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Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Live from the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, broadcasting from the Pod's moving and storage studio, it's The Ramsey Show, where America hangs out to have a conversation about your life and your money. I'm Ramsey personality, George Campbell. Join this hour, my best-selling author, Christina Ellis. And we are taking your calls at 888-825-5225.
You jump in, we'll talk about your life, your money, whatever is on your mind, whatever ails you. Hopefully, we can help you take the right next step. Rachel joins us up first in Seattle, Washington. Rachel, welcome to the show.
Hi there. Hey.
Chapter 2: When should I pay off medical debt?
How are you guys today?
We are doing well. How can we help you?
I am trying to start this journey doing baby steps and stuff, and I have some dental work coming up, and I'm wondering if I should
pay for that before i do my thousand dollar um emergency fund well tell us a little bit more about your situation how much debt do you have right now um best that i know of right now it's about well for uh well no maybe fifty three thousand dollars and what is that made up of
Um, mostly, um, about 36,000 in student loans and then, um, uh, about, uh, 4,000 in medical debt and about, um, and then, uh, about three, two to 3000 in, in some Current consumer debt and then the rest of it's old debts that I owe to people and to things.
Okay. Speak directly to your phone, Rachel. We're having a slightly hard time hearing you.
Sorry. When I get embarrassed, I get quiet.
There's no reason to be embarrassed. You're doing so great, and we're going to guide you through this. So tell us your income.
I expect it to be about $33,000 this year.
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Chapter 3: What are the implications of Super Bowl sports betting during inflation?
Okay. And tell us a little bit more about the medical procedures on the horizon. You said it's some dental work? Yeah. How much is that going to cost?
About $10,000. I've had a lot of medical over the last three years. I didn't have medical insurance for gobs of years, and so... walked in with hip issues, ended up with cancer. And that was just kind of the start of the journey over the last three years. And so, um, but one of the things is I hadn't done a lot with dental.
And so they, I've had a number of teeth pulled, but there's some of it in order to not have more teeth pulled and they had to reconstruct some stuff on my jaw. And so I have to, so if I don't put in some implant, an implant in one place, then I'll,
end up with um having to have some other teeth pulled i've got a couple teeth that need work and even with insurance it'll be ten thousand ten thousand out of pocket rachel that sounds that sounds overwhelming sorry you've you've been going through it yeah and so how long have you been listening to the show uh well recently probably the last couple months at
A couple of decades, no decade and a half or a couple of decades ago. I mean, I did FPU. I did, I got myself all out of debt except the student loans and then, and
been a lot of life circumstances and got off track and so you've been through it you've been through it and i think with you here now you've had your i have i've had a moment right like this all yeah feels overwhelming okay because it's going to take some radical effort and changes to get out of this mess and to also pay for the medical but i think you're ready for it yeah how much money do you have in the bank rachel
$440 right now.
Okay, and how soon is this procedure happening?
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Chapter 4: Should I prioritize investing or paying off my house?
So the two teeth, if I don't want to lose them and have it increase more, each of those need to be done ASAP, and I just had one of them chip another piece off, so it needs to be done. And then the other thing, I've got one... Phase one is scheduled for the end of May, and then phase two is I have basically a year to do it.
I have to heal up for about three to six months, and then within that next year I need to do it.
So we don't need to come up with $10,000 up front is what I'm hearing. We can do this in pieces and stagger it.
Yes.
So how much do we need for the next one, the ones that are urgent? How much money?
They're $1,200 apiece.
Okay, so we need $2,400 saved within the next few months. Is there a payment plan they put you on? Have you explained your situation to them?
I have, and when it comes to dental, they won't work with me unless I want to go more into debt.
Have you gotten a second opinion from a different dentist?
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Chapter 5: How can I handle financial disagreements with my partner?
Yeah.
Well, Rachel, I'm wondering. There's a number of places that will say, well, we'll pull it and that'll be cheaper. But then it destabilizes the mouth. And then I have have, you know, it's like, yeah, the short term. But yeah.
So you've been through all this medical stuff. You've had all these challenges. How are you feeling physically now? Are you able to work out of the house? Are you able to work a full time job?
um i have to take off one to two days a week for medical okay um i am a tax preparer so most of my income is earned right now so other than doing the two dental things i am trying not to do more medical than i have to right now although i'm in physical therapy for a couple types of physical therapy and
You know, I can go down the road, but all of that to say that it is a lot, and yes, there's a lot going on. But to wait longer is problematic, too.
