No One Accidentally Wanders Into the Land of Success
2024-06-25 01:57:25
The Ramsey Show believes you can build wealth and take control of your life—no matter what stupid mistakes you've made with money. Join as Dave Ramsey and his team of experts answer your questions on the top problems holding you back. Listen now or ask your question live by calling 888.825.5225 weekdays from 2–5 p.m. ET. Learn more at www.ramseysolutions.com
Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Ramsey Show, where we help people build wealth, do work that they love, and create actual, amazing relationships. Number one best-selling author of Breaking Free from Broke and co-host of the Smart Money Happy Hour, George Camel. Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. Open phones at 888-825-5225.. That's 888-825-5225..
Lindsay starts off this hour in Denver. Hi, Lindsay, how are you?
I'm doing good, Dave. Thanks so much for taking my call. I'm a huge fan. We're on Baby Steps 4 and 5 and 6.. We're going to be Baby Steps Millionaires, thanks to you.
Awesome, good for you.
Yes, and I was just calling because I wanted to know how to best manage my grandma's finances. I've been managing their bills since 2022, since my uncle passed away. He used to live in the home and he's no longer there. But in the last two years, I've seen my mom spend down their savings.
and kind of destroying them financially. Hold on, I'm sorry. I thought you were managing the money. Yeah. How does your mom get the money if you're managing it?
She'll grab the debit card, make purchases, and she'll say that my grandma let her buy certain things. They go out to eat a lot.
So the first time that happened, that's on her. The second time that happened, it's on you, because you didn't take the debit card away.
Yeah. So this last time, I actually made a fraud and I told my mom, if she uses her card again, I will actually make a police report because she's making too many charges without my grandma's knowledge. Because when I asked my grandma about this... Shut the account down.
Close the account. I already closed one bank account. Well, close it.
Close it. Then she can't use the debit card. It's out of business. That's simple.
Okay. How much money are we talking here?
Well, she has $18,000 in the savings. And so I was thinking maybe I should bring that down and send the extra to principal. And she also has a vehicle that we could sell to pay down her house. But my mom's also destroyed that, too. So not too long ago, she had the truck and there was a hail storm.
So I don't even know if the truck's worth $25,000 anymore, but my mom's just ruining everything. Lindsay, it's your fault.
It's my fault? Yeah, because you're letting her do that.
I should take away the keys. Take away everything.
You should have zero access to grandma's assets.
Shut down any door that your mother is going through.
Physical or.
. Lock it.
Proverbial. Close the debit card. Take the keys to dadgum truck. Move the truck to your garage. Stop her from having access.
Yeah, that's what I need to do. Yeah, you needed to do that the first time it happened. Because your mother is not a good person.
And my grandma doesn't even drive. So I've been wanting to...
Okay, sell the truck, then. Do you have power of attorney?
Not yet. I've been working on that.
Okay. I'm not going to participate in this anymore unless you give me power of attorney, and I'm going to shut down all this bullcrap. Okay. This is an act of love for your grandmother, and it's an act of punishment towards your mother, who's a criminal. Yeah.
Good Lord, girl.
And clearly the relationship with you and your mom and grandma and her daughter, it's over.
Yeah. Y'all put the fun in dysfunction, man.
Yeah. So the best thing you can do is protect everything and just get her out of your life.
Yeah. So the truck, it's a $25,000 truck. How old is your granny?
She's 80 years old.
Okay. And she doesn't drive anymore?
She doesn't. And she wanted to keep the truck around, because that was the last memory of my uncle. So she didn't want me to sell it. Oh, well, sorry. My mom just joined me.
Yeah. Sorry.
Putting miles on it.
Is it paid for?
It is.
Okay. It's a $25,000 truck sitting in the garage and then got ailed damage because your mother's a doofus.
Yeah. She took it out that night, and she's been driving it around town.
Okay. Is the truck back at your grandmother's? Yes. Go, pick it up and put it in your basement.
Okay.
Okay. And lock it up inside, where they have to, breaking and entering would have to be required to get the truck. All right. And then tell your grandmother that she needs to sell the truck. And tell your grandmother that we're cutting your mother off.
Part of the reason is your grandmother's allowing this too, but she's 80 and she asked you to take care of everything. And you're going to have to be a little bit tougher, kiddo. You're getting walked all over.
I know. I feel bad because it's my mom. And then she gets mad at me that-.
I don't give a crap about your mother's feelings. She's a crook.
She is.
Yeah. You don't get to have feelings when you're a crook.
She clearly doesn't care about yours.
She truly doesn't care about anybody except herself.
So how old are you?
39.
Okay. All right. So your mom has done power plays her entire life over you and over everyone else. No one has ever told this woman no successfully, and you're getting ready to be the first one. Congratulations.
You have to. It's your job.
I do need to.
Or you need to hand your grandmother the keys and all the debit cards, and you need to turn your back and walk away and just let this whole thing explode. One of the two. But if you're going to have your name on this saying, I'm helping, granny, you got to do it. You can't just sort of do it.
And when I do sell the truck, should I apply it to the principal? Because my grandma still owes $65,000 on the house.
How much? Is that the only money? She's got $18,000, and then she's got the truck. And what else has she got?
Oh, that's all she has.
And what does she live on? Social security?
Yeah.
Okay. Uh, it doesn't matter. You can use it. You can set it in the emergency fund. I'd probably just set it in an emergency fund, but you've got to have the $18,000 plus the proceeds of the truck where your stinking mother doesn't get her hands on.
it. Got it?
Yeah.
A bank account that you open up and it goes, the money goes in there, period.
Okay.
And no one has access to it, period. It's for the use of your grandmother to pay her house payment and, uh, help her supplement her monthly, because social insecurity won't do it.
Okay. You are too sweet, darling. I'm trying to get you mean.
Yeah. I know. I want to cry.
I'm going to throw some grit down in there, coffee, just stir it in there. Get you some sand. Okay. You're just a sweet, you're just a sweet little person. And I'm, I'm ready to go.
get your mom for you. My gosh, what a woman.
You love your grandma, right, Lindsay?
I love everybody.
You love her. Then love her enough to say no to mom and be mean because you're protecting grandma.
You're not being mean. When you tell someone they can't steal money, that is not mean. That is just like facts. That's facts and stuff. George, you can't steal my money.
That's not mean.
Criminals are difficult to deal with, Dave.
