The Key to Building Wealth Is Maximizing Your Earning Potential

Speaker 1 Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, it's the Ramsey Show. We're dead is dumb, cash is king, and the paid-off home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice.

Speaker 1 This is the Ramsey Show. We help people build wealth, find work, and do work that they actually love,

Speaker 1 and create amazing relationships. Ken Coleman, Ramsey personality, host of the Ken Coleman Show, is my co-host today.

Speaker 1 He's also a number one best-selling author and expert in the worlds of career and work. We're here to help you.
The phone number is 888-825-5225. Al and Raleigh starts off this hour.

Speaker 1 Hey, Ali, Al, welcome to the Ramsey Show.

Speaker 2 Hi, Dave.

Speaker 1 How are you?

Speaker 1 I got Raleigh and Allie all tied up there for a second. So I'm beautiful, man.
How can I help?

Speaker 2 All right, so I'm calling because,

Speaker 2 well, it's career advice. I got out of the military last year, and since then, I've been between a few jobs.
I'm currently working as a trucker now, and I'm a full-time college student.

Speaker 2 I'm going to school online about halfway through with that.

Speaker 2 I'm on baby steps four, five, and six. Thank you for that.
And

Speaker 2 basically, I'm having a lot of self-doubt and kind of falling out of love with my degree program and more in love with my job right now. And

Speaker 2 I don't know which one I should pursue more heavily. If I should buckle down and keep going,

Speaker 2 finish out my degree, and you know, hope I fall back in love with the program.

Speaker 1 What's the degree?

Speaker 4 What's the degree direction?

Speaker 2 Electrical engineering.

Speaker 3 Interesting.

Speaker 4 And you've fallen in love with trucking, huh? Driving the truck?

Speaker 2 I have.

Speaker 2 I'm very fortunate right now to be working

Speaker 2 a local position, so I don't have to go over the road or nothing.

Speaker 2 Monday through Friday,

Speaker 2 reasonable times, be with the family on the weekends.

Speaker 1 So what's that?

Speaker 4 Yeah, so

Speaker 4 that's a pretty all-inclusive gig in the truck, and you either love that or you hate it. I don't find a lot of guys that are middle ground on that, and I think that's really interesting.

Speaker 4 And I think you have to listen to that. The question I have is: if you were to slow down, you're halfway through it.

Speaker 4 I'm assuming you got the GI bill, so you're not paying out of pocket for the degree, correct? That's correct.

Speaker 4 And you chose electrical engineering, I'm wondering, because maybe you did some of that type of work in the military, or no? Was it just out of left field?

Speaker 2 No, no, no. So prior to the military,

Speaker 2 I was on the robotics team in high school.

Speaker 2 I really enjoyed it.

Speaker 2 But after doing 11 years in the infantry,

Speaker 2 I got tired of being a dumb grunt and I wanted to go back and use my brain.

Speaker 1 But

Speaker 2 it feels like things are piling up. And like I said, I'm having some soft doubt on it.

Speaker 4 What's piling up? There's the answer. What's piling up? Describe what you mean.

Speaker 2 Well, as the course load gets more and more difficult,

Speaker 2 I find myself having difficulty concentrating on the the work.

Speaker 2 Like when I'm on and the days and the days are going well, I get it and everything clicks and everything moves along. But on the days I'm not and there's quite a lot of them,

Speaker 2 just getting my thoughts together is really, really hard.

Speaker 4 Okay, so what I want you to focus then is

Speaker 4 what led you into the electrical engineering degree. And obviously there's something from your past, robotics.
You love to work with your head and your hands.

Speaker 4 You've got that kind of wiring in your brain, but it doesn't mean that this particular path is the best path for you.

Speaker 4 And so I would not make any decision to walk away from the degree right now, but I would take 30 days, just as a ballpark figure, to really dive into what are some fields that I am intrigued by,

Speaker 4 I am interested in, that would involve that type of engineering brain that wouldn't require the degree and that classwork and that type of work.

Speaker 4 Because I think there's some silver silver lining in here and that you've done some robotics in the past.

Speaker 4 You're intrigued on some days, you're thriving on some days and not on others, and that could be course-related and the type of work.

Speaker 4 So instead of throwing it all out, I want you to actually dive in a little bit more. And it's almost an old school exercise.
I got a pad. Hold on one second, Dave.

Speaker 4 I got a pad right here, and I'm going to go to those classes on the days that I'm struggling.

Speaker 4 I want to write down what's making me struggle, what's causing me to struggle, and the days that I'm thriving, why am I thriving?

Speaker 4 I would dive into that a little bit more over 30 days before deciding to get out of the degree experience.

Speaker 1 Absolutely. I completely agree.

Speaker 1 Hey, Al, when I was in college,

Speaker 1 I went in this one class,

Speaker 1 and

Speaker 1 when I left there the third day,

Speaker 1 I felt really dumb.

Speaker 1 It was really hard.

Speaker 1 Are you struggling with that?

Speaker 1 Academically, Academically, it was straining my brain.

Speaker 2 No, no. Academically, I mean, I maintain good grades,

Speaker 2 but

Speaker 2 there's just some self-doubt creeping in just because

Speaker 1 you mentioned dumb grunt earlier.

Speaker 2 Yeah, just.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 I'm a little bit afraid that this is like your first academic challenge, and I kind of want to encourage you to push through it because I think you got the stuff.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 1 Because I think it's self-doubt. I don't think it's reality.

Speaker 1 Am I wrong?

Speaker 2 No, I don't think you're wrong.

Speaker 1 Okay. And you may need some, during the 30 days, you may need to set your study habits pattern up better because it sounds like your catch is catch can.

Speaker 1 And if you've got something that's deep and that is scratching the back of your brain, like I'm talking about, that's very hard academically. It's like thick and weighty and hard to push through.

Speaker 1 I've been in those classes and I don't like them because it pisses me off when I can't get something quick. And,

Speaker 1 you know, if you have to do that, the only way to push through that is a study habit pattern that gets you real quiet, real centered, away from humans, no distractions.

Speaker 1 And you push through the concepts and get your head around them. And

Speaker 1 that's going to take you on through the, if you've got a heavy academic thing, it'll push you through it. Study habits will do it.
And the study setting, the setting.

Speaker 1 And if you're trying to do this like while you eat dinner at the truck stop, that ain't going to work, man.

Speaker 4 Al, I'm curious, is there a job in your mind that if we offered that to you today, we fast-forwarded all the degree stuff and you got to go do it?

Speaker 4 If you've got something in your mind right now, would you do that over trucking if you didn't have to struggle through all this and all the doubt went away and we just gave you the opportunity to step into it?

Speaker 2 Yes, 100%.

Speaker 4 You would 100% take that type of work over trucking.

Speaker 1 Absolutely. Okay, so there's the answer.

Speaker 4 Yeah, so there's the answer. So again,

Speaker 4 the exercise I gave you, plus what Dave is telling you,

Speaker 4 you have to identify what's causing the self-doubt. And that's the source of this.
Once we get to the bottom of it, so fear is I'm afraid something bad is going to happen. Its cousin is doubt.

Speaker 4 And doubt is, I don't think something good can happen.

Speaker 4 And that's what you're dealing with. I don't know.
I'm two years in. I don't know that I can get through this, that anybody will hire me because I was just a military grunt.
I'm just a truck driver.

Speaker 4 I think, Dave, that's the source. It's a a narrative in Al's head that he's not good enough.

Speaker 1 That's exactly. That's what I was getting at.
Yeah. Yeah.
And what I'm hearing is actually you are good enough.

Speaker 1 You've actually got the stuff because you didn't tell me like, there's no way I can do this. I mean, you didn't say that.
You're like, I can do it. I'm getting the grades.

Speaker 1 I've just got to get my head around. I got to get the habits and the rhythm.
You know what else you might do? You might visit someone that is actually doing what you want to do someday.

Speaker 1 Spend time with them. Maybe hang out with them.
Maybe who you're hanging out with is telling you you can't do it.

Speaker 1 You got to be careful who you hang out with.

Speaker 4 I asked you, Al, if we give it to you, would you take it? You said, 100%. Then go get it.
So go take it.

Speaker 1 Go get it.

Speaker 4 Nobody's going to give it to you.

Speaker 1 Get them. Get them.

Speaker 1 Ken Coleman, Ramsey Personality is my co-host today. Thank you for joining us, America.
We're so glad you're here. Open phones at 888-825-5225.
Regina is with us in Las Vegas. Hi, Regina.
How are you?

Speaker 2 Hi, Dave. Hi, Ken.
Thanks for taking the call.

Speaker 1 Sure. What's up?

Speaker 2 Well, I need some perspective. I appreciate the last caller because I think you gave me a little bit on that call, but I'm looking for some more.
I'm currently on Baby Step 2.

Speaker 2 Been four years gazelle intense.

