You Have To Sacrifice Now To Win in the Future

The phone number is 888-825-5225.. The call is free, and some say the advice is worth exactly what you pay for it. 888-825-5225.. We're going to start with Baltimore this hour. Robin is there.

Hi, Robin, how are you?

And what's your household income?

it is a want and not a need.

It'd be nice to move up. I'm not saying you can't do a want. I spend money on wants. I'm okay with that, but we need to classify it where it really is. Now, the number one key to building wealth, the number one wealth-building tool that you have is your income, and when you send it all to Sallie Mae, it's very difficult to build wealth.

And so, before you buy, wants, you get your house in order, no pun intended, and that means you get these debts paid off. And so if I'm you, I'm rolling up my sleeves. I'm going to work as much as I can work. I'm going to live on nothing, and I'm going to knock out these debts, A-S-A-P. And it's probably going to take you 18 months, and that's living on beans and rice.

Your family is not going to die if you don't move up in house. It would just be a really nice thing to get to move up in house. That means it's a luxury, not a need.

And in this case, yes, $1,300 a month for childcare. That's a lot. And it's more than your mortgage, you said. So I would absolutely be doing what Dave said, but finding ways to make more money and reduce costs, which means you could take that 18 months, as Dave's saying, with rice and beans, and with more income we add, the more intensity we add, the quicker you get out of this debt. And now we can begin to think about the future, but your focus needs to be on the now.

Easy path for her in the short term is go buy a nicer house. But she's stuck in the debt. Her budget's even tighter. She's going to struggle to be able to build wealth and find money to save and invest for her kids' college and for their retirement, investing and be able to get the house paid off. that Sally Mae kicked out and the other rest of that debt kicked out.

That's what normal people do. They buy whatever they want, whenever they want it, like they're in Congress. And normal finances in America suck. You don't want to be normal. It's awful.

And so what you want to be is unusual. You want to be weird. So one of the greatest compliments you get on the show is, if I call you weird. It means you're doing hard stuff to get an easy life. long term.

It's always harder to work out and avoid a donut than it is to just pop donuts in your face. Believe me, I know. I have the ability to eat untold, infinite numbers of donuts in one setting. And I have to curb that appetite. And it's hard.

But it's easier than walking around with all the diseases of obesity.

I'll pay the price. It's awesome. I don't want to be somebody else. I like me. Life's good.

I got a great life. And if all that means is some idiot left-wing journalist thinks I'm a capitalist pig and correctly identified me as such, then have at it, baby. That's the price of admission to be Dave. That's right. You know, what's the price of admission to be wealthy?

What's the price of admission to raise great kids? What's the price of admission to look at your drunk friend and say, you need to get off the sauce. You're screwing up your life. It's harder to have the conflict than it is to go along and buy him another round. Hard is easier than easy.

Always turns out to be hard because you're wimping, you're mailing it in. You're not paying a price. This is The Ramsey Show.

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It would amount to purchasing two vehicles at the same time, basically.

It's a Subaru race car.

Long story short, I've been taking it only to dealers, and my local dealer kind of wrecked it the last time they serviced it, trying to install a clutch and destroyed the transmission and did a bunch of damage and basically ruined the car for me.

So, I wasn't thinking about getting her one before he said that.

It's an okay offer. But it wasn't like. he gave you like half off the stinkin' thing or something. So he basically gave up. his margins, is what he did.

And he's got you back on the hook for more work and everything else in the shop. But no, I'll pass on the second one. I would save up and buy her a better car, and I would pay cash for it, and I would not cash out my retirement. But we don't borrow money to buy cars. We don't buy cars where the total of all your vehicles is more than half your annual income.

And I don't buy brand new cars unless they're a million dollars, unless you have a million dollar net worth or greater. And here's why. Because they go down in value, and you need to be concentrating on things that go up in value.

And then you put that into the savings, and all of a sudden, we've upgraded pretty substantially without any kind of debt. It is doable. People get the itch.

I'm not doing it. No. No.

That's exactly right. That's the federal law. So that means she gets the new one. You get the one with the busted head gasket. Y'all are about to trade cars out.

