Alec
Appearances
The Ramsey Show
The Baby Steps Break You out of the Paycheck-to-Paycheck Cycle
Hey there. How you doing?
The Ramsey Show
The Baby Steps Break You out of the Paycheck-to-Paycheck Cycle
Good. I'm doing good. Me and my wife are here. We're just calling because we have... We're, we're only, my wife's 23, I'm 24. We moved down to just, we're just North of West Palm beach. We moved here six months ago and we're currently renting. I rent about 2,500 bucks a month for just a standard, you know, three bed, two bath. We have a, we have a two year, two and a half year old daughter.
The Ramsey Show
The Baby Steps Break You out of the Paycheck-to-Paycheck Cycle
And, um, what our question is, is, you know, we, we really want to buy a house and. the housing market's so crazy down here in Florida, you know, so it's hard to, hard to afford a house, just even a basic house like what we have right now or, uh, on a, on my income where, cause I'm, I'm just a carpenter. I make about, you know, 40 to 60,000 a year right now, depending on how it goes.
The Ramsey Show
The Baby Steps Break You out of the Paycheck-to-Paycheck Cycle
And, you know, I'm basically, and my wife's a stay at home mom, but right now she's going to school. So then she can, in about nine months she'll be working too. But, um, Basically, it's like I'm just basically just getting by, you know, making ends meet, paying the bills, and then, you know, just whatever we have left over is what we have and a few hundred bucks, you know, at the end of the day.
The Ramsey Show
The Baby Steps Break You out of the Paycheck-to-Paycheck Cycle
But on the other side of things, my wife, she was in a pretty serious court trial thing for about eight years, and she finally won it, and she got about a half a million dollars from it. And we have it invested. We have it invested right now with a financial advisor because we didn't want to squander it. You know, it's a good steward.
The Ramsey Show
The Baby Steps Break You out of the Paycheck-to-Paycheck Cycle
We want to be good stewards of our money that the Lord blessed us with and just trying to do things the right way, you know, and. But right now, we found a house that's $50,000 under any comp. It's a 3-2, 1,500 square feet, you know, a nice, beautiful curb appeal. And, you know, it needs a little bit of updating on the inside.
The Ramsey Show
The Baby Steps Break You out of the Paycheck-to-Paycheck Cycle
It was a one-owner house, and the people passed away, you know, grandma and grandpa type of thing. Okay. How much does it cost? Me and my wife are looking. What did you say?
The Ramsey Show
The Baby Steps Break You out of the Paycheck-to-Paycheck Cycle
Yeah. And we have, we have five 16 right now in, in the account, we have 80,000 liquid and uh, we, we can, you know, we can pull out the three 15 by the time closing. And so we have, we have the house under contract right now. However, I keep hearing from like my dad, My dad keeps telling us to pay cash for the house, like pay cash, pay it off, don't take out a loan.
The Ramsey Show
The Baby Steps Break You out of the Paycheck-to-Paycheck Cycle
But then like our financial advisor who's doing the investing for us and a few other people are like, well, why don't you just take out a loan and you don't got any liability.
The Ramsey Show
The Baby Steps Break You out of the Paycheck-to-Paycheck Cycle
Yeah, we're going to be the first ones in our family since our grandparents have a home that we own. And that makes me want to hug your dad. The only reason why they own it is because they paid the 30 years of mortgage and they just lived through it. That's the only reason why they own their house.
The Ramsey Show
The Baby Steps Break You out of the Paycheck-to-Paycheck Cycle
Yeah, because, well, he's saying, like, oh, you know, he's like, oh, you'll make about, you know, 15% to 20% on your $500,000. But we're looking at it like... First of all, what's he advising in cocaine?
The Ramsey Show
The Baby Steps Break You out of the Paycheck-to-Paycheck Cycle
All right, thanks. I'm looking at it like... Go buy your house in cash. Yeah, that's what we want to do, and I'm glad you guys are all about it, too, because we're looking at it like if we pay cash for the house with all our total bills at the end of the day, if we pay cash and no insurance, we're not going to have to get insurance because we don't have a loan. I know, but you live in Florida.
The Ramsey Show
The Baby Steps Break You out of the Paycheck-to-Paycheck Cycle
You should get insurance.
The Ramsey Show
The Baby Steps Break You out of the Paycheck-to-Paycheck Cycle
Can I do some math for you, though? That's about $1,000 a month. And then the loan would be $2,000 a month. And then we're just looking at it just keeps adding on if you take out any kind of loan. But if we don't take out a loan, our bills would be about $800 a month. you know?
The Ramsey Show
The Baby Steps Break You out of the Paycheck-to-Paycheck Cycle
Exactly. That's how we're looking at it. I'm glad you guys are saying that because I was just, you know, you know, you try to play, pray and, you know, try to get as much information from God as you can, but sometimes you just got to kind of make the leap. Yeah.
The Ramsey Show
The Baby Steps Break You out of the Paycheck-to-Paycheck Cycle
I think this is our golden opportunity because we're still going to have about $200,000 left over. And if we put $5,000 into the property, it's done. It's just little things like take the carpet out, paint the walls.
The Ramsey Show
The Baby Steps Break You out of the Paycheck-to-Paycheck Cycle
Thanks, guys. You do good work? I try to follow his footsteps the best I can and help people out and stuff. You know, it's just tough living in Florida, man. Prices are so high, and we're looking at it like, why am I paying?