Doc Discussions with Dr. Jason Edwards
THIS is the podcast you have been looking for! "Doc Discussions" are just what the title says they are: physicians from a wide range of specialties, talking about relevant, up-to-date medical topics, not to mention tips on habits to help you live your best life. Your host, Jason Edwards, MD, is a board-certified radiation oncologist with a PhD in cellular and integrative physiology at St. Luke's Hospital in St. Louis, Missouri. Dr. Edwards explores not only diseases but also suggests techniques to optimize mental and physical health for a long and good life. Real people. Real advice. Real good. This is Doc Discussions, with Dr. Jason Edwards!
Doc Discussions with Dr. Jason Edwards
Breaking Grandma's Rule: The Money Talk That Could Change Your Life
Jason Edwards welcomes back Jared Barton, CRNA, to discuss the Dave Ramsey baby steps program and how it transformed his financial life and mindset about money.
• Jared discovered Dave Ramsey while working in the steel industry making $38,000 annually in the late 1990s
• Tracking every expense gave Jared an immediate $500 monthly "raise" without changing his income
• The debt snowball method (paying smallest debts first) provides psychological wins that help maintain momentum
• Financial discipline doesn't necessarily reduce quality of life or happiness
• Research shows purchases provide only temporary happiness boosts before returning to baseline
• Current housing challenges can be overcome through starting with modest properties and building equity gradually
• DIY skills significantly reduce home maintenance costs and build pride in ownership
• The final baby step focuses on wealth building to enable generous giving to others
• Financial freedom isn't about deprivation but about intentionality and respecting your future self
Take control of your financial future today by tracking your expenses, building an emergency fund, and taking the first steps toward debt freedom.
Welcome to Doc Discussions. This is Jason Edwards and I'm here with my friend, jared Barton. Jared was with us on a previous episode. He's a CRNA or a nurse anesthetist, and after the episode we got to talking about the Dave Ramsey baby steps program and how that had a positive impact on them and I thought you know, one of grandma's golden rules is don't talk about money, politics or religion, and so I think if we have to break one of those rules, this is probably the best one to break. How are you?
Speaker 2:doing Jared. I'm great, I'm great. Thank you, jason, for having me back.
Speaker 1:You bet buddy and so tell me where you were in life when you kind of came across this program. Were you out of nursing school or where were you at?
Speaker 2:I had just changed jobs and had gotten in the steel industry this was many, many years ago, steelworking, steelworker. So I was in a steel processing center how about that? And somebody had mentioned Dave Ramsey and how it had just changed their life and I had never heard of the guy, didn't know anything about the man, yeah. And so I did a little research and he had. He was. He was pretty new as far as having the audio collection, that he had a book, but he also had it on an audio CD set and I got, I bought one and it was it wasn't CD set and I bought one and it was at Financial University. It was the one before that.
Speaker 2:I can't remember the Total Money Makeover is what it was. It was this first one that came out. It was technically a second one because before that they did the envelope system, if you're familiar with that. I've heard of it. Yeah, they got rid of that, thank God, because I never could have done that. I've heard of it. Yeah, they got rid of that, thank God, because that was I couldn't.
Speaker 1:I never could have done that.
Speaker 2:But what it was basically the way it started was is I did the audio because I did not want to read the book, because I was afraid I wouldn't. Yeah, Financial stuff is just not that exciting, right? Exactly so I got the audio series and was and listened to it, and I did, I just jumped right into it. I took and I've always been pretty handy with Excel, so I went on my computer and made myself an Excel spreadsheet of everything that I spent my money on, Because that was the big thing is you got to write down pen to paper and write down every expense.
Speaker 1:Now can I ask you and you can say no, roughly how much were you making working on a steel plant? I was making $38,000 a year, $38,000. And what year was that roughly Late?
Speaker 2:90s.
Speaker 1:So $38,000 in the late 90s is not a bad salary. It's not flush with cash, but it's definitely solidly middle class. I was fine.
Speaker 2:I was fine. I had a little house. I had my first house. I mean, I was young, so first home. I had a degree in college already and I wasn't a dock worker. I was a management Gotcha. I wasn't a. You know, I wasn't a dock worker, or I was. I was a management Gotcha. You know the, the, the, the people on the floor were making you know around, you know eight to $10 an hour at the time.
Speaker 1:And that's probably about what a school teacher made back then, roughly, that's correct, and so so you started off with this plan and and his system evolved into this baby steps plan. But the first step is to save a thousand dollars, correct? And so you do that, and then you start working through the other steps. It's payoff. All debt was number two. How did that go for you?