So this is how that works. That's a marriage thing. They're just helping you. Oh, open phones at 888-825-5225.. Dylan's with us in Scranton, Pennsylvania.

Hi, Dylan. How are you?

I'm currently 23 years old. I'm married. I do own a house with my wife. We purchased in December of last year.

And basically part of the deal is that right now I'm on my parents' insurance. But the church does offer full health insurance, full medical. But I'm going to lose $18,000 of my salary. So the church is paying me that $18,000 currently. So I'm bringing home like $58,000 a year.

I'm learning plumbing, electrical, everything with this job.

Ken Coleman, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today in the lobby of Ramsey Solutions on the debt-free stage. Shawn and Tammy are with us. Hey, guys, how are you? Doing? fantastic.

How are you doing, Dave? Better than we deserve. Good to have you guys. Where do you all live? We live in Houston, Texas area.

Oh, wonderful. So good to have you. How much debt have you paid off? We paid off about $100,000.. Wow.

How long did this take? It took us about eight years. Okay. And your range of income during that time? It ranged from about $70,000 to about $130,000 for both of us.

Okay. Cool. And what kind of debt was the $100,000?? It was mostly student loan debt. Oh, Sally Mae.

It took a while to get her out of the house, huh? So tell us the story. What happened here? There you go. So we got a copy of your show.

Yeah. So we moved to Houston and bought a big house. A big house. It was about 4,000 square feet. And I started a new job there.

And a buddy of mine at work, he went around and he was passing around and said, Hey, you guys, I got this audio thing. And we downloaded it on our computers. I listened to it, and it was a financial piece of university. I apparently pirated a copy of it. Okay.

That'll work. And we started listening and we were like, Wow, we're doing that wrong. And we're doing that wrong. And there's a way, better way to do that. Yeah.

It was like one thing right after the other. It was like, Oh, man, this makes so much sense. Why are we so stupid? So we made a huge chart on the back of our bedroom door that had all 100 little steps that we needed to get to $100,000.. And we just got fired up and we started paying it off and paying it off and paying it off.

And we did great at the beginning. And then I started having these weird spells where I would forget things. So we went to the doctor and found out that I had epilepsy and tried a couple of medications, and then they didn't help. So then we went and got an MRI and found out that I had a brain tumor. Oh, there's that.

Wow. So then we were like, Okay, you stop the debt snowball. You just start stockpiling money. Right. And you get ready.

And so I had the brain tumor taken out. And then we find out that if you do it on purpose and you save up your money, it takes a good two, three months to get the bill. And this time, we just paid off the bill with cash instead of adding to the debt like we had our whole lives. Oh, wow. One of the debts that we had was the birth of our daughter, Kaylee, this cute little blonde over here.

But with her, we knew we were pregnant. It took nine months to bake her up in the oven. And then, nine months later, we still hadn't paid it off. And that's how we were living before. And now we get a brain tumor out of the blue.

And by the time the bill comes, we just pay it off. Wow. That's a nice thing to have while you're facing something that severe. Yeah. Wow.

Well, and it doesn't stop there. You know, afterward, because of the brain tumor, we found out there was other complications that happened. You know, she had lost, you know, when they took it out, she lost sensation in half of her face. So she couldn't feel what was in her eyes. So she had an eye surgery where they grafted a nerve into her face from her leg.

And then she couldn't hear. Or actually, she could hear too well, I guess, is the thing. So, three ear surgeries later, she now has much better hearing. But this was like a year later and then a year later so that we could pay our out-of-pocket max every year. But that kept kicking Sally Mae down the road a little bit, because you're dealing with health stuff.

Exactly. I always say that we're the little engines that could. Yeah. Like we were on the debt snowball plan. Yeah.

And we wanted to do it. But all these things kept coming up. Much more important to take care of you than Sally. Yeah. And then we crashed our car.

Yeah, I got in a head-on collision and totaled our van. Yeah, why not? Well, and that was our first car that we bought with cash, because we had to upgrade from the little tiny sedan that we had, because we had six kids now. So we bought a minivan, a used minivan. Mm-hmm.