Speaker 2 And I'm going to be looking at a court date here tomorrow that's going to end up increasing that debt to about the tune of $25,000.

Speaker 2 I have literally been gazelle intense for four years, even during COVID, and my gas tank is on empty.

Speaker 2 I'm just not seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, and I don't know if I can keep up the pace that I've been doing. I have three jobs, and I'm just, my gas tank is empty.

Speaker 1 I'm sorry.

Speaker 2 So I don't know if I'm looking at a bankruptcy or if I have to do something not stupid.

Speaker 1 I'm sorry.

Speaker 1 How much debt have you got, not counting tomorrow?

Speaker 2 10 grand. And I literally was, I was coming for a debt-free screen in October.

Speaker 1 And what's your income?

Speaker 2 My income is $45 a year. I've upped it to $55,000 even during COVID.
But the problem I'm having is I end up in court because all these extra debts are attorney fees.

Speaker 2 And every time I go to court, I don't seem to be in good favor with the court. My child support has increased.
So it's a very long journey, and I'm just tired.

Speaker 1 You pay child support.

Speaker 2 I do. We have 50-50 custody and it doesn't work out in my favor anytime I go to court because he's a full-time student making $10.50 an hour.

Speaker 1 Okay. And

Speaker 1 what's the $25,000 tomorrow?

Speaker 2 Tomorrow is the attorney's fee for the last two years of litigation.

Speaker 1 You owe $25,000 to an attorney?

Speaker 2 Yes, sir.

Speaker 1 Over child support?

Speaker 2 Yes, sir.

Speaker 2 It was because of COVID, it was extended, extended, extended, extended, extended.

Speaker 1 So it's just well, if he wasn't working while it's extended, why did the bill keep going up?

Speaker 2 Because my ex-husband made sure that the bill kept going. He kept putting things in there and we kept having to respond.
So, you know, as each response happened, it's that $2.50 an hour, you know.

Speaker 2 So it just

Speaker 2 really spun out of control.

Speaker 1 Yeah, you needed a new attorney.

Speaker 2 Pardon me?

Speaker 1 You needed a new attorney $25,000 ago.

Speaker 2 I agree with you, sir, but unfortunately I gave him a retainer and I had nothing left in the tank after that. That was my emergency fund.
Yeah, I know.

Speaker 1 When you make $60,000 and you spend $25,000 on child support, that's not in balance.

Speaker 1 I totally agree with you, sir.

Speaker 1 I'm not fussing at you. I'm just crying with you.

Speaker 1 No, please, fuss at me. No, you don't need to be fussed at.
You've gotten fussed at enough.

Speaker 1 You just got to best, kiddo.

Speaker 1 Yep. So you owe the attorney's fees, and the attorney has sued you for the fees?

Speaker 2 Yeah, tomorrow is the day. And we go to the judge.
We've stayed off. We've done everything to try and...

Speaker 1 Yeah, you're going to lose because you owe the money.

Speaker 2 Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah.
I'm going to lose. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Well, you owe the money. I mean, it's not.
There's not really a thing to, you know, he sucks as an attorney is not a defense

Speaker 1 for the attorney fees. I mean, you took him on.

Speaker 1 Yes.

Speaker 1 And this guy

Speaker 1 knows that you make $60,000 a year.

Speaker 2 He represented me for two and a half years.

Speaker 1 And he knows that you don't have any money. He knows that.

Speaker 1 What does he think this is going to accomplish? Do we have any idea?

Speaker 2 I truly don't know. I just guess he wants to garnish my wages, which is going to basically leave me and my daughter in a big deficit.

Speaker 2 It's going to change our world. Yeah.

Speaker 2 So

Speaker 1 do you have

Speaker 1 options, I guess, or perspective?

Speaker 1 I would just tell him that we're either going to have to work something out.

Speaker 1 that is a tremendous discount, and I'll go scrape some money together and give you a lump sum at a tremendous discount, or I'm going to help you to get zero because that's called a Chapter 7 bankruptcy.

Speaker 2 And that's kind of what I did on my own because I knew what I was up against.

Speaker 1 You told him that.

Speaker 2 Yeah, I basically said, you know what I have, and you can go forward with this, but you know what's going to happen.

Speaker 2 And I basically, you know, laid it on to him, and

Speaker 2 he pushed the button. So I'm looking at this bankruptcy head-on.
And I just, I want to know I'm doing the right thing.

Speaker 2 Trying to stay a step above and

Speaker 2 a step ahead for my daughter's sake.

Speaker 1 Well,

Speaker 1 I always tell folks if you're going to file bankruptcy, and

Speaker 1 I never recommend it, it's a horrible process to go through, but if you're going to, make sure you've tried every single thing you can try before you do it. Because it is a life-altering thing.

Speaker 1 It's in the same category as a divorce. It's something you want to avoid if there's any way you can.
So you try everything. Now, you've tried almost everything here, but here's the thing.

Speaker 1 Even if he gets the judgment tomorrow, and he probably will,

Speaker 1 then he has to act on it. And until he actually does act on it, it just sits there.

Speaker 2 Well, he's pushed the motion to put in a he's already filed the motion to garnish my wages.

Speaker 1 But there's not even a judgment. Is there a judgment already?

Speaker 2 Well, we put a stay on it, is my understanding.

Speaker 1 On the judgment. On the four moral arguments, correct.
Okay.

Speaker 1 Well, garnishment, you know, the day the garnishment hits, that might be the day that you make your decision that you've done everything you can do.

Speaker 2 Well, the day the garnishment hits, I'm going to have to move. I mean, I'm that tight.

Speaker 1 No.

Speaker 1 No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. If you file Chapter 7 bankruptcy, there's no garnishment.
It goes away. Understood.
Okay. So I'm saying if he actually does do that, not just threatens it.

Speaker 1 And so what we want to be careful of is that we've,

Speaker 1 you know, one more time I'll talk to him. One more time I'll say, listen, if you do this, and just say it out loud, just say, you're not getting a garnishment.
Okay, I had this negotiation one time.

Speaker 1 I was negotiating for

Speaker 1 a business guy that had a bank debt with a local bank, and I'm sitting with the banker, and the banker says, we're going to foreclose on the property, which obviously a bankruptcy stops a foreclosure.

Speaker 1 And I said, no, you're not. He goes, oh, yeah, I am.
Yeah, I am. I said, no.
We're either going to, there's two options.

Speaker 1 We're either going to work out something as we sit here with you guys and negotiate out some kind of settlement, or the guy's going into a Chapter 11 bankruptcy or a 7 bankruptcy.

Speaker 1 But you're not foreclosing on the property. I can keep you from foreclosing on the property.
So let's establish that you're not going to foreclose.

Speaker 1 Now, it's either because of a bankruptcy or because we work something out. So which one do you want to do? It's your choice.
Because, well, and then he comes up, well, we're going to foreclose.

Speaker 1 I'm like, dude, you're not real smart, are you? What I just said was

Speaker 1 you're not going to be allowed to foreclose.

Speaker 1 Federal court's going to stop you or you're going to come to an agreement today but foreclosure is not going to occur that's the type of conversation I would have with this attorney okay there's not going to be a garnishment

Speaker 1 either I'm going to stop you with a chapter seven and you're going to get zero in that case or you and I work something out

Speaker 1 and you know and then but that that and those type of ultimatum discussions in a negotiation are sometimes the last thing you can do. And you want to do everything you can do to try to avoid this.

Speaker 1 You've fought so hard, you've come so close, and it would be a bloody shame for this one thing to take you down.

Speaker 4 Yeah, and practically speaking here, whatever the amount is, I'm assuming, Dave, that the lawyer has shared what the amount is, the garnish would be, and so we've got to figure.

Speaker 4 So if he's going to get anything, it's that number or less that he agrees to. And then you look at, okay, can I keep doing three jobs? And it doesn't sound like she can do three more jobs.

Speaker 4 I mean, three jobs, much more. Her tank is empty as as well.

Speaker 1 Well, her tank's empty because she just keeps getting piled on.

Speaker 4 Yeah, but if she can push through and manage to make that money, a better second job, a better paying second job, that's that last resort to, okay, if I can settle this with this guy and not go into bankruptcy.

Speaker 1 I give him five grand cash and go borrow it.

Speaker 4 That's interesting. Yeah.

Speaker 1 You know, that's what I, because, you know, I'd rather have 25, I'd rather have five grand death than 25.

Speaker 1 That's true. But, I mean, we'll settle with you just one way or another here.
But try some stuff like that, Regina, because sometimes these guys, they just, you have to explain it to them.

Speaker 1 They don't, they're not smart sometimes. I mean, dumb lawyers are everywhere.

Speaker 1 Oh, Lord of mercy. I'm sorry, honey.
Hey, hang on. We're going to hook you up with one of our coaches, one of our financial coaches, see if they can walk you through this.