Speaker 2:Well, can I back up? I'll tell you one quick thing is, is I I wasn't completely 100%. Is I wasn't completely 100%? I'd say sold on the idea at first, but when I did actually do, because there for a couple months I just kind of did the, I guess, like everybody you know, it's like my power bill is about you know 100 and something-ish, and so I never did. But then when I actually put the pen to paper like he stresses, stresses like, if you would just listen to what he says.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and actually did that. I actually gave myself a huge raise in pay because I was blowing money. You know, stop by the gas station get a coke, get some chips, you know right, you know, yeah, stop get a hamburger on the way home, you know. And you don't realize how much that adds up. And, yeah, even on a modest salary, I believe when I did put the pen to paper, I gave myself about a five hundred dollar a month raise and pay. That's crazy, especially back then 38 grand and and and you're talking not doing without anything, just not not just wildly blowing money you know, and were you happier, was your life better or worse.
Speaker 2:No Right, it made no difference, absolutely not.
Speaker 2:If you look at the two metrics of length of life and quality of life, it makes no difference and you're saving 500 bucks a month Exactly, and then and then, after you get cause that's where you get, that's where you have to start because you gotta have good, you gotta have really good data going into this, because you know they say garbage in, garbage out, so and you can't, you got to do it. Now the one thing I will say is I did not do it like to the dollar. I got a bunch of my power bills per se let's say it was electric power bill. Then what I would do is I looked and over the course of so many months it was about $110.
Speaker 1:Okay, so you weren't. You weren't shooting from the hip, but you didn't have a sniper rifle either. You were just kind of somewhere in between.
Speaker 2:Exactly. And so for every single bill, every single instance where money was leaving my hands, I had it almost identical to the bill. But I wasn't doing it on a month to month basis, except for what I did was I did. A column of my bills was set on my sheet where I had what they run normally, and then another column I did, and they were all actual. So if I said my power bill is 110 and it came in at 108, then at the end you can self-tally it. You're a big nerd like me and know how to use Excel.
Speaker 1:Yeah, excel's great, by the way, so you can put a delta in there and it shows you the $2.
Speaker 2:I have all different lines, subtracting, adding, putting all this for me. And that way, when you get to the end, then you start seeing it. It'll tell you whether you're in deficit or in the positive, You're in the green or in the red, you know, and and based on that, you in the end of the month it can't be in the negative Gotcha. So you've, you've got to. Really, if you're, if you don't start out real smart, you're going to end up really dumb at the end of the month.
Speaker 1:Cause you're going to be broke Now I had lots of debt.
Speaker 2:I had college debt. I had random, stupid credit card debt. You had credit card debt. I had yeah, I put some of my college on my credit card, so I had thousands and thousands of dollars.
Speaker 1:And that's high interest?
Speaker 2:Oh, of course it's like loan sharks coming after me, you know.
Speaker 1:And you know. So I did a little bit of research on credit card debt. It's currently at like $1.3 trillion nationally. It's about 47% of people have credit card debt and on average it's about a seven grand bill. So credit card debt's a real issue in this world. And so how did you go about paying off the debt? Because a mathematician would say find the highest interest debt and pay that off first, which is called the debt avalanche, and then the debt snowball is different.
Speaker 1:It's find the debt that is the lowest dollar amount and pay that off first and you know, initially a smart person would say that's dumb, you should pay the highest interest rate off. But the people who understand how humans work realize that it's actually better to pay the lowest off first, because then you get some positive feedback and it makes you stick with the program right.
Speaker 2:So yeah, like you said, the very first step is get a thousand dollars for an emergency fund. That way, if something breaks, something cracks, something goes wrong, you can, you can pay for it. You don't have to stop, you can just continue on. You pay for it, you don't have to stop, you can just continue on, you pay for that, get whatever, because $1,000 will fix most any emergency. God forbid, you know something major. But if you're talking about, you know your X breaks, your fridge breaks, you know your car gets a flat tire, $1,000 is covered and then you fully fund that and you just keep on trucking with it. But yeah, then you start paying off of the debt. That's maybe step two, did you?
Speaker 1:do the debt snowball where you pick the lowest dollar amount.
Speaker 2:So you listened to them and you stuck with the program. I did because I wanted to start with the highest debt dollar amount. But it would have taken me years and I think I would have lost some. But it would have taken me years and I think I would have lost some.