I know, but, you know, but no, this is a boundary-less moron right here. She just, no one ever tells her. no. She thinks everything is hers, even when it's not. This is the way thieves think.
She's the queen and we're the sorry people.
Exactly. Yeah, that's exactly right. It's unbelievable. I'm going to teach her a new word. No.
It's a new word for her. She can form it as no. Can you do that, Lindsay? Can you, can you stand up to her and stop all this, or not?
I will stop her, no.
You got to stop it. I will stop her, no. You got to set the structures in place where she no longer has access to any of this money. She never gets another dime because you're so smart. You got it?
Okay. And if your mama's mad, so what? Get in line. This is the Ramsey Show.
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George Campbell, Ramsey Personality is my co-host today. Thank you for joining us. Open phones at 888-825-5225.. You jump in, we'll talk about your life and your money. AJ is with us.
AJ is in Springfield, Illinois. Hi, AJ. How are you?
Hello, gentlemen. Thank you for taking my call. I appreciate it.
Sure. What's up?
I need some help. We are just starting off on the baby steps and I'm trying to get my wife on board. She's 50 years old. I'm 40.. We have zero in the savings and I am just worried that we will have nothing in retirement.
She works at a local university, in the treasury department, making like less than two grand a month. I'm military, former military. So I get my disability. So I get about $4,400 a month and we are about $48,000 in debt. We are just starting the baby steps.
We're on baby step two and we're just starting off. We have three kids that are all special needs and they might not leave the house, and I am just pulling my hair out trying to figure out how we're going to survive into our golden years.
Okay. And you're unable to work due to your disability? No, I can work. I was a football coach at a college, but my mother-in-law, her cancer, came back, and so I was taking her to her chemo five days a week for a few months, and that just finished like a week and a half ago. So right now, with the kids being at a school, I'm a stay-at-home dad taking care of them while she's working and all the jobs are kind of filled up right now.
So I'm still kind of looking around, but I just signed up for a side hustle, as in the football referee, and I'm still looking around. I'm going to start doing DoorDash again, just to try to bring in some extra income. But right now, with the-. Is it fair to say that with?
you, your wife being underemployed and you being unemployed, that you all have an income problem?
Well, we make about $87,000 a year. I thought you said she made $2,000 and you made $4,400..
That's not $87,000.
Well, I bring home $55,000 and her take-.
What happened to $4,400?
. Did I not hear $4,400??
Yeah, it's $4,400 plus her $2,000, that's $63,000.
. So yeah, after it's $7,200-.
$72,000.
Yeah, $72,000, but with her taxes and all that, it's like $87,000.
But yeah, that's why I'm trying to get some side jobs and stuff.
Dude, you're clearly stressed about this. This is a tough life and situation you're in. Does she have any sense of urgency or stress around this?
A little bit, but she's more worried about having money in the savings account versus paying off all of our debt.
What, do you have money in savings?
We have like $5,000-.
You both have recognized that there's a problem. What we're having an alignment problem on is how to solve the problem. Is that right? She wants to save her way through it. You want to get out of debt.
That's correct.
But she recognizes there's a problem. She recognizes your situation sucks, right? Yes. Okay, all right.
That's a good step.
Well, no, she doesn't. She thinks we're doing okay because we finally bought a house. We have.
the quote-unquote lifestyle where we have a car and a house and finally can have some stability for the kids. But I'm like, no, we're in mass amounts of debt. We need to get that stuff paid off.
How much debt do you have?
$48,000.
On what?
Two car payments, $2,400 in credit cards. I bought her some jewelry for our 10-year anniversary.
and a couch.
When did you buy jewelry?
About six months ago.
Okay, so you weren't freaked out six months ago?
I was working.
You weren't freaked out six months ago?
I wasn't until I stopped working and then realized we are completely screwed.
Okay, all right. So, well, I think that, number one, we need to back it up. You don't come at somebody in this situation with the what. You come at them with the why, okay? What we are doing is not working.
We are deeply in debt and we are broke, and I am freaking out. This is your discussion with your wife, okay? I'm not okay. I think we're going to retire and have to eat Alpo. I don't like this plan.
This is freaking me out. You seem to think we're okay. I get that, but I'm not okay. And you need to hear me, that, as your husband, I am freaking out. This is terrorizing me.
I see these numbers and I can't sleep. I see these numbers and I have increased anxiety. My heart rate goes up. This is scaring me to death, honey. I think we have a real problem and we need to do something about it.
And what would it be like if we had no payments? What would it be like if we had two strong incomes and no payments of any kind? How much could we save and invest then? What traveling could we do? What cars would we purchase?
What would life look like if we didn't have any payments? I'm freaking out. I want us to sit down and determine where we want to be in 10 years and how we're going to get there. How would you like to be completely free? I think it would mean the world to me.
And just no kids. The kids are asleep in bed. Your TV's not on. We have a scheduled appointment to sit down and talk about this. And don't talk about what to do.
Talk about why to do it. The why is I want to retire with dignity. The why is I want us to have choices in the things we get to do as a family. The why is I want to change our family tree. We've got three special needs kids here.
Broke people can't take care of special needs kids into adulthood. And we're broke. We've taken on this responsibility. We've got to do something. Help me.
Talk to me. Let's talk about this. And then ask her what she thinks we ought to do once you get alignment on that. And don't talk about freaking Dave Ramsey.
I don't. Good. You just turned me into a cuss word.
But then I stopped completely because I know. Honey, we need to sell your car,
Dave Ramsey said. This is a real way to get your spouse on board, you know?
No. Yeah, I'm not going to do that. It's got to be her idea.
Yeah, the two of you. And then I'll tell you what we'll do. I'll have Christian pick up, our associate producer in here, and get you guys signed up for Financial Peace University. if your wife will agree to go with you. Okay.
I'll give it to you free. Okay. And get on the Every Dollar Budgeting app. We'll give you both of them, okay, as our gift. But if you try to do this by yourself, it's going to make your marriage and your relationship worse.
It's going to drive a wedge. So don't do it by yourself. Talk to her. Hey, would you try this with me? It was free.
I gave it to me. Would you try it with me? Would you look at this? Would you think about this? It would mean the world to me.
And she will do it, if nothing else, as an act of love towards you, once she hears your heart on the why we need to do this, not what we need to do. You can't talk about the what until you are in agreement about what the future needs to look like. And then together, we can discuss, okay, we need to sell this. We need to increase this piece of income. We need to admit that that was a mistake and never do that again.