Had a total debt, and then I was informed about a month later that I was put on notice for a layoff. Of course. Yeah. So it all happens all at once. Edgum country song, man.

It's unbelievable. And so, you know, people tell you, like, yeah, I started Dave Ramsey and it's a good idea and stuff. But then stuff happens in life and you can't just follow it. And we were like, baloney. We don't do debt.

Even if we have six bodies and a car that only fits five, we're going to make due and we're going to buy a car with cash, because we don't do debt anymore. Mm-hmm. So we bought a brand, well, not a brand new car. It was new to us. It was a used car.

Mm-hmm. Had, you know, 40,000 miles on it. We were, you know, the Lord blessed us with the cash that we needed in order to get it paid for without going into debt at all. So many naysayers kept saying, hey, guys, just get a loan. Come on.

You can do it. It's just a car. Mm-hmm. We decided not to. And then the medical journey just kept going on.

So I guess, what was it? Total, how many surgeries? So then they said for epileptics, there's this thing you can install in your brain and it will help turn it off. Mm-hmm. So I had brain surgery again.

And then it didn't work. So then, the next year, they said we can just go in and take that chunk of your brain out. And we said, okay. And by this point, he was like, okay, we're putting our out-of-pocket max in our budget. Yeah.

Because we keep doing it year after year. And then it didn't work. Yeah. Because I'm just that patient. Yeah.

But luckily, he said we can do, we can put the thing back in your brain. But I can't imagine how it would have been if this doctor was like, there's something else. we can try to help you, because you're a difficult patient. Mm-hmm. But you haven't paid your bill from last year.

Oh. You know? Because that's the way we were living before we did the Ramsey plan. But this way, we paid it with cash. So when they had something else that we could try to help us.

So I'm counting five surgeries now or six? How many was it? Seven, I think, total? Seven. Total is nine.

Total is nine. Four of them were brain surgeries. When was the last one? Yeah. How long ago was the last one?

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

So how are you doing overall now? I still have about two seizures a week. Mm. Bless you. But the thing is, what would it have been like if, every time I needed a surgery or every time I needed to change medications, we had to panic about money?

Yeah. Like, now it's not a problem. And while you're doing all nine surgeries, you go ahead and pay off Sally Mae. Uh-huh. And have some kids and fix a head on and get laid off.

Yeah. Oh, my gosh. We were the little engines that could. And you know the thing? I think more than that, I think you just didn't quit.

Yeah. Oh, my gosh.

Yeah. What do you tell people? the key to getting out of debt is? To not pay for Christmas with your December paychecks.

Once we got the budget, it was just nice to be able to say, this is how much we need for new school clothes, and this is how much we need for Christmas, and this is how much we need for out-of-pocket max in case Tammy needs to have brain surgery. And I'm the free spirit. And now the thought of not having a budget, it's scary to me, because I'm like, but. And a monthly budget meeting. Yeah, really.

So let me ask you this. I don't know anything about the medical part of this. Does stress add to the likelihood of you have an episode?

Yes. He's shaking his head. yes. She says no, but I say yes because I see it. Okay, all right.

So the fact that you don't have financial stress in the house is probably helping. It's huge. Yeah. And it's allowed us to focus on the things important. These four right here, our relationship with each other.

Her health. Her health. Exactly, yeah. Instead of focusing on money, on this material stuff that consumes so many people's lives. Stupid car payment on a stupid car.

Yeah. Wow. You guys are fun. Amazing. You're inspiring.

Wow. All right, let's bring the kiddos up. What are their names and ages? This is Jacob, Sierra, Haley, and Kai. And they are 13,, 11,, 9, and 7..

All right. Very good. We've got a copy of Baby Steps Millionaires for you. That's the next chapter in your story. And you guys have quite a story.

The little train that didn't quit, for sure, without a doubt. Also got a copy of a non-pirated Financial Peace University version. And we'll let you watch it legally this time. And available with Ramsey Plus. It's online now.