Speaker 1:And so they've done research since this and proven that actually, picking the debt with just the lowest amount, the fastest one, you'll pay off, and you're making the minimal interest, the minimal payments on the other ones, correct, and you throw everything towards the lowest dollar amount, not the highest percentage that you're paying. As far as interest Right, and data has shown. As far as interest Right, and and data has shown that that works better Right and, so and and and, mathematically you're actually not that much worse off either if you did the other perfectly and it's just something it really does.
Speaker 2:It's so gratifying when you get to pay one off. Yeah, you know, you're, you're, you're in, you're still in debt, but you're in debt minus one, yeah, and you get this almost just this excitement of this works. I can do this, you know. And when you pay off that first debt and you start on the next debt, you have a little bit more money to throw at that second debt. So, even though that amount is larger now, you have more money to throw at that debt to to pay it off sooner.
Speaker 2:So you have some psychological momentum and some financial momentum, yeah, and so that's that's very helpful as well.
Speaker 1:And then I had some people I know who I went to high school with, who who did this and and it was it was just in a few years, but they paid off. It was something crazy and they had, I would say, two kind of normalist jobs, you know nothing, crazy, um, and I think they I think one of them, the guy, the husband, may have built a spec home or two in the summers, so he was doing some side gigs, but it was some. It was in the 200, like 200 and something thousand and I think they were both like uh, like solid jobs, like school teachers, but not crazy right and um, and a lot of people say and you know you're eating? He always says eat rice. And you know you're not spending much, you're not going out to eat. Your friends are criticizing you, saying you're weird. Did you experience any of that?
Speaker 2:no, I didn't. Okay, good, I um, uh, I I didn't. I've never been really that that big on. You know, by the time I'd started this too, I was a little bit. I wasn't, you know, in my teens or, uh, you know, in college anymore. So I was, I was older, when I old, but I wasn't still in that that, you know, go to the clubs, it clubs and blow body type phase, so not that big of a party or drinker, that type of deal, so that wasn't a big thing. I never really went out to lavish restaurants that type of deal, always driven cars that run.
Speaker 1:So it wasn't a giant deviation from your norm for a norm and I think people think, oh, going down this path and actually kind of getting some more discipline in my life financially is going to be horrible. I'm not going to go out to, but I think people actually would probably look back on it and say that was kind of a cool time in life.
Speaker 2:I think so too, because you're I mean I'm actually I'm off next week and I'm taking a staycation because I want to. Yeah, I mean I could go somewhere and do something if I wanted to, but I need to, I need there's things I need to do at the house, yeah, so you know, that's just part of getting older, you know, and if you just kind of get that mindset to where you know this year we're taking two really nice staycations, you know to really nice staycations. You know, and do something for yourself or something for your house, something that you know that you need to do or want to do, then it makes it fun as well and at the same time, you're just banking that money.
Speaker 1:Instead of blowing money on a big, big, expensive vacation, instead of blowing money that you can put towards your debt.
Speaker 2:So you know he always has all these sayings you know, live what is it? Live like nobody else today so you can live like nobody else tomorrow. Be frugal right now and then you don't have to be later. And being frugal doesn't mean being boring, it doesn't mean the rice and beans sounds awful, and I didn't do that for sure I wasn't eating rice and beans. I wasn't eating caviar and lobster either, but all with a reason.
Speaker 1:You know the it's, and people may find this hard to believe it's it's actually hard to spend money on things that actually make your life better in the long run. And so if you had and this is like research there's, there's research, you know, on this If you had like two twin brothers and one of them broke their leg one day and the other one won the lottery the other day and the day before, you know on this If you had like two twin brothers and one of them broke their leg one day and the other one won the lottery the other day and the day before you know, they'd both say they're seven out of 10 happy. Two years later, they will both be seven out of 10 happy again.
Speaker 1:You know, it's, it's and it's because, or or the lottery stories you've heard that or their life's way worse. But you tend to just kind of go in the short term, right, if expectations are exceeded in a short-term scenario, then you're happy for the moment until you kind of re-equilibrate. Like, if you get a new car, it's fun for three months or six months and then it's just your car again, but you spend a bunch of money and for five years you have that note. Yeah, you know a bunch of money, and for five years you have that note. Yeah, you know um, and and actually um, kind of.
Speaker 1:The one of the things that's kind of the opposite is that I've in my mind is going on vacation, um, which I'm not a huge fan of vacation personally um, because it feels like you're just in my mind blowing money and you don't have anything tangible. But I actually think going on vacation, you are at least left with like some memories, right, and in a way that may even be worth more than buying a thing, right, you know that um. So even though it seems intangible, it kind of lasts longer it does, and and again.