Speaker 1 Ken Coleman, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. Open phones at 888-825-5225.
Ashley's in Greenville, Greenville, South Carolina. Hi, Ashley.
Welcome to the Ramsey Show.

Speaker 2 Hey, Dave, thanks for taking my call.

Speaker 1 Sure. What's up?

Speaker 2 All right. So my question is a business-related one.

Speaker 2 Not this past September, but the year before, I purchased a bakery that was eight years old. It was a mom-and-pop bakery for about $105,000.

Speaker 2 It was really small over the year. We improved it.
We did some renovations on our own dollar. We didn't pay for them.

Speaker 2 And unfortunately,

Speaker 2 it's not been successful, and I'm having to close it.

Speaker 1 I'm sorry.

Speaker 2 That's okay. It is what it is.

Speaker 2 And my question is,

Speaker 2 originally my landlord, I have five more years left on the lease. My landlord said, that's fine.

Speaker 2 I'll let you out of it.

Speaker 2 And that was great. However,

Speaker 2 He called

Speaker 2 last week and asked me how things were going, how things were moving out, and I mentioned that I was moving some of the equipment out.

Speaker 2 He was under the assumption that the equipment that was built around

Speaker 2 the face that was built around the equipment, he owned.

Speaker 2 However, the couple that I purchased the bakery from actually sold it to me. I have purchased documents for it.

Speaker 2 And he is holding my equipment hostage by not letting me out of the lease unless I leave the equipment.

Speaker 2 I am, I have considered, I've looked up chapter 7 bankruptcy because that would give me 60 days to assume or reject the lease of which I would reject the lease.

Speaker 2 And then my assets, including the equipment, would be sold to pay off my debts. However, I do not have any debt for the business.

Speaker 2 It's an LLC, and I decided to get out of the business before I went into debt.

Speaker 1 Did you sign the lease personally?

Speaker 2 I did, yes. Okay.

Speaker 1 The lease is not in the LLC's name. It's in your name.

Speaker 2 It is. It is in the LLC's name, yes.

Speaker 1 Oh,

Speaker 1 did you guarantee it personally?

Speaker 1 Yes. Okay.
Doesn't matter. It's your personal lease.
You're personally liable on the lease, is what you're telling me. Okay.

Speaker 1 Right?

Speaker 1 Yes. Okay.

Speaker 1 And how much is the lease payments monthly?

Speaker 2 They are currently $622.40. They go up by a certain percentage every year starting in October.

Speaker 1 So you have five years of $7,000, so you've got somewhere around $35,000 exposure, right?

Speaker 1 Correct. What's the equipment worth?

Speaker 2 It's less than $10,000 worth of equipment, so I'm less

Speaker 1 swallowed

Speaker 2 because I'm hopeful that I can maybe start it again one day and it would relieve some of the startup costs down the road.

Speaker 1 Do you have any money?

Speaker 2 I have about $20,000 in personal savings and that's about it. I sunk

Speaker 2 all of my life savings into the first business.

Speaker 1 If you were going to buy this equipment right now in your situation

Speaker 1 used,

Speaker 1 what would you be willing to pay for it?

Speaker 1 If you found it on the,

Speaker 1 let's say you let him have it, and the next day you walked into a garage sale and you found this same piece of equipment sitting in someone's basement, what would you buy it for?

Speaker 1 Or would you buy it tomorrow or would you wait until later?

Speaker 2 That's a really great question.

Speaker 2 The one piece of equipment that's really I'm hanging on to is the oven because it's an old oven and the old ones are the best because they don't.

Speaker 1 And you found it in someone's basement tomorrow at a garage sale. What would you pay for it?

Speaker 2 I would pay probably upwards of $1,000 for it.

Speaker 1 $1,000.

Speaker 2 Correct.

Speaker 1 Okay. All right.

Speaker 1 So

Speaker 1 I think you can sit. Number one, the first thing you need to do is with this landlord, you need to sit down in person.

Speaker 1 Yes, we are. We're meeting on Wednesday.
Good, good. Because you're an honorable person.
I think he's not a dishonorable person. As a matter of fact, he's got a lot of mercy.

Speaker 1 He's just letting you out of $35,000.

Speaker 2 He's already got someone lined up that he will surely.

Speaker 1 He's letting you out of $35,000.

Speaker 1 That's not a bad, I mean, it's not a bad guy. He could have held you to it for a $1,000 oven.
I mean, it's not a bad trade.

Speaker 1 So at the end of the day, if I have to negotiate away the $1,000 oven in order to get out of a $35,000 exposure it's gone he can have the oven but I would ask him about it and just say listen I we honestly I think you're an honest guy and you think I'm honest and we're just had it we just did not have alignment on this one subject would you be willing to sell me the oven because it's the only piece I'm particularly interested in at a you know at whatever it's at salvage price, which is probably $500 or $1,000.

Speaker 1 That's the only thing that I care about. And the rest of it is I care about getting out of the lease.
Could we work that out?

Speaker 2 yeah it it still just gets me that I've already bought the oven so I don't want to pay him for it

Speaker 1 you're missing the part where you got out of a thirty five thousand dollar liability that probably gets him

Speaker 1 that the tenant he had just decided they weren't gonna pay

Speaker 2 yeah but he's wanted me out of there since I signed the lease

Speaker 2 Because he can charge double for the people that have already lined up for it. Okay.

Speaker 1 You do what you want to do. That's what I would do.
I would consider this a blessing. And I would,

Speaker 1 in a horrible situation with a heartbreak,

Speaker 1 I'd let him keep the oven or I'd give him $1,000 or $500 for it and get the documents signed to completely relieve you of any liability, LLC or personal, further on this lease so that he can go forward.

Speaker 1 I guess if you want to play hardball from a negotiating standpoint, you could, because it sounds like he's chomping at the bit to get you out of there, and you could just say, you know what, I think I'm just going to give you another $600 and stay here a while

Speaker 1 and make him lose his potential tenant because you keep paying.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 If he doesn't, you know, if you won't let me have the oven, I think I'm just going to keep paying the rent because I think the oven's mine. I've got a bill of sale for it.

Speaker 1 And, but, you know, honestly, I...

Speaker 1 I personally wouldn't do that. I personally would.
This is a horrible thing you're going through. It's an emotional thing you're going through.
The failure of a business is a crisis of identity.

Speaker 1 Anytime I close a major area that we tried here at Ramsey, it's me admitting that I was stupid, and I hate admitting that, yet sometimes I am stupid.

Speaker 1 But I get the opportunity running a business to admit it occasionally, and it's not fun. It's really not fun.
I'm sorry. It really is emotional.

Speaker 1 I wouldn't screw this whole thing up over a grand. I promise you I wouldn't.
You're going to lose that the first time you meet with an attorney.

Speaker 1 They charge you $1,000 for driving past their office.

Speaker 1 Just like it's a drive-by fee. You know, I mean, it's like...

Speaker 4 Well, I think you made a very good point that she fails to see. Obviously, there's some tension there, and she feels like, well, he has somebody else lined up.
I found him. She mentioned that.

Speaker 4 So she feels like she's doing some good, but we cannot forget the fact that this guy is going to let her out of $35,000 contracted commitment.

Speaker 1 You can't forget that. And I

Speaker 1 could be wrong, but maybe the new tenant needs the oven.

Speaker 4 I think think there's a reason. This guy is not a jerk.
I think he's like, you know what? I'll let you out of 35. I'm going to keep the oven.

Speaker 4 That's a pretty fair trade.

Speaker 1 You know, it's a tenant improvement, and you're walking away scot-free. And so

Speaker 1 if I were the landlord on the other side, even if I had another tenant lined up, I would think that's a fair deal.

Speaker 4 I think it's a very fair deal.

Speaker 1 So it's up to you, though. You can do what you want to do.
Let me ask you this, Dave. You could drag it out.

Speaker 1 If he's got the other tenant and he could lose the other tenant by you delaying him, that's a way to screw with it if you want to do it but do so at your own peril but i was going to ask you because you you've you've been a landlord you are a landlord if she hacks him off in some way or just starts negotiating he's like wait a second i'm letting you out of this deal and i don't want the stinking of it and he gets he could hold her to this contract and he could hold her to the 35 000 he could put her in some room but she says she says that he's got somebody wanting to pay double so

Speaker 1 you know that's the the leverage back and forth i don't know i mean to me that's almost irrelevant though it's what what the deal is to you. Yeah.

Speaker 1 The deal is you personally put your pen to paper and said, I will pay you $35,000. And he says, hey, you brought me another tenant.
I'll let you out. That's an act of mercy.

Speaker 1 It's not a legal requirement or a moral or an ethical requirement.

Speaker 1 And, you know, if he misunderstood and thought the tenant improvements became his,

Speaker 1 after the act of mercy, then that's something you can discuss with him, and I'm recommending you discuss it. But wouldn't push it too hard.
It's a thousand bucks for 35. It's a good trade.

Speaker 1 This is the Ramsey Show.