And we'll give you a one-year subscription so you guys can go through it. Brand new videos on this. And they're the best we've ever done. The classes are the best it's ever been in all these years. And also a copy of Total Money Makeover.

All right, gang. Count it down. $100,000 paid off in eight years, while they take quite a journey from 70 to 130.. Count it down. Let's hear a debt-free scream.

Okay, you guys ready? Three, two, one. I am debt-free!

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Ken Coleman, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. Matt's in Erie, Pennsylvania. Hey, Matt, how are you?

I don't want to just survive. I want to thrive. You know what I mean? Yeah. And so I hear you talk about the importance of having a big shovel to pay off debt.

And as someone who's getting started in his career and his ministry, I don't have a huge shovel. My question is, is how can I wisely increase my income while balancing the responsibility and calling it being a pastor to pay off our house?

So how many hours a week could you give?

But what's a skill that you have right now that you know you can get paid for?

And it could be something as silly as walking dogs or pet sitting. And, you know, making $30 an hour doing that. And we've had people do their debt-free screams on here that have done that. The great news is you're way ahead. A, you're thinking about this.

B, you only owe $48,000.. I mean, you could pay off this house in, like, two years. Yeah. Of extra income.

And the data that we have is somewhere around 80% to 85% of pastors are bivocational. Most churches are not of size that they can even support the senior pastor full-time. Just in general, the movement, the way the church movement's been in America. And traditionally, the worship pastor and youth pastor starve to death, you know, until you get into a megachurch or something, right? And so, you know, in your calling, it's going to be a few years before your calling pays you a substantial amount of money.

Now, as your calling does develop, though, particularly your oratory skills, if you become a great preacher, you may get some side gigs, speaking at youth conferences and other things. You know, filling in for a pastor here or there, pulpit ministry, that kind of thing. And even later on, maybe some writing. So a lot of pastors supplement their incomes within the calling. And then some, just simply, you know, they have a bread route, a donut route, and they deliver off a truck, you know, and they work, UPS or whatever it is you do.

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

But you got limited hours, and you have a limited time during the week. So what are we looking at? People-based work sure would be great. Sales, customer service work. But if it's just good old-fashioned delivery or waiting tables, I would do that.

Do you think that would be a smart decision to do to buy that house?

What are you hesitant about?

So, no, I'm not going to tell you to do this deal based on this. I think you're going to get yourself in trouble. And on top of that, you're living in a house with other people.

Kind of defeats the purpose, man. If I wanted to live in a hotel, I'd buy a hotel.

No, thank you.

Just all in the name of, I can make a buck, all in the name of all. real estate's a good investment. All real estate's not a good investment. Real estate is a good investment. All education is not a good investment.

Education is a good investment. But there are stupid forms of real estate and stupid forms of education. I mean, you can get a degree in German polka history or medieval left-handed puppetry, but that doesn't mean you're going to end up being anything but a barista. And that's stupid education. And when you buy real estate leveraged up to your eyeballs and you say, well, the renters are going to pay the rent, that's stupid.

Because I've had renters for 30 years. Let me just tell you, some of them don't pay. sometimes. They go in chapter 13 bankruptcy. There's a pandemic moratorium on evictions.

And you're sitting on them. And, you know, it had nothing to do with the pandemic. They just chose to not pay because the government told them they could. And then, when you do finally get them out, they have, ugh, can you tell I'm bitter?

Don't do it. Don't do it. This is the Ramsey Show.

Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Ramsey Show. Where debt is dumb, cash is king, and the paid off home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice. We help people build wealth, do work that they really love, and create actual, amazing relationships. Ken Coleman, Ramsey Personality, host of the Ken Coleman Show, number one bestselling author, is my co-host. today.

as we talk about your life, your career, and your money. Open phones at 888-825-5225.. Reid is with us. Reid is in San Antonio, Texas. Hi, Reid.

How are you?

And that simply means that they, in the old days, now we wouldn't do it exactly this way today, but in the old days we would mail, the mortgage company, would mail a VOD request to your bank, a verification of deposit to see if you have money in the account to do your down payment. They would send a VOE to your employer, a verification of employment. Your employer would write down and say, yes, he works here, and here's what he makes. Send it back to the mortgage company. That was all snail mail in the old days, right?