Whatever it is,
you start putting those things together, George. Yeah. AJ, I think we also need to look at what does a career look like for you? You're 40.. You're a spry 40..
I want you to really sink your teeth into something you love and make great money doing it. And I'm going to send you Ken's new book, Find the Work You're Wired to Do. It comes with a get clear career assessment. I want you to also step into that and have some mojo, because I think you've lost some of that as.
you've stepped into unemployment. Yeah. Agreed. Okay. We'll give you all that.
We want to help you, man. We want to help you, but you've got an income problem and you've got an alignment with your spouse problem. And what I'm saying is have a dream date, dream again together about what a wonderful future would look like. And then what are the difficult, sacrificial steps that must be taken to get to that wonderful future? Because no one gets to a wonderful future accidentally or easily.
It's both hard and intentional. That's where good things come from. Hard things and intentional things create good things. No one wanders accidentally into the land of success.
It's a, you got dirt under your fingernails, you're scratching, you're clawing, and you're fighting. And the only way to do it is together when you're married. This is the Ramsey Show.
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George Campbell Ramsey personality is my co-host. I'm Dave Ramsey. This is the Ramsey Show. in the lobby of Ramsey Solutions, on the debt-free stage. Tyler and Sarah are with us.
Hey guys, how are you? Doing? great. Welcome. Where do you live?
Omaha, Nebraska. All right, fun. And all the way to Nashville to do a debt-free scream. Yes, sir. How much debt have you guys paid off?
$200,000.
. $200,000.. And how long did that take? Four years and nine months. Yeah, good.
All right. Making. what kind of income range during that time? $171,000 to $230,000.. Cool.
What do y'all?
do for a living? I'm a security consultant. And I'm an attorney. I work in-house for a financial.
services company in Omaha. Excellent. Excellent. Oh, I wonder who that is. Good.
Way to go, guys. Good. And I love the t-shirts. Weird people. You're looking at weird people.
What's the bottom line? I can't quite make it out. Debt-free since 2024.. All right. All right.
It's the new university shirt. Okay. Got it. Okay. So $200,000,.
if you're saying weird people, that must mean you paid off your house. That's the house. I love it. Way to go, you guys. What's the house worth?
About $410,000.
. Okay. And it's a paid-for house. Yeah. Wow.
I'm so happy for y'all. Thank you. How does it feel that I have a payment in the world? It feels amazing. Yeah.
Wow. How old are you two? 37.. And I'm 36.. And the house is worth about what?
Oh, $410,000.
. Oh, you said that. I'm sorry. And how much in your nest egg? A little over $405,000..
Okay. So you're approaching a millionaire. Yeah. That baby steps millionaires in your mid-40s. Yeah.
Way to go.
That's incredible. So were you.
long-term Ramsey followers, or was this a new thing? Oh, for a whole marriage, yes. I had a road trip. So we made several road trips back to her family and my family. And so we would listen to those and we kind of did it on our own.
So yeah, when we started out, we've been married for about 11 years. When we started out, we had baby step two debt to get through. Tyler had a small truck loan and I graduated from law school with nearly $100,000 in student loan debt. Okay. So you cleared all that off.
Yes. And that's.
not in this $200,000.
. That's not in this. Okay. So then you attacked the mortgage beginning four.
years ago. Yes. Right. Yeah. Okay.
Yeah. It kind of like with my truck, I graduated college debt free, but then I rewarded myself with a brand new pickup truck. With a new payment. Yeah. And we.
both kind of thought that each other's debt was stupid and irresponsible. So we had to deal with that as one of our first marriage financial issues. Your truck's dumb. Your student loan's.
dumber. Yeah. Whose debt is dumber? It's in a game show. So my plan was just to pay off my truck, as I was, because I got a new job, income was coming in.
And when we were talking about getting married, we thought, we don't want to have this hanging around. We just want to kind of fly through it. And so that's what we did. is we made a lot of extra payments. We lived off my income and her income went to just paying off her student loans.
Okay. And it got it all clear.
real fast. It did. And then, four years and nine months ago. So really, the start of this is just the start of paying off the house, is just the continuation of the baby steps. It was.
Yep. We.
took a little break in the middle there to get the other baby steps going, build up some savings. In fact, one of the things that we had saved up for was to go on the last Ramsey cruise in March of 2020.. And we were going to go like, it didn't matter that the coronavirus was coming. We were going to go. Dave too.
And so during that time, we got all that money back. And then, since we were already in a good financial position and had good, solid jobs, we were really able to make a lot of progress on the mortgage and just decided. Are you going to go on the one in 25?? Unfortunately not. We have some other financial goals that are in line before that this time around.
Okay. We wish we could. I'll show you how you did me. Okay. All right.
That's cool. That's fun.
This is a huge lump sum. we put on there. And I printed off our amortization schedule on the back of a door. And when you could see how much progress you're getting, because you just get frustrated with how much money is not going to pay off the principal. It's all going to interest.
The more we were able to move that line, you could see how many months you were skipping. You're just dropping down in the schedule. Yeah. So we refinanced in 2020 to a really low interest rate, which just moved the line even further. And so that allowed us to just keep on moving on it.
If you think about it, we're sitting here talking to people that paid off their house in four years and nine months. That's just weird. That's very weird. I'm proud of y'all. Most of culture says,
I'll hang on to it for 30 years and I'll probably refinance. I'll do a HELOC. We'll pull the equity out. We'll do some other dumb stuff. And you guys went and help.
We just want to be done with.
payments. Right. Yep. Okay. So you're a hundred percent debt free.
You're at about 800 K net worth. You're 47 years old. You're making, I'm sorry, 37 years old. I'm sorry. And you're making 230 and you're not going on the cruise.
What are you going to do? That's fun. You got to do.
something fun. This Nashville trip was one of it. Go ahead. And then we're going to buy a minivan.
Oh, okay. Cool. Very good. I like it. Good for y'all.
Well done. Thank you. Well done. Did you have people cheering you on or is this just a private party? It was mostly private.
People.
around us knew that we were doing it, because just the way we lived, we, we weren't frivolous. We didn't, we said no to a lot of things. And then, when we, we led a couple of FPU classes, and so.
they were able to help cheer us on as well. When you lead the class, you got to do it. Yeah. Yeah. There's no hypocrite, right?
You got your game on. Built in accountability partner. That's right. That's the worst. Yeah.