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Speaker 4 Today's question comes from Aiden in Virginia. I had a work accident that put me out of work for a few weeks.
When I returned to work on light duty, I was assigned to a different department.

Speaker 4 I enjoy it and have been asked to stay in this position, which will come with a hefty pay increase.

Speaker 4 The only downside is that if I choose to stay in this position, a work friend of mine will probably be fired.

Speaker 4 He's the person who encouraged me to grow in my relationship with God and to do the baby steps to tackle my finance issues.

Speaker 4 How do I save my friendship with my coworker if they fire him and give me his position? I'm scared that he will think I've been faking the friendship and just trying to take his job.

Speaker 4 I don't want to lose this opportunity at work, but also don't want to be the cause of my friend losing his job.

Speaker 4 Well, Aiden, I'm a little confused with the way the question is worded because they've put you in a position and they want you to stay in this position.

Speaker 4 And I don't see the connection to where that position was his position because he's still there. So if you know something we don't know and you've got a hunch here,

Speaker 4 if your hunch is right,

Speaker 4 this is a pretty sticky situation. It's a pretty tough situation.

Speaker 4 And I don't have a quick answer to that, although what I would do is they've asked you to stay in this position.

Speaker 4 So that implies they like you and you've got a little bit of leverage to say, hey, here's a question.

Speaker 4 If I take this, I've heard this or I'm feeling this, is this true? Because you've got some hunch or somebody's told you something.

Speaker 4 And I would go to the leader in a private meeting and I would ask the leader if this is in fact true. I would not assume anything.

Speaker 1 Exactly. I think you've added drama to this.

Speaker 4 Yeah, I don't know if it's true.

Speaker 1 The way you've worded this, it doesn't sound like it's a lock.

Speaker 1 So

Speaker 1 here's the thing. Business ethics are fairly easy.

Speaker 1 Treat other people

Speaker 1 like you want to be treated.

Speaker 1 Okay, so you switch shoes.

Speaker 1 How would you want your friend to treat you if it was you?

Speaker 1 I can tell you what I'd want them to do. I'd want them to come clean, tell the whole bunch.

Speaker 1 If I'm you, I'd walk in the boss's office and I'd say, boss, thank you for this position. I am so grateful.
I'm so excited. But I got to tell you, if it means that my friend gets fired,

Speaker 1 I can't do it to him.

Speaker 1 I'm not going to be the cause of my friend losing his job. As much as I want this, I would love to have this job, but I will not.
I cannot do that.

Speaker 1 It's wrong for me to cause my friend to get his head chopped off. No,

Speaker 1 that's the answer. I agree.

Speaker 1 And if you lose the job, you lose the job. But you can't, you got to sleep with Aiden.
You got to look in the mirror. You got to put your head on the pillow at night and go, whew, I feel pretty good.

Speaker 1 That sucked. I lost that position, but I did the right thing.
And I got to tell you, man, you can sleep when you do the right thing.

Speaker 1 Even if the right thing hurts, even if the right thing leaves a mark, you can sleep. And you don't get to your deathbed, you know, many years from now

Speaker 1 with this stuff swimming around in your head wishing you hadn't done this crap yeah i agree but let's get to the bottom and let's make sure this is in fact the case it doesn't feel like that the way it's been set up here so we'll see you just put all this stuff on the table it makes everybody that's trying to do stuff behind the curtain pay no attention to the man behind the curtain you rip the curtain open shine a spotlight on the whole thing and just say it all out loud yeah as deloney says turn all the lights on And by the way, that advice, when he says it that way, he's taking the high road.

Speaker 4 And in that situation, he can read the body language, read the tone, read the stumbling,

Speaker 4 the stammering, if in fact that happens. And now he has a really good idea and he doesn't hurt his brand within the building.
It's a win-win-win all the way around to handle it that way.

Speaker 1 Absolutely. And

Speaker 1 if they're willing to lie and go behind your friend's back

Speaker 1 and slit his throat. You're next, buddy.
That's true. What makes you think you're different? So this ain't the sweetest job in the world all of a sudden.

Speaker 1 It's a toxic environment and you want to get out of there anyway. So this, this, this, you know, the process of flipping on all the lights reveals everything here.
All right, boys and girls.

Speaker 1 It's like, Ken, one of my favorite things, not sarcasm,

Speaker 1 is someone comes in my office and says, you know, I need to tell you something about such and such, but

Speaker 1 you can't use my name. And I'm like, well, you can't tell me.
Right.

Speaker 1 Because you're what's known as a gutless wonder. Right.
You know? And no, you can't tell me.

Speaker 1 If you can't stand behind

Speaker 1 your

Speaker 1 problem,

Speaker 1 then you're just a gossip.

Speaker 1 And I'm not going to, I'm not, as a leader, I'm not going to act on anonymous sources.

Speaker 1 You can kiss my anonymous source. Not a chance for doing that.
No way. That's just gutless, man.

Speaker 4 Yeah, I agree.

Speaker 1 I agree. Crazy.
Zach is on the line. Zach is in Calgary.
Hey, Zach, what's up?

Speaker 1 Hey, can you hear me all right? Absolutely. How can we help?

Speaker 2 Perfect.

Speaker 2 Yeah, so I've been looking for an outside opinion on my situation here.

Speaker 2 And I know you guys are going to give me a straight answer. So

Speaker 1 you can count on that, brother.

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 2 So we are a little tight on mortgage, me and my wife.

Speaker 2 We knew that.

Speaker 1 What's that mean?

Speaker 2 Eating up. Well,

Speaker 2 it's probably

Speaker 2 north of 40% of our take-home.

Speaker 1 Yeah, that sucks. Monthly pay.

Speaker 2 Yes.

Speaker 2 Um

Speaker 2 so we're just trying to get some advice in what we should do.

Speaker 1 What is the probability that your income is going to increase dramatically quickly?

Speaker 2 Um, unless I take side jobs consistently and work

Speaker 2 12 hours plus a day,

Speaker 2 not likely.

Speaker 1 You want to do all that just to keep a house? I don't.

Speaker 2 No, not really.

Speaker 1 You need to sell the house. You bought a house you can't afford.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 If your income's not going to go up fairly quick,

Speaker 1 I mean, you know, in the next year, two years or something like that, to

Speaker 1 where the house payment ends up being 25, maybe 30% of your take-home rather than 40%,

Speaker 1 you know you're in an unsustainable mathematical situation. You don't have any wiggle room in your dadgum budget.
You are what we call house poor.

Speaker 1 The house owns you. You don't own the house.

Speaker 2 Oh, I feel it.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 2 Our other idea was there was a job offer about two weeks ago that's in a smaller town that pays less, but we could buy a house cash

Speaker 2 or have a very small mortgage or maybe 100K.

Speaker 4 What would keep you from doing that?

Speaker 2 It's a small, small town.

Speaker 1 You don't want to live there.

Speaker 4 Okay, that's fine. That's good.
It's a good answer.

Speaker 1 Nothing wrong with any of this. And so here's another option.
Get a better job

Speaker 1 and stay where you are.

Speaker 2 Well, that's the thing.

Speaker 2 I'm a plumber, and I got one of the better-paying jobs in Calgary.

Speaker 1 What's your wife do?

Speaker 2 She's a stay-at-home mom.

Speaker 1 Okay. She's homeschooling her kiddos.
Okay.

Speaker 1 All right. Yeah, you guys just,

Speaker 1 you got

Speaker 1 house fever, which causes the brain to stop working and causes us to purchase something we can't afford.

Speaker 1 And then the fever went away and the bill is still there and you woke up and realized you'd made a mistake. And so I'm sorry.

Speaker 1 You either have to get your income up or you have to get rid of this house. These are your two options.
There's nothing else that's going to work here, man.

Speaker 1 What you're sitting in, and you've discovered this, you knew it before you called us. It's unsustainable.
You cannot. win.

Speaker 1 Everything you do after you pay this house payment is hard because the house payment is just just eating your lunch.

Speaker 1 No pun intended. So, I mean, it's just hard.
I've done it too, Zach. I mean, I've done that kind of thing, and you go, oh, crap, I'm so, what did I do? You know, you get, oh man, it's hard.

Speaker 1 But the good news is, you can sell it. And, you know,

Speaker 1 it's not, it's not a tattoo. It's not going to be there forever.
So, you can get rid of it. That's a plan.
Get rid of it. Sell the house.
Sorry.

Speaker 1 That puts us out of the Ramsey Show in the books.

Speaker 1 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.

Speaker 1 Ken Coleman, number one best-selling author, Ramsey personality, host of the Ken Coleman Show, is my co-host today. We help people build wealth, do work that they love,

Speaker 1 and create actual amazing relationships. So you've got questions about your life, your career, your money, we're here to help.
Open phones 888-825-5225.

Speaker 1 Caleb is in Charlotte, North Carolina to start this hour off. Hi, Caleb, how are you?