But they actually went around, and they checked with your landlord, and they looked at your credit bureau report and saw what was actually on the credit bureau report, what was being paid, were you paying the bills that you have on time. And if you don't have any bills on the credit bureau report, they assumed you were smart, because you are. Instead of dumb, like the FICO score says, you're dumb if you don't have any bills, because it's only a measure of how much you play kissy-face with the bank.

But that's what manual underwriting is. It means they manually actually have to verify that the human being is capable of paying the note, and then you can get the mortgage. And it's the same exact rate, no more, no less, than a regular FICO score rate. The difference is, if you've got a 750 FICO score, a monkey can make that loan. They just look at the number and go, ooh, ooh, big number, do it.

Okay. Then there's absolutely zero analysis, other than they depend on the analysis that created the FICO score to be their analysis, which is part of what caused the crash in 2008,. because we were loaning people with high FICO scores money who were actually broke. And so we had a whole bunch of broke people buying houses, and it caused the 2008 crash. That's not happening as much now.

But one thing, FICO has gone in and worked on their algorithm, because it sucks. But it's mathematically impalatable. But anyway, all that side issue for model soapbox. But, yeah, you can get a mortgage. Just go to a mortgage company that does manual underwriting.

Ben is in Norfolk, Virginia. Hey, Ben, what's up?

So I was wondering what your thoughts were on that, even though I'd be gaining a military pension in five years, if I could play catch-up on retirement later and just get the house paid off super fast, or do exactly per the Baby Steps or, in that situation, what you would tell people?

Thanks for your service, by the way. We appreciate you.

Most people don't bother. We have a whole population full of freaking zombies that just go along and do whatever Amazon, MasterCard, and Apple tells them to do. And then they Google it, and Google tells them they're smart. And none of this is true, by the way.

You're actually using thinking skills. Way to go, dude. I'm so proud of you. I'm not being facetious. You really are.

If you keep paying attention like you're paying attention, you're going to be fine. Even if you don't do it perfectly, Dave, the way I would do it, you're going to be fine, because 90% of people winning is they pay attention. So, no, I would not do that. I would get out of debt like you're planning, and in January I'd start putting as much as you can aside for a down payment until you're ready to buy. When you buy, put the house on a 15-year fixed and start saving 15% of your income towards retirement.

And, yes, you're going to have a wonderful military retirement, which I'm very happy, as a taxpayer, to pay you. Thank you for your service. One of the few things I actually think we do well out of D.C. But, yeah, all that to say, stay in order.

And they always, you know, they figure I'm going to say credit card debt. Well, that's one. Student loan debt, that's one. Leasing a car, that's another one. Whole life insurance, that's another one.

There's too many to have one, right? But really, what happens is that the answer is not paying attention. Because no one sits down and goes, hey, I want to be stupid. Right. Let's see what stupid looks like.

But we just wander along like a zombie and come home with a new car. Or, you know, you impulse a bass boat. Oh, my God. You know, and so this is what happens. People don't pay attention.

Anything that, if you're going to win at anything, winning is an intentional act. You want to win at your marriage, you have to intentionally embrace, engage the process of being married. You want to raise good kids, it's not accidental. It's a lot of work because they're weird, you know. I mean, it's just a problem.

So everything you win at, you've got to be intentional. This is the Ramsey Show.

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Ken Coleman, Ramsey, personality, number one best-selling author of the book Paycheck to Purpose, is my co-host today. Today's question of the day is sponsored by Neighborly, your hub for home services. As the weather warms up, Neighborly can help you find local service pros like The Grounds Guys, 5 Star Painting, and Mosquito Joe, which you would need in Nashville. We've got mosquitoes the size of eagles here. And to turn your outdoor space into your favorite space and help you find all the help you need at Neighborly.com.

We're so honored to have them as a sponsor now. And April is National Financial Literacy Month. All month long, teachers and students in classrooms across America are taking the time to talk about the importance of learning money skills.

