's money to do it. There's your ultimate litmus test. I mean, that's the smell test right there.

Okay. If it's too risky to use your own money, it's way too risky to use someone else's. That's the spark notes. George, way to come in and clean up. I come in and I just lay out a tweet to help him out. Thank you very much. So, Tracy, is there another way to do this? Is there a cheaper way? Yeah, well, my concern is, once again, I get the marketing plan analysis done, and it's going to come back and say, you're going to need $50,000 more. I'm confused why you need this analysis.

I wanted to make sure that it's going to work before I jump into the... But what can't you do that they can, whoever they is that you're going to give this money to? Yeah, I'd be a marketing group, and it's the... Who's selling this to you? How'd you hear about this? It just feels fishy to me. There's a marketing group, and they came and they...

talked with us and he says if you don't do anything else, he recommends doing the marketing plan. Of course he does. Here's the deal. There's nothing out there that they're going to tell you that you couldn't find through YouTube, through a one-on-one coach, a mentor in business that you could even pay an hourly fee to. Yep.

But I think truthfully, you can figure this out on your own and try out the marketing on your own and see what works for your specific business without dropping 10 grand. I'm going to add to what George said, Tracy. If I'm you, I would start finding out who's doing what you want to do. And if you give me the old, well, nobody's doing it exactly that way. I'll go, okay, then go find some people who are doing something similar. And you know what I would do with the 10 grand?

I'd spend a fraction of that. I'd go find somebody, and I'm making this up, but let's say somebody's doing something similar to what you want to do. You know what I'd do? I'd say, hey, what's a day of your time worth? What's it worth? And if they say $1,500, go, I'm going to give you $1,500, and I'm going to fly to you, and if you don't have a boardroom, I'm going to find a local hotel that's got one, and we're going to get in that room for eight hours, and I'm going to learn everything I can learn from you.

To me, that's what George is talking about, and to me, that's the kind of knowledge. I don't want some marketing group who's never spent a second, a second, actually operating the business that you want to operate. Tell me anything about the market analysis. They don't know what they're doing. Can I give you a $10,000 crash course that you could get for $20 today, Tracy? Sure.

What's that? Two books. Number one is Steal Like an Artist from Austin Kleon. Like what Ken was saying, go look at what other people are doing and make it your own. The other book is Marketing Made Simple from Donald Miller. Those two books alone should get you very far. If you go apply it, try it, you're going to have a little failure on the way. But if you do it with cash and you're testing it all out, you're not going to fall flat on your face.

Okay. But even then, and those are great books, but even then, those books are only helpful to the sense that you understand what it is you're trying to pull off. I'm telling you, I'd pay a couple of business owners to sit with you and download the good, the bad, the ugly, what they did right, what they did wrong. That to me, it's a fraction of the cost. I think that's, if I was in your business, that's what I'd want to know.

Okay. Appreciate your guys' time. Thank you so much. Thanks for the call. I'm really glad he called. If I can spare him $10,000, I've done my good deed. Boy, you snooped that out quick. And he literally said to you, he goes, yeah, this marketing company came by and told me, at a minimum, do some market analysis because here's the deal. They spend that.

So that the market analysis makes you go, well, that's just part of doing business. And they go, we could help you for an extra 50 grand. We can implement this for you ourselves. That's how these companies work. I'm not saying they're a scam. No, but his gut, by the way, is the ultimate answer to that. He was like, I don't know if it's worth 10 grand. So let me go finance it. Well, no.

Don't do that. If it doesn't work out, guess what? You still owe the money, even if you've got no progress in the business. That's the scary part. All right, let's get to Dennis now in the Orlando, Florida area. Dennis, how can we help? Thank you.

Hi, guys. Thank you so much for taking my call. I appreciate what you guys do. Thank you. I wanted to talk about taxes there. So I've been putting money into my 401k based on my tax preparer that I've had for a couple of years there. He mentioned doing a max amount on your 401k, despite me being in debt there. But he mentioned, because I'm just learning more and more about you guys there. He mentioned

putting in as much max amount of 401k you and my me and my wife there so that our taxes are lower in april of next year so we don't have to pay as much in taxes there so basically to lower the amount that can be taxed there and i was uh and unfortunately he did pass away about a month ago so i'm looking into a blue taxpayer there and i'm checking to see if that is still the right move even though i i'm just learning about you guys there so i'm learning about not and debt and not putting stuff into 401k until much later on in these

steps that you guys have there because right now I'm in baby I think two because I'm paying off a lot of debt there and I wanted to see what you guys thought about that maxing out in your 401k to lower your taxes that you have to pay for next year April I would not do that spending 10 grand to save 2 grand is not good math

And so while it's great that you can, when you contribute to a traditional 401k, there are tax deductions. When you do it in a Roth, you've already paid the taxes. You don't get any benefit there, but you've already paid the taxes. So that's nice. But you're in baby step two. You're trying to pay off debt. I would pause all investing until you've knocked out the debt because truthfully, you don't have money to invest right now.

And that's what I'm thinking there. Because, I mean, I just learned about you guys there. So I've been with my tax preparer for years until they passed away like a couple of months ago. So I'm just like, wow, I'm considered broke. I didn't even realize it there. And I'm a physician that I'm like, whoa, I didn't realize I'm considered broke. Well, think about the job of a tax pro is to help you save money on your taxes, right? Yes.

And that's great for that, but they also are advising you to do things that involve your personal finances, investing, all kinds of things that could lead you down a different path. And I think right now you need to go down the path of debt freedom, get the emergency fund, and begin investing. And if you want to reach out to a new tax pro, so sorry that yours passed away. You sounded like a great person. Go to ramseysolutions.com slash tax, and we can get you connected with a Ramsey-trusted, vetted tax pro in your area who can help.

Yeah. Wow. That's sad, but a lot of people out there that can help. Thank you for the call, Dennis. Great advice there on that, George. Very succinct. Why spend 10 to save 2? Never do something for the, you know, I'm going to get a tax with savings. Don't do that. I've never understood that. And a lot of tax people are telling people, oh, go spend more money. How about save it?

I'd rather have more money and pay taxes on it than spend money that I don't really need. Or don't have in this case. Oh, in this case, yeah. Hey, for those of you that are watching on YouTube or listening via your favorite podcast app, the show is about to end, but we've got more calls coming up in the Ramsey Network mobile app. It's new to all of you who may not have heard about it. The Ramsey Network app is the only place to finish the

full episodes of The Ramsey Show. If you're listening on radio, that doesn't apply to you. We'll be back after a quick commercial break. Remember, two ways to get the app. Click on the link in the show notes or search Ramsey Network in the App Store or on Google Play. You don't want to miss what's coming up. I'm looking at the board. A couple of doozies. Woo! Woo! I'm going to have to warm up. Maybe I have to stretch a little bit. Some lunges? Head on over to The Ramsey App. Good hour, George. We'll be right back. Before you know it, this is The Ramsey Show. ♪

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