Speaker 2 Good, Dave. Thank you for taking my call.

Speaker 1 My pleasure. How can we help?

Speaker 2 So I'm in the middle, or I guess I should say the beginning stages of starting a business.

Speaker 2 And I'm wondering if it is the best idea to take any any profit and put it straight back into the business so I can keep doing it debt-free

Speaker 2 or would it be better to take the profit and pay off personal debt which would be because right now we're in the kind of the middle stages of baby step two on our personal debt.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 2 I currently have a full-time job which is

Speaker 2 in addition to the business so the business is separate.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 1 And so you're you can get out of debt on your full-time job. Are you married? Yes.

Speaker 1 Does your wife work outside the home?

Speaker 2 No, my wife is a stay-at-home mom.

Speaker 1 We've got a... So what do you make in the day job?

Speaker 2 About $140,000.

Speaker 1 Good for you. Okay.
How much debt have you got?

Speaker 2 Right now we're probably around $18,000.

Speaker 1 Okay. Yeah, stop your whining and get out of debt.
Really? Seriously. $140 over 18? Knock it out, dude.
Well,

Speaker 2 that's a new, it was a big jump recently.

Speaker 1 Okay, good. I'm messing with you.

Speaker 1 The bottom line is your numbers are fabulous. You got a big old shovel and a small hole.

Speaker 1 So let's just knock out that 18, and that's the good news. Now you've got the side business, and you can afford to take all the side business and pour your money back in out of that.

Speaker 1 We're not borrowing money for business ever.

Speaker 1 You will ensure your failure if you do for multiple reasons.

Speaker 4 Especially in a small business situation. I mean, this is throwing off a lot of cash.
What is the expense that you're thinking about that you'd have to cash flow versus going to debt?

Speaker 2 Well, it's not, so it's going to be a baseball training facility.

Speaker 2 I'm will be leasing the building, so I won't be in debt for that.

Speaker 2 It'll just be equipment and how fast or how much equipment I want to start out with versus, you know, just kind of growing a little more organically.

Speaker 1 Yeah, organically.

Speaker 4 Stick with organic, man. It's just, you don't want to stress yourself out.
And this, I'm guessing, is the dream.

Speaker 4 Is this something you eventually want to step into full-time or you want to keep it on the side?

Speaker 2 Eventually, I would like it to be full-time.

Speaker 2 Baseball is kind of my background, has been for a long time, and the job I'm in right now, I love.

Speaker 2 But it may not be more than a 10-year thing, you know. So eventually I would like it to be able to support my family full-time.

Speaker 1 Sure. Well, good.

Speaker 4 Then organic is the way to go, or else that dream could become a nightmare. Dave's right.
You just don't need debt on this. And you're so close.

Speaker 1 Here's a couple things for you. Yeah, here's a couple things, Caleb, we teach in Andre leadership on this.

Speaker 1 When you grow a business with actual cash, you purchase different things at a different speed than you do when you use other people's money.

Speaker 1 You're more careful about what you buy, and you're more careful about what you pay for what you buy because it's like real money.

Speaker 1 You know, and there's a reality to that. The second thing that happens is it forces you to grow, to make make your purchases slower, and you're going to be learning about the business.

Speaker 1 You're going to get what we always laughingly call learnings,

Speaker 1 which are mistakes that leave scars, and

Speaker 1 you're going to learn stuff that would tell you not to purchase something that you might have if you'd gone ahead of the learning.

Speaker 1 And the cash holds you back and kind of keeps you, by dealing with only cash, it keeps you from going ahead of what you've got to learn yet. And so you don't make us, you know, you don't.

Speaker 1 and then the third thing is when we borrow,

Speaker 1 here's the deal. I've been doing this business for 30 plus years.
90% of my ideas suck.

Speaker 1 About,

Speaker 1 and this is a world-class

Speaker 1 nationally known brand.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 all the 10 million people that have gone through Financial Peace University, the 22 million people listening to this, all of that impact is because of about 10% of our ideas.

Speaker 1 The other 90% of our ideas, we survived them because they were stupid.

Speaker 1 And the problem is when you're going for your walk in the morning or you're run in the morning or you're sitting on the back porch with a cup of coffee,

Speaker 1 all your ideas are brilliant. And when you put them out there in the real world, you just determine that they're not.

Speaker 1 And when you borrow money into the wrong thing, you magnify the size of the mistake

Speaker 1 because you do stupid on steroids.

Speaker 1 and so when you use cash it causes you to go at the speed of your learning it you'll learn you'll make better purchases and more careful purchases and you don't magnify your mistakes because there's 100% of the time you're going to make mistakes it's brilliant and one thing to add to that Caleb cash increases your innovation Because if you're borrowing money, you go, oh, I'm going to buy this equipment, this equipment, because everybody else does it.

Speaker 4 And when you got to go cash, you go, how do I teach the baseball swing? Or how do I do this without a bunch of fancy equipment? It really does increase your innovation because

Speaker 4 when you don't have the cash, but you still want to grow it, you go, how can I do this the least expensive way? And the imagination takes over, and that's what leads to innovation.

Speaker 1 Chris Rochelle talks about this the other day. I was just going to mention him.
The limited resources

Speaker 1 when you realize your resources are limited. And everybody's resources are limited, but the borrowing takes away that effect temporarily.
But the limited resource forces the creativity.

Speaker 1 That's correct. And it forces you to get scrappy.
And you scratch a new claw. And scrappy always wins.
And

Speaker 1 some of the more shameful errors we have made at Ramsey were when we got a little bit fat.

Speaker 1 And we had a little bit of cash. We had a little bit of room.
And we just went, well, what is my thing?

Speaker 1 And then all of a sudden, you lose that scrappiness. You lose that creativity.

Speaker 1 You lose, you know, forcing to learn the techniques, blocking and tackling goes to the side, and we think we're too good for it.

Speaker 1 And,

Speaker 1 you know,

Speaker 1 and you're looking for an easy button, and there's just not a freaking easy button. That's right.
So you're really doing a good thing here, Caleb. You're really doing a good thing.

Speaker 1 Yeah, you've got a great situation with a great day job to pay off your debts and to continue building your finances, and 100% of the profits on that business can go back into that business,

Speaker 1 grow it organically, grow at the speed of cash. You know, we built this building

Speaker 1 three years ago, four years ago, whatever it was.

Speaker 1 The only thing the newspaper actually got right, because they never get anything right on me,

Speaker 1 they make up crap when they want to. But anyway,

Speaker 1 Ramsey is building the building at the speed of cash. Yeah.
And

Speaker 1 that was the headline. Oh, good.
And after you got past the headline, nothing in the article was accurate, but you know, like it never is, right? But that's where

Speaker 4 an accurate headline.

Speaker 1 But I mean, that's it. We are.
Because that's what I told the little guy. We're building the building at the speed of cash.
In other words, we run out of cash, we're going to stop building.

Speaker 1 There you go.

Speaker 1 This is the Ramsey Show.

Speaker 1 Thanks for joining us, America. We're glad you're here.
Ken Coleman, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today. Mark is with us.
Mark is in Atlanta, Georgia. Hey, Mark, how are you?

Speaker 2 Hey, good afternoon

Speaker 2 for me here. Great to talk to you and Ken.
I'm 56 years old. I have a 47-year-old wife, three boys.

Speaker 2 Just got laid off unexpectedly from a 250K per-year job, but I'd have it for at least a couple more years.

Speaker 2 He had net worth over $3 million.

Speaker 2 Of that, $1.5 million

Speaker 2 now in an IRA, half a million in funds and stocks and a $1 million paid-for house. No debt.
whatsoever. My question is, well, for one, does that seem like enough to retire on, if need be?

Speaker 2 But I'm also thinking about pursuing teaching.

Speaker 2 So I'm not going to be able to get any cash. I have

Speaker 2 $150,000 in cash, but I can't tap my IRA until I'm 59.5.

Speaker 1 But you've got a half million in investments non-IRA.

Speaker 1 I do. Okay.
And I couldn't do that, but

Speaker 2 I don't really want to use that, though. I mean, I had a financial advisor recommend

Speaker 2 tapping my mortgage temporarily because it'd be cheaper than

Speaker 2 tapping the IRA.

Speaker 1 You're a financial

Speaker 1 dumbbud.

Speaker 1 You're kidding me. He's telling you to go into debt and you have a $3 million net worth with a half a million dollar investment portfolio that's non-retirement? Just use your money, man.

Speaker 2 So just sell stocks, pay taxes.

Speaker 1 Yeah,

Speaker 1 yeah.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 4 Well, let's not forget, Mark, you told us briefly you wanted to teach. So you're not teaching for free.

Speaker 4 So based on your financial situation, how much money do you need to make to where you wouldn't even have to tap any of that money or very little?

Speaker 2 Yeah, I mean, that's what I'm wondering. I mean, I think we'll meet, you know, I got three boys, you know, soon to be college.