What are mom and dad requiring of you? Are you doing gas money, helping out with some of your insurance, whatever that is? What are your spending habits, things you're saving for? And I think the budget there, Dave, is kind of created around that, when you don't have a livelihood or the four walls that we teach.

Your purpose of doing a budget when you're in high school or junior high school, either, one, is not to become wealthy. It's not to become a master budget person. It's to start to build the muscle of telling your money what to do instead of wondering where it went. Which, by the way, is all a budget is. Adults.

devise a plan and follow it. Children, regardless of their age, do what feels good.

And so, if you're 52 and you do what feels good, you are, by definition, emotionally, a child. You're immature. I deserve it. Oh, shut up. You don't deserve anything you haven't earned.

That's when you deserve it. You're not entitled to a new car. I work so hard. Oh, really? You're the only one, you whiner.

Okay, so that's a child, regardless of if they're 12 or they're 52.. And we hear them all the time saying stuff like that. Well, you don't know. Yes, I do know. I've done it all.

I'm old, okay? And so I've seen it all, heard it all. The thing is, the whole thing here, Alex, is to get you to the other side of that and say, okay, as an adult, because we're training young people to be good adults, and training young people to be good adults involves telling your money what to do instead of wondering where it went. And so all you've got to do is go this month, or I want to buy a car by September. Okay, how are we going to do that?

Individual responsibility flourishes when you get taught that you can have enough money. But this anti-work movement, all this junk that's out there, is coming from young people who've never been taught how to manage their money, and thus they don't have enough. And then they begin to say, I work too hard. I don't have enough money. I want the government to supply me the money.

And I'm not trying to make this political, because it's not. It's actually sociological. When you understand how to handle money as a young person, with what we teach in financial literacy month and everything we're doing, parents.

Go score.

Now, Alex has not got that problem. He's a guy asking a question on this show. He's ready to make money. He's a great young man. And so, I mean, we've got a lot of great young people out there.

That's right. But we do have a group of Participation Trophy graduates who are intent on making mediocrity their goal. And it's a problem.

That's right. Hard to get a date. Yeah, it's true. It's true. You don't feel real eligible because you're not.

Right. He's a dreamer, Daddy. Yeah, that's right. He is. That's all he does.

That's right. It means you're going to live in my basement. if you're dating a dreamer. God help me. I'd love for you to say he's a doer.

Please tell me he's a doer. Yes. He has big dreams, and he's doing things to make those dreams come true. That, I like. I like that a lot.

You see, this is highly attractive. It turns out mediocrity is really kind of smelly.

Ramsey Solutions does. That's why we're in schools. But if we don't teach this, then what happens is they come through the system, Dave, and the system tells them, you need a credit card so that you have a backup plan.

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

it was. True story. I was 12 years old, and I cut grass for $3 for a yard, and I figured out I could cut the grass in one hour, so I was making double what my buddies were making as whopper floppers. So I've never been held to the standard of I am forced to do something. Yes.

And you aren't either. You can choose to go, do anything you want to do, boys and girls. This is still America.

So I just gave away Financial Peace University to that guy who's getting ready to get up on his feet and get going again. You don't have to be broke to go through FPU. You just want to learn how to handle money better. Here are God's and Grandma's ways of handling money. What does Scripture say about money?

Live on less than you make, as an example. And what does Grandma say about money? Live on less than you make. Get out of debt. Stay out of debt.

And we're going to show you not only the principles, but then how to actually go about doing those things in your life. We get it. If you're worried about money, it's all consuming. You wonder if you've got enough to pay your bills. You can't afford to fill up at the gas station.

Nobody can. It's always on your mind. But you shouldn't have to live with that kind of stress, and you don't have to. When you follow a proven plan, you'll discover peace with your money. In Financial Peace University, you'll learn the same plan that's helped 10 million people.

Get on a budget. Save. Spend wisely. Pay off debt. Become wealthy and outrageously generous.

Great time to take the course. We've updated a ton of the content, including George Campbell, Dr. John Deloney. Decide today that you're done. I've had it.