You gotta, you gotta be hardcore, then. Yeah. Good stuff. All right. Then, if you've been leading a class, do this, uh, talk to the people out there, because, even though there are literally thousands of debt free screams posted on YouTube, thousands with an S, even though that sometimes people still believe, don't believe it can work, um, talk to tell them, you know, what advice would you give to somebody out there right now?
that doesn't think it'll work?
Well, we've, we talked about it really is all attitude. If you want to do it, you can do it. The framework is there. You've laid out a lot of very practical things that people can do. It's just, you have got to have a fire in your belly to be able to do it.
And, uh, the stamina to stick through it, because for a lot of people, it's a lot of years of having to say no to things, um,
and making sacrifices. Y'all are going to be millionaires by the time you're 40.. That's the goal. Yeah. I mean, you will be you're.
the math says you are. Yeah. Way to go.
Whether you think you can, or you think you can't, you're right. That's right. Right. Henry Ford. Yeah.
That's it. Yeah. All right. And you brought the kiddos to do the debt free. scream with you, right?
What are their names and ages? Um, this is Silas. He's eight. Hadassah is six and Anna is one. And they have been practicing and they've really been sticking with us, uh, these four years, learning about being content.
Um, and wanting. our goal is to ultimately just be generous with our money, uh, and make a difference. Be good, money managers of the money that God's given us. Amen. Be good.
with the matching shirts for the kiddos too. Yeah. Weird people, weird people. That's right. Well, you changed your family tree.
We're very proud of you. You're amazing people. You are weird. in a world where normal is broke. You're weird.
So for those of you new to this, you don't know, weird is a huge compliment. If normal sucks, be weird. Right? So that's a huge thing around here. And, uh, we're just, you guys are amazing.
Very well done. All right. Tyler and Sarah, Silas, Hadassah, and Anna, a 200,000 paid off house and everything. Almost baby steps. millionaires already.
four years and nine months, making one, 71 to two, 30 counted down. Let's hear.
a debt free scream. Three, two, one.
Yeah,
baby. Wow. I think we shocked baby Anna out of.
freaked out. And she's like, what is all this yelling? What is all the, why are all these people yelling? Because we're free. And that's the sound you make when you're free.
It's never a quiet sound. It's a loud sound. Freedom is a big deal. You get to make choices. Yeah.
You use your outdoor voice for freedom. You get to make choices, man. Mortgage means death. pledge in.
French and they just broke the death pledge. So they're living now truly in freedom. No lender.
gets to tell them what to do. Hey man, preach it, George. This is the Ramsey show.
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Years ago, the team came in and sat down in my office as the CEO and said, we want to build an app. I said, you want to build an app? For what? They said, we need a budgeting app. People need an app for their phone to know how to do budgeting.
I'm like, why would you do that? I got a perfectly good yellow pad right here. You can just get your little pencil out, your little calculator, and they're like, Dave, you're a freaking dinosaur. I know, but I do own the place, so be respectful.
I'm sure they didn't use those words. Actually, they did. Yeah, they did.
Wow. How did the Shark Tank meeting go when they pitched this to you?
We actually negotiated with a company that had built a budgeting app and thought about buying one. By the time we got into it, we realized the amount of work we would have to do to fix all the stuff they did wrong. It was easier to just build one. We just sat down with our guys and started building one. It cost us more money to do it that way, but it was easier.
Because it reflects the Ramsey plan from the beginning.
It's called EveryDollar because we tell you to have. every dollar needs a name before the month begins, and you need to agree on it with your spouse. No one wins the Super Bowl accidentally. It's a series of intentional acts. In the financial world, it's called a budget.
Every month, you tell your money what to do instead of wondering where it went. Every dollar needs a mission. Every dollar needs an assignment. Every dollar. We named it EveryDollar because that's something I've been doing from stage and on the air for years.
at that point.
Turns out those little goobers in my office were right.
That was over a decade ago now.
It was over 50 million downloads ago. Woo! It's crazy how this thing has exploded.
Of course, every minute, we are iterating it and fixing it and getting it better and better and better. Now, it walks you through the baby steps. Now, it does paycheck planning. If you get paid twice a month, you can divide up what paycheck goes to what bill, all that kind of stuff. The thing is stinking amazing.
You can get it in the App Store because it's an app. There you go, baby. I'm not talking about appetizers here. Very different. Bad joke.
Download EveryDollar for free in the App Store or Google Play. You can put it on your phone, your spouse's phone. You can put it on your desktop and get started for free. If you want to hook up to your bank, you get a whole bunch of other different things. There's a small fee to do all that.
Man, this thing's incredible. It makes it simple to make your money behave. Too many people don't happen to their money. They go out on a Sunday afternoon, drive and have no destination.
Well, every time you leave the house, it's $100.
. So, you got to have a plan for where the money's going ahead of time. You're pre-deciding when you make a budget.
Game plan. EveryDollar in the App Store, Google Play, or at EveryDollar.com. Marcel is with us in Chicago. Hi, Marcel. How are you?
Hello, George and Dave. Thank you. How are you doing?
Sure. What's up?
So, with me and my wife, we started the baby steps three months ago, and we managed to kind of clear $20,000 of credit card debt. Loans. And $28,000 on a car, which I was having a stupid car loan, $950 a month.
You cleared all of that in two, three months?
Yes. We started pretty intense. I was sick and tired of being in debt. And not seeing the end of the tunnel, kind of getting more and more, and too much in debt.
Good job.
So, this is part of. also, we're having a five-month-old baby. It's our first one. So, I think this kind of woke something in me, where I'm like, okay.
I got to be responsible for this.
Yeah, you're a good dad. You're a good dad. You care about the future of your family. Well done.
Thank you. So, I have a trucking business where I'm operating as well. in it. I currently have two trucks and two trailers. And one truck is almost paid off with $7,000 left.
One trailer is fully paid off. And then I have another truck, which is $170,000.. And I'm kind of upside down on it. because of the economy and trucking business, and everything went down. It probably would be worth $110,000 or $120,000 at the moment.
And the other semi-trailer is worth $42,000.
. And if I would sell it, it will be like $70,000.. So, going through the baby steps, we also have another car loan, which is $20,000 on a Tesla, but it's going to be paid off in five months.
So, my question is, since I have also a business and still that debt, I consider it being mine because I put the signature on it. I'm not sure how to plan on paying it. Do I finish the baby steps on a personal level and move on to the business?