Speaker 2 Most of that's going to be handled already, but, you know, but you know, the teaching, it's going to take a little while to get certified, and that's probably a $56,000 a year job. That's correct.

Speaker 2 So that's more, you know, almost, you know, more like a little volunteer work.

Speaker 1 Why are you assuming?

Speaker 4 Would you have wanted to transition to teaching? It's interesting, You said I was hoping to do that for a couple of more years.

Speaker 4 Had you already begun to think I'm going to keep my quarter of a million dollar job for two or three more years, then go into teaching? Was that already the plan before the layoff?

Speaker 2 Yeah, absolutely. Just, you know, I want to give back.
I'm an Army veteran.

Speaker 1 What were you doing? My Army days.

Speaker 2 You mean my job? Yeah.

Speaker 2 It was institutional capital markets.

Speaker 4 Here's a question I have. I just wonder why you aren't looking to get back in the game, making about the same, maybe even more,

Speaker 4 and get back on track with the plan you already had. It just feels like you've accepted this idea that, well, I got laid off two or three years earlier than my ideal timeline.

Speaker 4 And so now all I can do is draw some retirement here. And I just wonder why not get back in the game?

Speaker 2 Yeah, it's either that or, you know, start getting into teaching, which will take a year or two to get certified.

Speaker 1 Right, so get back in the game.

Speaker 1 Teaching certification. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Go make a half million dollars while you're getting your teaching certification. $250 a year.

Speaker 2 And

Speaker 2 it'll take a half a year or so to get a job. And how do you know?

Speaker 1 If I can find one.

Speaker 2 Because I've been looking around a little bit.

Speaker 1 When did you get laid off?

Speaker 2 A month ago. Yeah.
Okay.

Speaker 4 When you say looking around, what does that mean? And I mean specifically,

Speaker 4 what are you doing actively?

Speaker 2 Talking to people that are in the industry. I mean, basically, what I did was a very unique capital markets job, and it's not easily replaceable.
All right.

Speaker 2 It's something that, you know, basically is some of it's going to be automated and some of it's, you know, just managed, managed away.

Speaker 4 Okay. So hold on a second.
So I can hear it all over you. You feel like I was so niche, I can't do anything else.
And that's not true.

Speaker 4 You have skills and experience that were related to a very specific job that are transferable in a similar industry. Yes or no?

Speaker 2 Uh, yes,

Speaker 4 then again, I

Speaker 4 mean, listen, let me acknowledge something, Mark.

Speaker 4 The data says that losing a job, being laid off, has the same psychological and emotional impact on us as losing a loved one. So, that was a month ago.

Speaker 4 And so, I want to make sure that it doesn't feel like I'm pushing you too hard here. I think this has rocked your world.
It's thrown your timeline off, and it's understandable.

Speaker 4 And so, you've got to process and heal from this. But I think part of the residue that's on you from this real loss is that you think that you are extremely limited.

Speaker 4 And if you hear nothing else from me and Dave, you're not limited.

Speaker 4 You're 56. You're not 96.
You got a lot of skills, a lot of experience. And dare I say you have a lot of connections too.
Yes or no?

Speaker 2 Absolutely.

Speaker 1 Mark.

Speaker 4 I want you to feel a hug through the phone here. You got to get back in there, man.
You got a lot to offer. And I think this plan you have, and by the way, thank you for serving our country.

Speaker 4 You're a great American. Yes.
You're a great American, and you've got a lot to give still.

Speaker 4 Dave, that's what I'm feeling.

Speaker 2 Okay, let's say that I'm called immediately to teach, and I hear what you're saying. That sounds good.

Speaker 1 You're not. You're escaping to it.

Speaker 1 That's you waving a white flag because you're hurting.

Speaker 1 Well, if you were called immediately to teach, you would have quit and gone and got your teaching certificate. You got laid off and then decided

Speaker 1 and then you're going to try to tell me you're called. I'm not buying it.

Speaker 2 Yeah, I hear you.

Speaker 4 Okay. But here's the deal, Mark.
Even if you don't want to go the route of get back on the path to a two to three year plan, what Dave and I are saying is go get gainfully employed.

Speaker 4 Make as much money as possible. Don't just fall back on that retirement reserve.

Speaker 1 Well, they just use the half million, but we're not borrowing on a HELOC. Absolutely.
Probably need a new financial advisor.

Speaker 1 Okay, so let me ask you this. I'm curious, okay?

Speaker 1 What is it that you're wanting to teach and why?

Speaker 2 Ultimately, I want to teach high school business and finance because I have so much to give and so much knowledge that's going to waste if I don't give it back.

Speaker 1 What would be wrong with doing that at the college level?

Speaker 2 I'm not interested. You know,

Speaker 2 it's definitely harder,

Speaker 2 you know, it would be more

Speaker 2 strenuous on me. I don't want to go into that type of environment.
I like kids that are still molded, you know, that are

Speaker 2 in their teens. You know, as an old Army sergeant, you know, I feel like

Speaker 2 I can be a

Speaker 2 stake in the ground as far as right and wrong to a lot of these kids.

Speaker 1 One of my favorite finance professors teaching real estate syndication in my senior year was teaching a graduate level class that I jumped over and took, even though I wasn't doing grad work, was a practitioner like you.

Speaker 1 He was not a PhD. He was not a certified professor.
He stepped over and taught three different high-end finance classes to college seniors when I was in college. And to this day, I remember that guy.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 he actually had a cookout for the class at his house. We went to his house.
I can drive to his house right now, and that was 43 years ago. I bet he doesn't live there anymore.

Speaker 1 But I mean, I think you might be that guy. And oh, by the way, that pays a lot more than $56,000 a year.
Yeah, that's exactly right.

Speaker 1 And honestly, the stuff that you know, high school seniors can't comprehend

Speaker 1 the stuff you've been doing.

Speaker 1 It's graduate level and senior finance level stuff. You can go do this if you want to.

Speaker 1 I'm just challenging the overarching thing that this is what giving back necessarily means. So if you want to teach basic financial literacy, hey, we'll give you financial piece.

Speaker 1 We'll give you the foundations and personal finance, high school curriculum that's been taught in 48% of the high schools, and you can go teach it for your high school once you get certified to be a math teacher.

Speaker 1 But it seems a little crazy to me that a guy that is as qualified as you has to go get certified to teach math to seniors in high school.

Speaker 1 Because you can do math in your sleep. Yeah.

Speaker 4 What we want you to hear, Mark, is you got options, and you felt like a guy, you present like a guy who doesn't have many options, and one option you don't have is a HELOC.

Speaker 4 That is absolutely unnecessary. And heal from this, get your head up, shoulders back, and look at some options to get back on that two to three year plan.

Speaker 4 I think things are going to develop as you begin to look for them.

Speaker 1 This is the Ramsey Show.

Speaker 1 Ken Coleman, Ramsey Personality, is my co-host today in the lobby of Ramsey Solutions on the debt-free stage. Ty and Lottie are with us.
Hey, guys, how are you? Great. How are you? Good.

Speaker 1 How are you doing? Better than we deserve. Welcome.
Good to have you guys. Where do you live?

Speaker 3 Emerillo, Texas.

Speaker 1 All right. Bit of a haul over to Nashville.
Just a little bit. Yeah, good to have you guys.
How much debt have you paid off?

Speaker 3 $582,000.

Speaker 1 Goodness.

Speaker 1 How long did this take?

Speaker 3 We started in 2013 and then just finished up here, I think it was in July or August.

Speaker 1 So 10 years. 10 years.
10 years. Yeah.
Wow. And your range of income during that decade?

Speaker 3 It was anywhere from $65,000 to $114,000.

Speaker 3 We sold some houses and I sold a business in the midst of that too, so it kind of had some variation there, too. Gotcha, okay.
But that was my W-2 income.

Speaker 1 Gotcha. What do you guys do for a living now?

Speaker 3 I actually work for the Department of Energy, but before this, I've always traded commodities or traded some type of feed. So but I just didn't like that.

Speaker 3 And actually I read Kim Coleman's book and decided to take a change in life. Really?

Speaker 1 How's that working out? Love it. Good.

Speaker 3 It's a great.

Speaker 3 We're on the 13th day of our road trip to get here just to have a vacation and Dollywood and everything.

Speaker 1 Oh, come see you guys.

Speaker 3 Got to come see y'all guys.

Speaker 1 Wow, there you go.

Speaker 3 Five-year planned of a trip right here.

Speaker 1 There we go. Lottie, what do you do?

Speaker 5 I'm a stay-at-home mom.

Speaker 5 We have four kids going on five.

Speaker 1 Oh,

Speaker 1 congratulations, well done.

Speaker 1 All right. What kind of debt was the $582,000? Oh, we had it all.

Speaker 3 Some of it was just I farmed and run cattle, so I had a lot of farm debt.

Speaker 3 I had a house, a $50,000 Duramax, man, zero interest.