No more like I was talking about before the break. You can do this. Go to Ramseysolutions.com slash FPU. Check out Financial Peace University at Ramseysolutions.com slash FPU. Barbara is with us in Minneapolis.

Hey, Barbara, welcome to the Ramsey Show.

We have a blended family with children ranging from the ages of 32 down to 21.. There is a 26-year-old son, my stepson, my husband's son, married, lives in Wisconsin, has five children under the age of seven, so they're busy.

This son has asked us over two years ago, asked to borrow $3,000.. My husband and I, we are baby steppers. We are on Baby Step 6, and hopefully we'll be seeing you in about a year and a half for our final debt-free screen to move us to Baby Step 7.. We've had a difficult time getting this son and daughter-in-law to pay us back, and it is causing significant strife in the family. My husband and I are to the point where we just know we're not going to see the money again, the remaining balance of $1,500, and we've accepted that and we've moved on.

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

You don't owe me anymore.

And I love you. I don't agree with a lot of things you're doing, but you're a grown man and you're allowed to do those things. And we're still going to be friends. I'm still going to be grandpa. And you don't owe us any more money.

Forget it. And if you want some help, we can give you some coaching, and we'll be your biggest cheerleaders. But we won't give you either one, coaching or cheering, without your permission. Cut him loose. Set him free.

This is bothering you way more than it's bothering him.

He hasn't got enough character for this to bother him.

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

That's not what I'm talking about. But as an ongoing, abusive thing, that's, you know, you're welcome to call here and you're welcome to be in our home, but you're going to maintain these levels of volume and this level of reasonable respect. And I'm going to give you the same thing. But, you know, don't call here and we're not responsible for your children. They're your children.

Correct. We love you and we're cheering for you. If you ever want any advice on how to get where we are financially, we can show you. But we're not going to tell you what to do and you're not going to make us give you our money. You're a confused young man.

He just needs some boundaries. Your husband is a nice, gentle man, isn't he?

I don't want him to be mean. I don't want him to be mean, but it takes strength to set boundaries. And that's what's lacking here is boundaries. And let me tell you, anytime someone like your stepson who doesn't respect boundaries, anytime you put up a fence and he's used to playing in your yard, he's going to have a fit. Mm-hmm.

So don't expect this to go well.

Mm-hmm. Money's off the table. And the fact that you forgive it is not going to make this young man suddenly have character.

You just got to love him where he is. And if he wants some help, I can show him how. You can show him how. But until he's ready for some help, it's everybody else's fault. Mm-hmm.

You didn't teach them how to do it. But when you see an adult kid like this who's not working to support his family,

And I think you're right. Confusion can make a person so lost that they lose all gumption to get out there and do something. And that's the best your husband could be aware of is to try to love his son that way. But I agree, Dave. You've got to cut it off for a while until he gets a wake-up call.

Hang on. We're going to send you a copy of Dr. John Deloney's book, Own Your Past, Change Your Future. It'll help you guys navigate this, Barbara.

All right, let's cut to the chase. It's easy to get discouraged about crazy house prices and interest rates. But when you have the right real estate agent to help you buy and sell the right way, you'll have confidence to make smart decisions. Ramsey Trusted Agents aren't just experts who guide you through buying or selling. They're someone you can trust to have your back from the first call to closing day.

Find a Ramsey Trusted Agent near you at RamseySolutions.com slash agent. RamseySolutions.com slash agent.

Ken Coleman, Ramsey Personality. Open phones at 888-825-5225.. John is with us. John is in Atlanta. Hi, John.

Welcome to the Ramsey Show.

And so now I'm kind of feeling like not only should I be giving a portion of that 10% to my local church, but I'm growing just as much, if not more, listening to those pastors. Should I be supporting those churches also and giving a portion of that 10% to those churches or those pastors?

So I do kind of know what those guys would tell you, and I think it's the same thing I would tell you. And I have Ken Chime in here because he's a PK as well. Okay, what is the purpose of the tithe? Is it for you to buy a ticket to a self-improvement Christian seminar? No.