I'm kind of like a bit lost how to.
maneuver the business. Good question. Very good question. Well, there's two parts to the answer. One is you've already accurately identified that it's not technically business debt.
It's technically personal debt, because they don't loan businesses. your size money. They loan you money. Okay. And so, you have a bunch of debt.
But I would separate this and say, number one, the $7,000, I just try to get that knocked out. Okay. Quick. And just like the Tesla, knock the Tesla and the $7,000 out. Done.
And then that leaves us with the two big notes on the newer tractor trailer, right? Yeah. Okay. Now, what I would do, you obviously run your business as a separate checking account, a separate P&L. You keep everything over there.
You have a good, hopefully a good accounting system on that, right? Yes. Okay. Here's what we teach. It's a lot of depreciation,
so you have to keep everything in order. Exactly.
Well, and you have to do your tax planning because you have to do some quarterly estimates. So, what we teach entree leaders in our small business coaching is a little bit of a different formula on debt in the business. We won't call it business debt. We'll call it debt in the business. All right.
It's a completely separate operation over there. And what we teach them to do is to take a minimum living wage. What's it take to operate your household as your salary out of the business? Not big profits. Okay.
Not big checks, not windfall, no big bonus money for you. Okay. But just enough for your family to eat comes out of the business. Once you've done that, then calculate net profit after you have been paid. Okay.
For this month. And then we suggest you put 20% to 30% of that net profit into retained earnings for the business somewhere in there, and the other 70 or 80% on the debt.
Let the business cash flow build retained earnings a little bit, while using the lion's share of the profits to knock the debt down while you make a living out of the business. Okay. Yes. You see how I did that formula?
Yes. Yes. I figured it would be something like this, because I was worried that if I.
pay all my money towards the debt, you can't, your business has to have operating income. Correct. Yes. Yes. You've got to have more than just budgeted, because you're in a, especially in a mechanical world, like you're in, where you've got equipment, cause stuff just blows up, you know?
Correct. And then you, you know, you'll lose a contract if you don't get the load delivered, and so on. So you've got to perform in business and you, and to do that, you have to keep a cash position. And so the good news is I started doing that. We started this business that ran it called Ramsey.
It's about a $300 million business. now, on a card table in my living room, 30 years ago. Um, somewhere along the line, my wife got tired of us whining about not having any cash in the business because we were broke. You know, we weren't making much money in the early days. And she said, the reason you don't have any cash in the business is you all are hypocrites.
You tell people to have an emergency fund and you don't have any cash saved in the business for emergencies. Sharon burn. Yeah, I got, I got trashed. So I hate it when she says stuff like that. And I really hate it when she's right, which is a lot of the time.
So we called our retained earnings, the Sharon fund. for a long time. It was nicknamed the, uh, Sharon fund today, saving a percentage of, and we've never had debt, but we always save a profits before we pay out bonuses or anything else to me or anybody else. We put a percentage into, uh, the Sharon fund, into retained earnings. Consequently, all these years later, that's a big old fun.
Now it adds up a lot of money, especially you don't need to use it. Yeah. And we haven't hardly used that. I mean, we've used it to buy some things for the business and we've used it to, uh, you know, cover a few cashflow things here and there, but by and large, it's just built up as part of a healthy company. It's a great cash position.
It's what it is. So that's how we did it, brother. And, uh, you're a good man. I'm glad you're glad you're thinking like that as a new dad, this is the Ramsey show.
live from the headquarters of Ramsey solutions. It's the Ramsey show where we help people build wealth, do work that they love and create actual, amazing relationships. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host, George Camel, number one, bestselling author of the book. Hey, uh, I can't get it out. I tried to say paycheck to purpose.
That's that's. you got so many children through the heart. It's a stake through the heart. So it's something about being broken, breaking free from broke.
Thank you. I'll try to help you at the paycheck and purpose side, but our friend Ken Coleman is,
is the expert on that. Yeah, there we go. Anyway, George, is also that you've got so many books around. smart money, happy hour with Rachel Cruz. One of our big hits on the Ramsey networks, on YouTube and on spot on podcast.
So he's here to help me answer your questions at triple, eight, eight, two, five, five, two, two, five. And it's a good thing because, apparently, okay. Anyway, Nate is in Richmond. Hi, Nate. How are you?
I'm doing? good, man. Thanks for taking my call. Sure.
What's up? So I, yeah, I'm in a bit of a position. I feel kind of stuck right now. So I'm 26 years old, Dave. I graduated from a pretty expensive school in 2020, uh, right in the height of COVID.
So, and I was actually supposed to get an internship from that, from that school. that was actually taken away from me because they changed management and cut the program. So, um, it hasn't been the most stable financial runway for me for a while at the current time that I'm in right now. for the last couple of years, I've been really struggling with finding a job with my degree. I was a double major.
I worked hard when I was in college. I got a marketing degree and a management degree. However, I didn't get a whole lot of real practical experience. Unfortunately. Um, that's what I was hoping the internship would provide for me.
And most of my, I have like almost a hundred thousand dollars in student loan debt, and I've been trying to pay him back. I just finished baby step one. So I'm trying to do what I can. However, trying to be frugal, as frugal as possible, is not really, you know, it's going to be quite some time before I'm able to actually be able to be debt free. And I didn't know what the best solution would be.
Um, my expenses, I, you know, I tried to lower as many of them as I can, but at the time, I wish I could save more and pay these off quicker, but I'm just in a position where a lot of my coworkers, which I don't really need the degree that I have to be in the job that I'm in. So a lot of my coworkers are saving 500, 600, or just have that much money to play with. And then next month, my loans actually increased. My coworker has hair and I.
don't, but it really doesn't affect me. Okay. My coworker does. Who gives a crap?
If I compared myself to Dave, I'd be really screwed.
Who, um, yeah. Who, you know, who gives a crap about your coworkers? Nobody. What do you make?
Yeah. I make about just under 40,000 a year.
What are you doing?
So I'm a leasing consultant for a property management company right now.
Okay.
Because I know real estate is like, that's definitely one of the things I want to get into, but my credit was crap and I had to fix that. So.
Why not find an entry-level marketing job making 40 or 45?
Or entry-level marketing job making 50 or 60.
Well, I made the most that I ever made was probably a little bit over 45.
. And that was when I was selling cars, but I did not like that position really.
But why aren't you pursuing marketing jobs?
I have, but a lot of them want experience with, like digital marketing and stuff like that.