Yeah, I'm looking at your income, and it's pretty tight. And with this procedure coming up, I'm just trying to think through different ways you can raise some more money to be able to afford these procedures. Maybe there's something you can sell. If you're physically able to, maybe you can get another job, work a little bit extra.
But with $33,000, I know that things have got to feel really tight, especially with the debt payments.
Yeah, and one thing I should say is that my mom...
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Chapter 6: What should I do with leftover money in an ESA account?
Um, allows me to live with her. There's she's there's a bunch of. stuff without having to pay rent. Okay, that's good.
Yeah, we need to lower your expenses as low as possible, increase your income as much as possible, bust it preparing those taxes so that you can create this money to pay for the medical. So we're going to put the baby steps on hold right now. Our job is to stack up as much cash as possible and take care of your health. Then we'll get to the rest of the debt.
So take a pause, but go hard at creating this pile of cash to get you through this. I'm so sorry. It will get better, Rachel. We are here for you. Let us know if we can help in any other way. This is The Ramsey Show. Welcome back to The Ramsey Show. I'm George Campbell, joined by Christina Ellis this hour. It's a free call at 888-825-5225.
Well, Christina, as I was doom-scrolling on Instagram, as I tend to do, I saw this post from ESPN pop up, and here's the big headline. A record 50.4 million U.S. adults are expected to bet a combined $16 billion on this year's Super Bowl.
Chapter 7: How do I manage student loans compared to my mortgage?
Just take that in for a second. $16 billion, 50 million Americans. That is a large percentage of the entire population. Now, at first I went, okay, that's crazy. But then I went, wait, aren't these the same people complaining that inflation is too high and there's not enough money at the end of the month and they're living paycheck to paycheck? And so that was my post.
My reaction was, Americans, inflation is killing us. We're living paycheck to paycheck out here. Also Americans. Oh yeah, bro, I got 500 bucks on the Chiefs. Make it make sense. That's all I'm asking. This just boggles my mind that people are willing to spend their hard-earned money and just throw it away at a sports casino for fun. So here's the juxtaposition.
Yahoo Finance said that half of Americans say their personal financial situations are worse now than they were a year ago, which is more than any time since the Great Depression. And Fox Business said amid high inflation and rising interest rates, credit card balances have now increased to $931 billion in the final quarter of 2022. This is insane.
The number of new credit cards have opened have spiked $21.6 million in the third quarter. I mean, the levels of debt with the levels of sports betting tell me that bad things are happening out there.
Yeah, that's very concerning.
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Chapter 8: What are effective strategies for financial planning?
It makes me wonder, is it kind of like the lipstick for men? You know how like what they say whenever there's a recession, like women buy more lipstick? Is that a thing? Do men like sports bet more?
I guess that's what they do to, you know, quell all the anxiety is they just turn to sports and then they go, well, my friends are betting. It's now normal to bet on sports. There's a thousand apps. And yeah, okay, let's see if Mahomes gets the touchdown in the, you know, in the third quarter.
It just doesn't make sense. That's wild. I thought it was more of a niche. I thought it was like, you know, sports betting. There's probably two or three percent of people, but 50 million people?
Every year it's become legal in more and more states. I think it's like 33 states now allow sports betting. And here's the thing. They are seeing record profits. It's like the new crypto because it feels not as dumb as crypto because it's something that you enjoy that you know a lot about. But these bookies that are behind the scenes, they are going to win. The house always wins.
This is just like Vegas, except you get to do this from the comfort of your freaking couch.
And it's wild, too, because we've seen so many studies and stats on kids and teenagers getting into this where it's like young kids. I don't think they're really supposed to, but it's becoming a huge thing in high schools where we're worried about kids doing sports betting, which that just blows my mind.
And the bankroll you need to even make any amount of money in this is insane. You would need to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to see any meaningful return. But what happens is you throw 50 bucks, you lose it. You put another 50 bucks in, you might win it back again. And so there's an addiction happening, especially with these young people.
It's like the gateway drug to gambling addiction. And here's what's crazy. The number of expected Super Bowl bettors is up 61% from last year's survey. And our state of personal finance study found that in the last three months, 14% of people said they had placed a legal sports bet. It begs the question, how many placed illegal sports bets? We just don't know. No one's going to admit that.
But 36% said they lost money in 2022 sports betting. And that's equivalent to 5% of the population having lost money on this.
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