Okay, it's not. The purpose of the tithe is to support the work of your local congregation. It's represented in the Old Testament storehouse. And the storehouse fed the widows and the orphans and paid the priests. And that was the function of the storehouse.

And so you gave a tenth of your grain to the storehouse, the Levites ran it in the Old Testament. And a little bit of biblical history. But the point of it is not to pay them for services rendered to you. The point of the tithe is to get a rhythm of giving in your life and to remind you each week that you don't really own anything. You're just managing it all for God.

And there's a lot of grace around the tithe, so you can do whatever you want to do. God's not going to be mad at you for sending Mike Todd and Craig Groeschel or whoever else you watch. Both of those are wonderful teachers, by the way, world class. But the local church function is supported by you, also, by your giving. But that's not even the reason for your giving.

The reason for your giving is so you learn to be generous. Not so. you purchase a ticket to a self-improvement event. And I'm kind of being a little bit smart, because you're like, well, this is all where I'm growing from. But this isn't about your growth.

Yeah, that's good. And I think that's the deal. I think you really love them.

He's a giver. He gave his only son. He's the ultimate in generosity. And so he's trying to make us in his image. And the principle is to build the giving muscle, the generosity muscle, and always be building your generosity muscle.

You hear me say that all the time anyway. But this is a uniquely Christian discussion we're having here, for those of you that are not people of faith. But that's the technical answer from an evangelical, Christian perspective. And what has been taught for hundreds of years is that the tithe is modeled after the Old Testament storehouse. And that's why it goes to the local church.

That's where the model came from.

But bring all your tithes to the storehouse. And that's an Old Testament direct quote.

And then we can have all kinds of other discussions. But I don't think you're going to hell if you don't tithe. But I can tell you this. There's a high correlation between people that are generous and people who win at life and money. It's very unusual to find someone getting a divorce who's been tithing for the entire time they've been married.

Because generous tends to make you less selfish. And it's very unusual. If you've got the two of you as a couple have made a decision to have a steady rhythm of giving, and you're in agreement on where that steady rhythm of giving is going, called the tithe in this case, it's also very unusual that you're not in agreement on most of the things. And it's an indication of the health of the relationship in your marriage. And so I had an old pastor tell me one time, he goes, I've been pastoring for 45 years, never had a couple in my church get a divorce that were tithers.

And he was saying that as if the tithe somehow is magical. But I think the tithe in and of itself is not. It's the principle, as you said, behind the process. And the principle is generosity and a steady rhythm of generosity. That's a wonderful question.

Thank you, John. Yeah, very thoughtful. For letting us get back on something that actually matters. That's really good. That's a great, great question.

We'll back up one more step. Because I'll just take a second more on this, Ken. Because I loved what you said there. I want to recap that. Because you do want to pan back from these things.

I, in my early, I became a Christian. as an adult. In my early days, I became very pharisaical, very detailed about stuff like where the tithe goes, what counts on the tithe, how do you calculate it? and all that. And I finally went, oh, wait a minute, God doesn't really need my money.

As if I was somehow singularly supporting the kingdom. That's hilarious. The arrogance of that is unbelievable. But Pharisees are arrogant. And I was a young Pharisee.

But what I got to later was the tithe is not for God. He doesn't need my money. If he wanted to take it, I'd be a greasy spot. It's God. He don't need my money.

And really that church, Craig and Mike Todd, they're doing fine. They don't need your money. But if you want to support the work that they're doing, because it's incredible work, and they're not your local church, then that would be called an offering. Yes.

I want to give the widow's might.

Oh, my gosh. Selfish dadgum people out there. I love John's question because he's anything but selfish. That's right.

Just give.

Thanks to Austin, Ben, Zach, Andrew, and Kelly in the booth. I am Dave Ramsey, your host, and we'll be back.

Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Ramsey Show, where debt is dumb, cash is king, and the paid off home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice. We help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create actual, amazing relationships. Thanks for joining us. We're so glad you're here. Luke is with us in Jackson, Mississippi, starting off this hour.

Hi, Luke. How are you?

It's just a hard thing to deal with, hard to see that happening.