And that's why you go entry-level. When I started here at Ramsey, I was entry-level.
You were an intern.
I was an intern. Yeah. And then I got a temp job and that turned into a full-time job. And, you know, I feel like you haven't applied yourself enough to actually find that entry-level marketing job. And I don't know why that is over four years.
It feels like you've just chased whatever would provide money ASAP. And it's been something you don't really enjoy doing.
Yeah. I mean, that's the truth. Yeah.
Nothing you've described follows the career path that you studied for.
Yeah.
You didn't study to be a car salesman and you didn't study to lease apartments. That's true. Okay. So marketing is a faster path to income and it's what you studied for. Assuming you get into it, enjoy it, and want to pursue that, it's a wonderful degree field.
I mean, you know, it should open up. It's a broad enough category. It ought to open up a whole lot of things for you.
But I think what you've discovered, just listening to the language that you're using, is that this thing called success is harder than you thought it was going to be.
Yeah.
Yeah. I mean, it's out here in the real world, you get bruised and beat.
Yeah. Especially when you follow a curriculum for a very long time, then you get into the real world and you're like, okay, what's next? I mean, it's been tough.
Well, you were lied to when they told you that getting the degree was going to make it easy. Yeah. It doesn't make it easy. It just puts a tool in your belt. You just have a big old hammer, but, buddy, you got to get calluses swinging the hammer at the nail.
And that's the hard part. I mean, it is, you know, and so what I'm going to encourage you to do, as the old guy in the room, is to persevere and really lean into this and go, okay, I'm going to lay out a five-year game plan where I'm making $150,000 a year as a world-class marketer five years from now. And that means I'm going to have to enter into a field that's going to take me there. I'm probably going to have to learn some digital skills. If you're going to do marketing in today's world, you have to be able to spell digital.
I mean, when I was doing this, when I started this company, the internet had not been invented, but I'm a good digital marketer now. And I'm 63 years old. I'm a Tyrannosaurus Rex. I have short arms, you know, I mean, come on. And so it's, you know, you've got to, you've got to be able to adapt and lean into what the trends are.
And today that means even, you know, you know what this old guy's learning, I'm learning about things like called AI, you know, and you do too, man, you're no different. Cause I'll get my butt kicked out here in the marketplace if I don't learn the language and the vernacular and the nuance of the new ways of looking at things. I didn't know what a conversion rate was. I didn't know, uh, you know, that, that the, uh, uh, well, anyway, I'm not, there's no reason to sit here and teach a digital marketing class, but yeah. Thank you, George.
But you know, it's true. I've had these meetings. I'm the dumbest guy in the room. Well, even when I did, I'm at least as the CEO, I'm at least going to learn enough of it to lead this place. Cause, if we don't lead Ramsey into a digital world, we're screwed.
Yeah. You know, we can't operate on analog. So you, you know, you're the same way, Nate, your, your career is digital, man. If you're going to sell stuff, guess where people buy it? Freaking internet, man.
And you got to deal with the monsters called Google and Facebook and all of that, you know, and all of their greed and misbehavior, and you got to deal with them and you got to handle it, and you got to work your way, you know, learn about ROAS and you got to learn about whole new ways of doing things and pull in other people. that, and so, yeah, get out there, man. Don't just kick back and rent apartments and whine about not getting out of debt. And I'm feel like I'm stuck, you know, roll up your dad, gum sleeves and get after it here. I'm going to send you a copy of my book,
breaking, free from broken. I walk through exactly what you just laid out. You fell for the trap. You fell for the lies. What now?
And that book's going to help you do just that. But the key here is margin. You got to spend less and make more. You've done a lot to spend less. It's time to.
make more. That's the next step. Yeah, you're not making any money and it's killing you, and you're hanging out with people that aren't making any money and feel like they're winning. That's hilarious. This is the Ramsey Show.
George Campbell, Ramsey personality, is my co-host today. Thanks for hanging out with us, America. We're so glad you're here. Open phones at 888-825-5225.. If you haven't heard the Ramsey bunch, that's us.
We are going on the Live Like No One Else cruise, March, the 22nd through the 23rd of next year, 2025.
. The 29th. It's not a one-day cruise. What did I say? 22nd to 23rd is what I heard.
Oh, I'm sorry. I was like, that'd be a real sad. Yeah, we're just going to go in one little circle and come back. A sunset cruise. Yeah, it's a 22nd through the 29th is what I was trying to say.
You're right. Thank you, George. Turks and Caicos, you can't get there in one night. And St. Thomas, you can't get there in one night.
Puerto Rico and the Bahamas, other places, well, you can get to the Bahamas in one night. But anyway, they do that one occasionally, and I wouldn't recommend that one. But anyway, this one is Holland America. It's one of the high-end ships, and it's a fairly new ship, and it's 100% Ramsey people going to be on there. Nobody else.
It's all Ramsey personalities. We're bringing some of our friends from the entertainment world. Dina Carter, who had a big hit called Strawberry Wine a while back. Big, big star here in Nashville. And Stephen Curtis, Chapman, good friend and multi-Dove award and Grammy award winner, is going to be with us entertaining.
We will all be doing sessions and events on the ship itself. And these are incredible stops. Monique Chauhan. I was with Monique last night, as a matter of fact, at a dinner. And she's from Iron Chef and all the food channel.
You know her from that. She's an incredible restaurateur, probably doing, might be doing a little cooking lesson on there. I will be at that event. So going to be some really cool, fun and funny people. Million songwriters.
Yeah. Magicians. A lot of Nashville songwriters. There's everything. And all the Ramsey personalities all week, including me, all week.
Sharon and I will be on the ship the entire week. So we're going to be hanging out with you. guys. Don't come unless you're Baby Step 4 and beyond. If you're still saving your emergency fund, you don't go on a cruise.
If you're in debt, on working on Baby Step 2, you don't go on a cruise, including ours. So don't. This is the live like no one else. If you live like no one else, later, you can live like no one else and give like no one else. So this is for people that want to have that milestone.
It's our chance to celebrate with you, celebrate you for being a hero and getting this far. And, you know, we tried to do this back in 2020.. And there was a little problem back that year, if you don't remember, that kept people from cruising. And so didn't get to do it. Everybody got their money back.
And now we get to restart and it's almost sold out. There are still some seats left, some tickets left, but are some suites and rooms and all that. But you better really get over to RamseySolutions.com slash cruise. It's going to be really fun. We're jacked about doing it.
