Francois (Caller from Los Angeles)
Appearances
The Ramsey Show
Cut Debt out of Your Life! (Literally)
Well, I live here. Dave will be very happy. I have zero car payments in the family. I've never paid for a car except cash. So everything we own is owned. If I can't put the cash down, I don't drive it home. Wonderful. It's a great way to live. Yeah, yeah. So I have a small, very small business compared to some of the guys that call in. I have a marine repair shop here in San Pedro, California.
The Ramsey Show
Cut Debt out of Your Life! (Literally)
I've been open for seven years. Pretty much started it from scratch. I'm 50 years old, so I have about 25 years experience. And the business grew very quickly for the first three, four years. You know, we're born again Christians, so we don't rip people off and mess around with their money.
The Ramsey Show
Cut Debt out of Your Life! (Literally)
And, um, I've been renting for the last few years, uh, two years ago, we moved into a big property, uh, because my landlady sold and it's literally the only property we could find. And it, it has been very hard on us because the rent tripled, uh, the gross at the time was around one 50 and that was just me on my own. Um, and we have a serious amount of demand there.
The Ramsey Show
Cut Debt out of Your Life! (Literally)
I went through eight people last year at my shop. He came in and tried to fit in, and from drinking problems to just incredibly bad at trying to do the job or just late or not on time, it's impossible to find skilled, responsible labor.
The Ramsey Show
Cut Debt out of Your Life! (Literally)
I am in a position where we've been verging on bankruptcy the last two years because I've been trying to build the business up and train people who have just turned out to be pretty awful.
The Ramsey Show
Cut Debt out of Your Life! (Literally)
I'm stagnant. I think I am floating between around $130,000 to $150,000 a year, which is about as much as I can cope with mentally and physically doing this alone. So you're maxed out on your own at that level without good health? I am burnt out, maxed out. If I had one extra pair of hands, I could probably almost double that. Okay. And what's your rent now? My rent currently is about 5,600.
The Ramsey Show
Cut Debt out of Your Life! (Literally)
Yeah, it's high. I mean, I have literally, so initially when we moved in, the property was about three, four times the size of my previous. And I thought, okay, there's always a demand for storage. So we'll try storage. And that literally did not happen. I don't know why. Then I tried boat rentals. We invested in some boats to get into the boat rental thing. And it's just been very slow.
The Ramsey Show
Cut Debt out of Your Life! (Literally)
I'm currently sitting here with about $100,000, $120,000 worth of inventory that we've been trying to sell, but the economy has just been so poor. So we're asset poor. The rent's been killing me. It's been very hard to find qualified. I don't care about certification. I just need someone that can, A, pitch up on time and do the job. Just a warm body at this point would do.
The Ramsey Show
Cut Debt out of Your Life! (Literally)
Oh, I don't even want to know. I did my tax return for 2023, which was the worst. And I'm not going to lie, it was $11,000.
The Ramsey Show
Cut Debt out of Your Life! (Literally)
I've thought about it. I've contacted some brokers because we only have five-star reviews. Let me just put it this way. I'm one of two shops in this town. The other shop, the guy's a total crook.