Speaker 4 They'll do it every day of the week for you.

Speaker 1 Wow.

Speaker 3 I had a Nissan car,

Speaker 3 and then we had our house. It was about $235,000 Tiffany's rings for this young lady.
That was, you know, they financed that too. Don't worry.
Yeah.

Speaker 3 I had about $20,000 worth of student loan that she paid for because she saved money before we got married. So she came into a mess before

Speaker 3 she decided to take me on. And then, yeah, I had some farm debts and stuff like that.

Speaker 3 And then some, I also took even a $5,000 trading class to learn how to trade commodities or trade futures or online. Come to find out you can't trade unless you have money.
So, yeah.

Speaker 1 It's kind of a show. It's kind of table stakes.
Yeah, yeah, it's a lot of people.

Speaker 3 Yeah, she tried to tell me.

Speaker 3 I'm going to claim that one's one of my stupid tax right now.

Speaker 1 now. I don't have any money because I just spent it all on the class.
That tells me I need to have money.

Speaker 3 Yeah, I was kind of sitting there about halfway through it thinking, man,

Speaker 3 this is dumb.

Speaker 1 I think there's something on my shoe.

Speaker 1 I think I stepped in it. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Wow. Good for you, man.
That's so cool. Yeah.
So you went from playa to cleaning up the mess because everything you said there was like, I do everything, man.

Speaker 3 Oh, yeah. It was like, boom.

Speaker 1 And now you're just like, boom, straight and narrow.

Speaker 3 Yeah, it really what drove me onto this deal is like for when I first came out of college, I I bought cattle for a major packing company.

Speaker 3 I spent a lot of time in Western Kansas, and there was only AM radio over there. There was Dave Ramsey, I was focused on the family, and Rush Limbaugh.

Speaker 3 That was my theology in life.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 3 every day I just spend time riding around looking at cattle and listening to you. And I basically, that started in 2006 and never stopped.

Speaker 1 Wow. Well, thank you.
We appreciate you being out there. Yeah.
Good stuff. Okay, so who decides 10 years ago we're actually going to do this stuff?

Speaker 5 Well, we started off trying to kind of cheat it a little bit because some people say I'm cheap. I like to say frugal.
But

Speaker 5 when I saw the price of the envelopes, I was like, we don't need the envelopes. We'll just kind of do it, you know?

Speaker 5 And so after about a year of that, and we were still fighting about money,

Speaker 5 we decided we need to take this seriously.

Speaker 5 You know, if it's not broke, don't fix it. So we went ahead and kind of got the, we lived out in the country, so we just got the at-home study program and watched through that together.

Speaker 1 Metropolitan University at home, yeah.

Speaker 5 Bought the envelopes, started doing the cash system, set up our budget. We had to do that budget meeting every month, sitting down together and kind of getting that going.

Speaker 5 So that was kind of the hard part at first, but then once we got the ball rolling,

Speaker 5 we found other things to fight about, but we didn't fight about money anymore. And so

Speaker 5 it just, it kind of made everything organized. We knew what to expect of each other and where we were at, and it just kind of went from there.
And like you say, it's just that boring consistency.

Speaker 5 You just do the same thing over and over, and then you see it make progress, and it gets really exciting.

Speaker 1 Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 3 There you go. And for her, it just was a security thing.
Like, I mean, that was one thing that I noticed that really

Speaker 3 she just, that was the rough part for her. Even for me, I mean,

Speaker 3 growing up as a kid, I mean, my parents, they're good people, but we just, we had some financial problems growing up. We had bankruptcy, and man, that just, that, I don't want that for my kids.
Yeah.

Speaker 3 And I want them to know that what we've done as a sacrifice,

Speaker 3 as a couple.

Speaker 1 Yeah. Now you're free.
Yeah. Yeah, you're free.

Speaker 3 When you talk about the grass feeling different, there's some truth to that.

Speaker 1 Yeah, there is a lot of truth to that.

Speaker 3 And that's one of the, I mean, I don't know if we, we actually, before we got our debt paid off, we passed the millionaire mark. And it was just like, I don't know.

Speaker 4 I still don't believe it.

Speaker 3 I kept looking at the spreadsheet because I was a spreadsheet before you had the Every Dollar app and kept looking. I'm like, that can't be possible.

Speaker 3 But it's just a lot of dedication and a lot of time. And that was probably the hardest part for me.

Speaker 1 A decade in, you're 100% debt free and babysash millionaires.

Speaker 3 Yeah, and we just,

Speaker 3 that was the consistency. Like, there'd be some times where you're just like, man, when does this end? But there was, if you saw it on the paperwork, you knew it eventually was coming to an end.

Speaker 4 I want you to talk about that. Stay right there because there's a lot of people that are in the middle of their journey and we know they're watching and listening.

Speaker 4 And they feel, they're feeling it today. They're going, I don't want to fucking finish.

Speaker 4 What did you do? Or what would you tell them?

Speaker 1 Okay, how'd you keep going? What'd you tell them?

Speaker 1 Well,

Speaker 3 you know, honestly, that one, that was,

Speaker 3 I'll bring our faith into that one. I mean, God was good to us.
Even I'll admit when we were, we made the least amount of money, we made the most because we were the best with it at that time.

Speaker 3 You know, more money, more problems type scenario.

Speaker 3 And that's probably where we were, as a group, you know, as me and her and even the Lord in our life, that's where we really, we had to bunker down and just be tough and not go, oh, you know what, forget about it.

Speaker 3 We're just going to go on vacation.

Speaker 4 We just didn't do that kind of stuff.

Speaker 3 You know, you just have to stay strong and it didn't wig out.

Speaker 1 Yeah, it didn't wig out.

Speaker 5 I think we both got to the point where you realize you make a mess of your life, you know, and that really God's the only one that can fix it.

Speaker 5 So it's great to have a program and it has great principles in it, but if you don't have God at the center where you can take your mess to him,

Speaker 5 then the principles only get you so far. And so God really was central to our story and got us through a lot of the hard things that we went through.

Speaker 1 Amen.

Speaker 1 Amen. Well, and

Speaker 1 when you're a person of faith and you're leaning into that and you realize the system I'm using has the principles from his word in the system, then that tells you also I'm going to be okay. Yeah.

Speaker 1 You know, I got reassurance from that when Sharon and I were walking that out. You know, it's like, okay,

Speaker 1 I get it that some of you people don't understand, but I don't care. This is what dad says to do, and dad's really smart.

Speaker 1 My heavenly father.

Speaker 5 And sometimes even what he says doesn't make sense.

Speaker 1 And you don't understand it i just have to assume he's smarter than me exactly i'm gonna go with it because i i'm not doing so good on my own so yeah he's smarter than me i know that i'm sure of that yeah i've never made a world so i'm pretty sure he's smarter than me

Speaker 3 that that whole that whole you know the the the uh debtor slave to the lender and that is i mean i i took my first loan out was with the usda when I was nine years old on some cattle.

Speaker 3 And so I wrote my life away at nine years old and I knew nothing else until me and her got married.

Speaker 1 Yeah. And now the other day, your baby steps millionaire is not a debt in the world.

Speaker 3 Yeah. Amen on that one.

Speaker 5 I will tell you what not to do because you talk about some people are the nerd and some are the fun spenders.

Speaker 5 Well, he's definitely more than nerd. And so he's a spreadsheet guy, like you said.

Speaker 5 But he would make his spreadsheet and he would bring it to bed and be all excited.

Speaker 4 Like, look at this.

Speaker 1 Oh, boy.

Speaker 5 We got to have some boundaries here.

Speaker 1 You're a real romantic, aren't you?

Speaker 5 Don't bring the spreadsheet to bed and show me. We'll talk about that over coffee in the morning.

Speaker 1 I'm thinking I don't want to see the spreadsheet now. Could be wrong.
Oh, my gosh. Wow.

Speaker 5 Yeah, that's nerdy for you. So he's definitely the nerd.

Speaker 1 I love you guys. You're fun.
Well done. Hey, we've got a copy of the Baby Steps Millionaires book because that's you.
Total Money Makeover book because that's you.

Speaker 1 And Financial Peace University, because that's you. You can give those away.
You can read them, whatever you want to do. They're our gift to you.
Bring the kiddos up and let's have a debt-free screen.

Speaker 1 What are their names and ages?

Speaker 3 We have Adeline, which is our oldest, and she's 10. We have August, that's 7.

Speaker 3 And then we have Piper, she's 5, and then we have Dax,

Speaker 3 and he's fixing to be 2 in November.

Speaker 1 And then number 5 will be porn in March. Love it.

Speaker 1 582,000 paid in 10 years, making 65 to 114. Count it down.
Let's hear a debt-free scream. You guys ready? Three, two, two, one.

Speaker 1 We're dead.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 That's how they do it now, Morella, boys and girls. Woo!

Speaker 1 I love it.