We've never done one of these. So well, actually, I did a tiny little one, like 30 years ago.
Oh, wow. As an event.
It was called the Money Game Cruise and 34 people went. Wow. Yeah.
And look at you now. Look at that. So it's going to be sold out.
It took. it took 25 years to talk me into trying it again. And then I got COVID.
So now we're doing it again. And yeah, by God, we're doing it. So there you go. And it's going to be fun. It'll be a blast.
So, RamseySolutions.
com slash cruise, get tech, get your rooms while you still can. Jennifer's in Nashville. Jennifer, how are you?
Good. Thanks. Thanks for having me on. Hi, guys. So I am looking for advice on how to.
approach planning a budget like retirement. My husband and I are on very different pages about where we are financially. And I need to be able to communicate to him that we are closer than he thinks.
Okay. What is your nest egg size?
Broken up?
No, just total.
So we have, oh, gosh.
You're all your investments that you're going to live off of at retirement. That's the discussion, right?
We have it. Sure. We have a set forth about one and a half million. We have another, like employer supported retirement fund, of maybe 100,000.. We have a million in cash.
We have zero debt.
Why do you have a million in cash?
I don't know.
I don't either.
We don't know what to do with it.
Well, you need to invest it. You invest it.
We do have another account with 100,000 that we're investing on our own.
All right. So if you take two and a half million dollars, he's afraid you can't live off of that. How old are you people?
We're in our early 50s.
Okay. And so the discussion is, do we have enough to live on and he's the saver or you're the saver?
Well, we're obviously both savers.
I mean, well, you both have done it. Yeah. But I mean, who's the natural who gets a high from saving?
Probably me.
Okay.
But he thinks that he just, he just doesn't think that we are. I mean, you know, I feel like we have enough money to go with.
But what's your household income?
450.
Okay. Well, two and a half won't create 450..
I understand that for sure.
Do you need, what do you actually want to live on? What expenses will you have per year? Do you think in retirement?
Just, you know, routine monthly expenses, a couple of vacations a year.
Could you live off of, say, 10 grand a month? Do you need 15 grand a month? Easily. Okay. Well, now you're more in line with the numbers you gave us.
Your house paid off?
Oh yeah. The house has been paid off for a long time.
What's it worth?
One and a half.
Good for you. Well done. Y'all have done so good.
Over $4 million net worth.
Okay. So here's some simple...
I'll tell you what, we started at age 30, with $150,000 in student loans and no money.
Wow. Good for you.
So we've worked really hard.
Yeah. And you've been making good money too. That helps. And you've been wise with it. And so you, you know, you ended up here with a $5 million plus net worth.
All right. Let's just do some back of napkins, simple, primitive math. Nothing complicated. Okay. I have tens of millions of dollars tied up in mutual funds.
Okay. In decent gross stock mutual funds, the S&P 500, which is the baseline of what the stock market does, has averaged for the past 80 years. So 11.2%.
Okay. My personal mutual funds, and it's not, you don't have to be a rocket scientist to figure this out, do have done a little over 12.. I beat the market a little bit, not much, by picking mutual funds that have a long track record of outperforming the S&P. Okay. So we can use, you can use some numbers somewhere around there if you wanted to use them.
So if you took the million, that's sitting in cash stupidly, and you put it in that, and your other money was in that, so let's say we take two and a half and it's making 10, 11, 12, somewhere in there. Okay.
Okay. Yep.
Round numbers, two and a half, 10, 250,000, 20,000 bucks a month.
That's more than enough to live off. Okay.
For sure. Well, I mean, and, but now, and you're not touching the principle doing that, you're just living off of it, but also that what it will purchase is going down because inflation's eating away at the value of it. Okay.
So that's not a great long-term plan, but I'm just giving you round numbers. Okay. So, in other words, if you pulled 200,000 off and it was making 250, and you're leaving 50 in there every year, you're probably covering inflation.
I would hope so.
Yeah. I'm just doing back, I'm just doing back a napkin math. All right. If you want to get a little bit more technical, you say, okay, I've got mine invested at 12%. If I pull off 8% of my investments and I'm making 12, that means I'm raising my principle balance by four every year, right?
Right. That would be what inflation has averaged 4.2% for the past 78 years.
Okay. Okay. So if you, if you just pull off, if you make 12 and pull off eight, this is not exact, but it's just gives a, gives you a comfort level that we can make it on $250,000 a year. This thing, this money, this money's making 250, 300,000 a year. We're going to pull off 150 or 180 or 180 is 15,000 a month, you know, and that doesn't count everything else.
And that's anywhere from like a six to 8% withdrawal rate.
And that, that math is perpetual motion. It does not ever destroy, because we've never dipped into the principle.
The goose just keeps laying the eggs. Yeah. The goose keeps laying the eggs. Yeah. You just walk that out.
Now, what you need to do, though, is you need to sit down with a SmartVestor Pro, go online at Ramsey Solutions and find a SmartVestor Pro in your area that has the heart of a teacher, and walk you through these basic things and get that million dollars invested and make sure that one and a half that's in the retirement's, in good mutual funds, doing that kind of returns. And if it is, y'all are just fine. You're going to be fine. And you've done a great job. You're master savers.
You're, you know, you've become from 150,000 in debt at 30 years old to now in your 50s, 25 years later, you're worth $5 million and you should be. Way to go. Congratulations.
George Campbell, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. Thank you for joining us. It is a free call at 888-825-5225, in the lobby of Ramsey Solutions on the debt-free stage. Mike and Nicole are with us. Hey guys, how are you?
We're doing great, Dave. Thanks for having us.
We're honored to have you. Where do you live?
Columbus, Ohio. Go Bucks.
I love it. Love it. Welcome to Nashville. How much debt have you paid off?
$107,000.
Cool. How long did that take?
About four years.
Good for you. And your range of income during that time?
I went from $53,000 to $58,000 in the first three years and then combined $115,000 towards the end.
Okay, cool. What do y'all do for a living?
I am an installation manager for a HVAC controls company. I'm a part-time music teacher.
Love it. Very good. Good for y'all. What kind of debt was the $107,000?.
$93,000 of it was student loan, a little bit of a Discover card and a small medical bill.
Okay. How long y'all been married?
15 years. 15 years.
So, after 11 years of marriage, what was the I've had it moment? What changed everything?
It was about a little bit after Christmas 2019.