Speaker 2:You know you don't have to.
Speaker 1:You know, travel halfway around the world for sure go to nashville, you know, go to kansas city, I mean you can have, you don't have to travel halfway around the world. For sure, go to Nashville, go to Kansas City, I mean you're going to have a good time.
Speaker 2:I've been to over half of the states in the US and I'd love to see the rest of them. Yeah, and that does not take a lot of money.
Speaker 1:So my kids, I've never taken them to Disney World, I've taken them to Silver Dollar City. They're 10 out of 10, happy. They're not going to get to 11. You know this is not right. This is not Spinal Tap. You know that's a reference to an amplifier in the movie. But I mean you know 10 out of 10, you're maximal happy.
Speaker 1:I'm not throwing shade at people who take their kids to, you know, disney World, but I mean to me it's it's just a bunch of extra money and like they're going to be happy with what they got. But I think you know kind of knowing that and knowing that when you, you can, if you want, you can keep spending money trying to chase this high and keep momentarily being happy, but it puts you in a bad position. You know, financially, and when you, when you realize that, you know kind of Eastern philosophy, that you know if you want to be happy, think about happy thoughts. You know it's, it's in your brain, it's not.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, if you want to feel accomplished, you know, don't go buy a Rolex, just think about your accomplishments, right, and subvert it. But you just don't want to get into a position and sometimes you can't help it, but you don't want to get into a position where you're financially leveraged and you're kind of up against the wall Because there's no stress like financial stress. I mean, I've seen patients show up in the ER having panic attacks and you just don't want to live that way if you can avoid it and some people have bad breaks in life, no doubt about it. I mean I definitely acknowledge that. But you want to do everything you can to prepare yourself.
Speaker 2:So if you do have a bad break, you're at least secure in that capacity and I don't know about you, but when I see somebody, you know I'm talking about you. I don't know what you drive. I don't know what you drive, but when somebody passes me in the brand new super duper BMW XXX you know, whatever, there's zero envy for me. I look at that and the first thing I think is man, you're broke. You are more than likely you are broke. You're fixing to go to a house you can't afford.
Speaker 1:You're going to park your car in the garage of your house. You can't afford. It's a weird thing because you're, you're um, if you wanted to be, you can kind of cut out the middleman, right? If you wanted to think you're rich, you could. At least you can look at the money that you saved, or you can spend all that money.
Speaker 1:Not be rich and let somebody else tell you you're rich right but or you could just subvert the process and look at your account and be like you know, know what. I've been disciplined. I can see in my account. There's money there, whether it's your retirement account or whatever, and people can spend their money on whatever they want. I don't want to pass judgment, necessarily, but you don't want to get on this hedonic treadmill where you keep buying something else, something else, something else yeah, keeping up with the Joneses. You don't have to be like oh man Walmart, what was him?
Speaker 2:Remember? He was known for driving this truck. Oh, sam Walton. Yeah, he barely drove. Yeah, an old Chevy truck.
Speaker 1:But there's something you kind of love about that story. You know Sam Walton, he's worth $80 billion. Story. You know sam walton, he's worth 80 billion and overall he's got a truck, an old chippy truck, and there's something that's kind of great about that and it's like the guy had some inner peace. You know um and so um, and so you stuck with the program I did.
Speaker 2:I have been, I'm still on the program. Yeah, it's. It's just basically just changed my, my way of thoughts, my thinking process, how I act and react towards money. Yeah, because once you get debt-free, there's no feeling like it and in fact you never will. It doesn't matter whether you make minimum wage or six figures. You'll never really know your income if you have all this debt. Yeah, because you have what you make minus what the government takes and allows you to keep, and then after that it's what all you've spent on your stuff. Yeah, and minus that is what you've now got to live on until the next either two weeks or week or month or what have you. Yeah, and so you never really realize your income and you won't. You won't until you, until you get done paying for your things. Yeah, you know, and it's, it's.
Speaker 2:I always think. You know like, uh, you know your, your grandparents, you know like, was talking about. You know if you couldn't afford it, you don't buy it, you can't. You know there was no credit cards and if you went to the bank, it was, it was a handshake. You know those type of days are gone.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and, and I think sometimes people work hard. You know, and, and you think, and you see, every social media has made this worse. You know, you see your neighbor with this fancy thing or that and you feel like, well, I deserve that, and it's, and it's like you. Your bank account will tell you if you deserve it, but it's not going to make you happier. It will not in the long run. Momentarily you'll be happy, but then in the long run you're going to be worse off for it. And and it's, and it's, um, and I do think you know we were social animals. We compare ourselves to each other for sure, and so and and we're all nobody's perfect with that. I'm not, you're not. You know we all fall prey to that, but it is just good to know that there's. If you're looking for quality of life in the long run, think about your future self and and try to try to have the discipline and develop the habits of being happy without spending money, so you can have that financial security.