Speaker 1 Ken Coleman is my co-host. Jimmy is in San Antonio.
Hi, Jimmy. How are you?

Speaker 2 Hey there, Dave. How are you?

Speaker 1 Better than I deserve. What's up?

Speaker 2 Yeah, I sent it a question.

Speaker 2 Your dude's got a contact with me, and now I got to ask it to you in person.

Speaker 2 So

Speaker 2 in today's world of like five-round interviews, automatic rejection systems, and like thousands of people applying for the same jobs, how do you think that a 20-something-year-old dude might try and stand out in today's job market?

Speaker 4 Personal connection. To the extent that you can find it.
And I say this, this is general advice, and I understand that at times it can be more difficult than others.

Speaker 4 But if you can find a personal connection, and it may be one to one, it's more likely one to two, meaning two or three people between you and a person in that building.

Speaker 4 So if you're applying for company ABC,

Speaker 4 and the first thing you want to do is just figure out through all of your connections, your close social ties, that's your friends and family, people you're doing life with, and then all of your relationships from acquaintances to former friends at college, Facebook, the socials, all of that.

Speaker 4 You start to see if you can find somebody that knows somebody in the building at ABC.

Speaker 4 And what we're trying to do there is, through the credibility of relationships, will that person at company ABC take your resume?

Speaker 4 And even though you got to go through all the other stuff, the AI and all the filters, will they take your resume in

Speaker 4 and talk to the hiring manager and go, hey, listen, here's how I know Jimmy. And this is what I know about Jimmy.
And, you know, I think Jimmy's probably a really good candidate to look at.

Speaker 4 We really want to be that simple. We want to be that analog in a very digital world.
That's going to make you stand out. There's some credibility.
Now, there's no guarantee for that.

Speaker 4 Now, second piece of advice I would give is if you get into the interview process, the way to stand out in today's world, and I think has always been the way to stand out, is the questions you ask in the interview.

Speaker 4 Most people don't treat an interview, Jimmy, like the interview is just as much for them as it is for the company. that's looking at you.

Speaker 1 This is a

Speaker 1 what are some good questions he could ask? Great.

Speaker 4 So first question I would ask is,

Speaker 4 tell me the kind of person that wins in this role.

Speaker 1 This is to the hiring manager.

Speaker 4 Describe the person that you think is going to win in this role.

Speaker 4 Another question is, describe your leadership and management style.

Speaker 4 What would someone need to know to thrive and connect well with you? These are two very interesting questions that require that hiring manager actually think.

Speaker 4 And in this process, if they've actually thought about that and they have an answer, they're going to give you an answer. You get to assess if you think you're a good fit there.

Speaker 4 The second thing it will do is whether they got a great answer for it or not, you're going to stand out because you put them on their heels in a good way.

Speaker 4 In other words, you didn't ask a twerp question. You asked an insightful question that implies that you want to fill that role.
And that's the way you ask it.

Speaker 4 Those are two samples, but I've got a how to win the interview resource at kencoman.com that's free that goes into great detail, so I don't have to list all those out.

Speaker 4 But that's how you stand out in today's interview process.

Speaker 1 Well, and it kind of

Speaker 1 I think it's always just a good idea to put the employer's shoes on. Yes.
So

Speaker 1 I mean,

Speaker 1 as an employer, I don't personally do interviews at Ramsey anymore, ever. I'm not good at it for one thing.
But

Speaker 1 what I'm looking for is if they're asking questions that tell me they're a taker,

Speaker 1 How much does pay? Yeah, that's exactly how much time off I get. Right.

Speaker 1 You're just trying to to figure out how little amount of work you can do for how much money, right?

Speaker 1 Instead, I like questions of

Speaker 1 they're not a taker,

Speaker 1 they're not subtraction, they're addition. That's right.

Speaker 1 They're not division, they're multiplication. And so, you know, how can I add value? How can I, the question you asked, I like that one.
It's like, what kind of person wins here? Yeah. You know,

Speaker 1 if I came in here

Speaker 1 and I, you know, what's the advice you would say to move ahead at Ramsey? Yeah, that's a great thing. And how can I add value?

Speaker 1 How can I make you more than I cost you?

Speaker 1 Because that's really what's running through an employer's head is can I ROI this payroll item?

Speaker 1 That's what they're asking. It's like, if I hire a technician, I'm in the heat and air business.
He's got to do more heat and air work than I pay him to make a profit on having hired him.

Speaker 1 Otherwise, I don't get to keep him because I can't afford him.

Speaker 4 Here's another question. Describe how this team that you lead, describe how they work together.
What's that, how would you describe if you're going to pick a one word to describe this current team?

Speaker 4 Again, an insightful question that yields an answer for you and it actually gives you some sense of what it's actually like there.

Speaker 1 And what kind of team member, what would I need to be

Speaker 1 to be a great team member? That's right. To add value to this team.

Speaker 1 What kind of synergy can I add or lift can I add?

Speaker 4 By the way, if you get a nothing answer or a crap answer, so if it sounds like a politician on a Sunday morning show, that's the nothing answer. A lot of words, no substance.

Speaker 4 Or you get a really kind of crappy answer, that's a warning sign that maybe I don't want to be a part of this team.

Speaker 4 If I can't sit with a leader and a leader tell me, this is the kind of person who wins here. You do this, you win.
We reward this here. And they, by the way, will show you.

Speaker 4 Now, Ramsey example, you ask that question at Ramsey and a leader is going to show you somebody in our company.

Speaker 4 They'll point this way, this way, and this way and say, now they started out in this position, now they're here.

Speaker 1 I always think of that old story of the guy walking along the dirt path, and he comes along a guy, and the guy says, What were the people like in that town you just left over there?

Speaker 1 And he said, Well, what were they like in the last town? Yeah, he goes, They were wonderful. He goes, You'll find them to be wonderful.

Speaker 1 He runs another guy and he says, What are the people like over there? And he goes, What'd you find in the last town? He goes, Oh, they're horrible, they were just awful.

Speaker 1 He goes, Well, you're gonna find that over there, too. That's so.

Speaker 1 And so, so if somebody sits down, all they tell me is all the horrible things about all the places they've worked, and the only common denominator is them. There you go, I'm done.
That's right, done.

Speaker 1 So, you come in and victim mentality, your interview, you screwed up your interview.

Speaker 1 So

Speaker 1 because it's possible that you are actually a victim of a toxic thing, but not repeatedly,

Speaker 1 that's highly unlikely unless you are like attracting this. Well, that's a very good point.

Speaker 4 You don't know how to sniff it out. You keep allowing yourself to go to these things.

Speaker 1 Well, I mean, yeah.

Speaker 1 Or you're just a drama coin.

Speaker 4 You're part of the toxicity.

Speaker 1 Yeah, you're the

Speaker 1 core of the issue. There we go.
Hey, guys, for all of you that are listening to the show right this second on YouTube or on a podcast,

Speaker 1 at the top of the hour here, the show is going to end.

Speaker 1 And the other 40 minutes of the show is available for free on the new Ramsey Network app. As a matter of fact, all three segments.

Speaker 1 of the all the entire show is available the first part and the last part on the ramsey network app uh video and audio.

Speaker 1 And so you can watch the show, listen to the show, however you want to do, download the show.

Speaker 1 You can search the show on the Ramsey Network app by subject and find calls that we have taken on each subject. You can send emails that we will answer

Speaker 1 on the air from the Ramsey Network app. It is 100% free.

Speaker 1 We are not going, we do not have plans to take it to a subscription. We simply need to offload part of the programming.
And we're built out like our audio book stuff is over there.

Speaker 1 Everything else is, we're starting to build a whole network app, literally over there.

Speaker 1 And the last 40 minutes of the podcast, the last 40 minutes of the YouTube show is now available only on the Ramsey Network app.

Speaker 1 So jump on the App Store, get the Ramsey Network app, download it, open you an account. It's completely free.

Speaker 1 You can watch the whole show there or you can just jump over there and pick up the last 30 or last 40, whatever you want to do. Google Play as well.
It works on all of that.

Speaker 1 If you're listening on radio, nothing changes. Everything's exactly where it's always been.
We're not moving a dime on radio.

Speaker 1 So if you're in a city where they carry, radio runs by the hour, if you're in a city where they carry all three hours, you're still going to get all three hours. We're not changing a thing on that.

Speaker 1 But this is podcast and YouTube. The last 40 minutes is free and available only on the Ramsey Network app in the App Store or in Google Play.
And jump over there and get that done. And

Speaker 1 you can click in the show notes if you want to get the free app too. That'll be another way you can get it and get it done.

Speaker 1 I can promise you this: the value

Speaker 1 is going to be worth the cost.

Speaker 1 It's free. It's free, okay? This is not hard.
Quit your cry. Don't be crying about it.
It's free.

Speaker 1 Yeah. Ramsey Network, check it out.
This is the Ramsey Show.