. We were like, let's look at our finances, and we pulled up all of our student loan statements and started looking at it, and the numbers just weren't making any sense to us. We started to tally it up and realized we were $33,000 more than when we started. Interest had accrued out of hand.
You were just making minimum payments, and so the interest had ballooned?
Yeah. We were on an income-based repayment plan and I think some of our loans had variable rates and we didn't really know what was going on.
So you were peddling backwards.
A hundred percent. Throwing money away.
So you're like paying a hundred bucks, but the interest is 500.
. And so it's just compounding every day.
And then we looked at it all and we were just in total shock. Totally. Yeah. I was just ill when I was like, how could this happen? How did, really, how did we let it happen?
And I spent that week after Christmas just prayerfully considering what to do about this, because I knew we had to do something. The financial trajectory wasn't looking good for us. So my friend Amanda actually had the Total Money Makeover on her shelf and I remember she had read it and she had really loved it. and I was like, I don't know. Amanda read this book.
So knowing I was broke, went to the library, got the book off the shelf and read it in a day and came to Mike and I was like, oh man, we really, we got to consider doing this. And honestly, the burden's kind of on us to consider the consequences of the implications if we don't do this.
So, January 2020, we got to it. We decided, let's do it. Let's see what we can do. And that month we put an extra thousand dollars towards our student loans. And then we went to Ikea and celebrated because the cappuccinos were free.
And that was really the first time we were like, oh my God.
We're doing it. We're doing it.
We put a thousand bucks towards this. This is working. This is insane. Okay, let's keep going. And we told our friends what we were doing.
and man, we were broke, but we're real relationally wealthy. We had a bunch of people in our corner and rooting for us and cheering for us. And we knew we wanted to document this event, I guess is what you would call it, that this was going to be something really monumental in our lives. So we actually started an Instagram account, mostly for an artifact, to document our journey, but it ended up being this really great support system and accountability system. Like, if you tell the whole internet you're doing this, you're going to keep at it.
And we actually, what was so fun in the Instagram journey was that we found this one couple who was also paying off a ton of student loans, and they started this hashtag called villainize your debt. And so they named all of their student loans after Disney villains, which was like such a creative.
I love it. Yeah.
And you know, they would like track it.
Jafar, you are going down. I love it. Yeah.
So we did the same thing. Our favorite show. Yeah, exactly. Our favorite show is The Office. So we named all our student loans after Office characters that you just love to hate.
That is so great.
Yeah. It was a lot of fun.
I imagine Toby had to be the biggest one.
Come on Dwight, where's Dwight? Come on, man. Yeah.
Toby was the big one.
Yeah, so right after COVID hit, I mean, they paused the interest rates and we're like, this is awesome. We can start making like real principal payments. And we just really went to town and hammered at it. We went through our budget and just looked at every bit of money that was going out. Like how can we shave and cut the fat and really like make everything we can towards these debts and take care of it?
And we really went at it hard. I mean, we cut down streaming services and lowered our phone bills and ate off like $60 a week for a little bit until I got a little too hungry. But yeah. Wow.
Well, I love that you guys, number one, you made it fun and it made it more of an exciting journey versus this, oh my gosh. And number two, you had built in accountability because everyone on Instagram now is like, hey, are they actually doing this? Are they paying off some debt this month?
Totally. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So that was our defense. And I really went to work on offense, just generating an extra income.
My friend Mary managed a local Airbnb and they needed a house cleaner. And she called me up and she's like, hey, do you want this gig? You know, you just work on the weekends for a few hours. It paid really well. And I'm like, 100%.
So I actually just took that job and I put in my earbuds and scrubbed some toilets and clean, do laundry and scrub the kitchens and make money and listen to the Ramsey show and all the debt-free screams to keep motivated. And we did gig apps, like I view it and field agent to bring in money. We flipped furniture, kid items, household items. I had a friend send me this meme that was so great, where it's like, well, you were debating if the glass was half full or half empty. I sold it.
And I just felt like that was such a good description of what was happening in our house.
Can we just talk about it, or should we just do something? Totally.
Totally. Our kids were in on it. I would pull over to the side of a curb. I bet I could flip those chairs for $40 or whatever. Our oldest would be like, are you selling that for your student loans?
We're like, yeah.
You know it, buddy.
Oh, yeah. So we actually did a ton of market research. And actually this December, one month before we were done, we did some market research for Bud Light. So we had like 48 bottles of Bud Light in our house. And I'm like, what are we going to do with all of this?
I love that you were like, kids, it's for science.
It's for the cause.
We, I was like, well, we need teacher gifts. So we actually put little bows on these Bud Light bottles and gifted them to our kids' teachers.
Like. there's a story behind this, guys.
Yeah, with a little note, like explaining what we were up to, and, you know, and how much we were grateful for them and such.
But creative, resourceful. What's not to love. here? You guys are inspiring. And the kids saw the whole thing.
Totally.
Some teachers get an apple. Yours gets a Bud Light.
That's right. Yep. And then, yeah, over the last year, I got a new job. She encouraged me to find something else, which ended up really working out great. And we just kept living simply and didn't really change anything.
Just had more income coming in and hammered hard at those student loans. And we were really able to see those numbers going down fast.
When the terror hit your belly that day and you went, this is not good.
Yeah.
And your hands are shaking a little bit. You're making $53,000.. And now, fast forward, four years later, you're making $115,000. with all this hustle and these moves and a permanent change in the way of thinking about it. And you've completely cleared off $107,000 worth of debt.
Y'all are amazing. You're heroes.
Thank you. Thank you.
Yeah. So really, if I was to ask what your why is, it's got to be your beautiful kids, our reason for doing this. But it really was because I don't want this feeling in my stomach anymore.
Totally. Totally. Yeah. I mean, I think a big, a definite big. why, for us, is we really want to be generous givers.
It's tough to do when you're indebted like that. So getting done with this is just so exciting because we're able to, like, we can give freely to other people who also need help. That was like one of the big goals when we started this thing. We were really looking forward to that day. And so here we are.
Yeah.
Really excited about that.
Yeah. What's the first fun thing you do now that you're out of debt?
Next month, we are going to Banff National Park in Canada.
Nice. That's a good one.
That one's on the books and we're ready for it.
Yeah. And I've earned every penny of it. Well done. That's a great one. I like it.
See, this is what happens, people, when you work on it. Bring the kiddos up. Let's hear their names and ages right quick.
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