Speaker 1:I grew up and there's this guy I've known almost my whole life and he had a below average job as far as income. It was an honest living. He was a good person, but as far as income it was below the job. Okay, as far as income it was an honest living. He was a good person. But as far as income it was below the median. Um, but he didn't spend much. Um, he always had. If he bought a car it was used Um he'd work on it, um you don't have it for a long time. I could probably name every car this guy ever had, cause there's only a few.
Speaker 1:And he's in his 60s now and he's got a nice enough house, it's paid for, he's got two cars and he just lived a disciplined life.
Speaker 1:I mean, he just did not spend more than he had and he's doing fine for himself. And I guess what I'd tell young people is you know, it's super. I think for the young people out there now it's really tough for them. I mean the, the, the amount you know your rent payment is or your house payment is as a percentage of your income, is probably the worst it's been in 50 years due to the inflation, you know the last five years. But you, you can become financially independent, you can become wealthy, but there's no shortcut. It's boring and it's going to take a long time and it's hard to suffer what you think is suffering today by not kind of scratching that itch of buying the thing you got your eye on. But it won't make you happier and you are going to be 65 at some point and it's better to just try to have the discipline and develop good habits today and for your future self.
Speaker 2:I think the, the. I think it's changed a lot too from like when, you know, I was in my twenties. You know, early thirties, the, the, the peer pressure is quite different because wes, you know, early 30s, the peer pressure is quite different because we, like you know, I didn't come from the side of town that had money. So, you know, going to Europe was beyond.
Speaker 1:That was only for rich people. That's what you see on TV, yeah, so there was no, you know.
Speaker 2:Hey, you know, come over and look at my new $70,000 truck, or hey, we're just getting back from Ireland. There was none of that, so you didn't have to. It was a lot easier to keep up with the Joneses. You had a car that ran, that looked halfway dead seat, and you kept it clean and you took care of it and that was pretty much. You want to keep it in my car. I just washed it. It's clean. It looks real nice. That was how you kept up with the chances. Yeah, you know your house was nice. You kept it clean. It didn't stink. You know it was. You know you you.
Speaker 1:You kept pictures online. Yeah, you know. If people see you wearing the same outfit you know for three different events, then they act like something's wrong with you.
Speaker 2:And Facebook is like look at me, book, it's what it is, show and tell. Book it's it's, and there's positives and negatives, but I mean it's not.
Speaker 1:Yeah it's.
Speaker 2:It kind of cultivates some of this behavior. That's not good for you in the long run. You've got to be happy with yourself For sure, happy with yourself.
Speaker 1:That doesn't come easy.
Speaker 2:Right, you don't read a book and it happens. No, and just like about the whole Dave Ramsey plan, is that you didn't amount all this debt overnight. You're not going to pay it off overnight. It's like like a diet. You know it was fun putting the weight on. It's not fun taking it off.
Speaker 1:Paying the debt off it's not fun either and there's a lot of similarities, you know, with dieting too. Um, being kind of more like an engineer and like actually looking at the calories is the way to go, but not all of us, you know, turn into an artist where we're like, oh, I'm roughly about this and so yeah, for sure it's, but good things they take time and they take discipline and it's.
Speaker 1:I think it's hard to replace that feeling of having that financial freedom. I mean, nothing you could buy would ever make you that happy or free.
Speaker 2:And I tell you for me personally, like as I was going through the steps, it was even just more motivation, it was more fun, it became fun, it became exciting, yeah, that I'm fixing to hit another milestone.
Speaker 1:A couple of yeah for sure, like most people will describe it as like no, that was a good time in my life, you know, going through that. A couple statistics here to throw out Worldwide to be the top 1% of earners worldwide, in America or not in America. Worldwide, you got to make $65,000 to be the first percentile worldwide. And so, just to put things into perspective, to be in the top 20% which different people will use different numbers, but the top 20% of considered upper class or at least upper middle class as a household, you make $160,000. Okay, which is a lot of money, but but I think a lot of people who fall into this category you know if you're a what's 160, I'm guessing is like a firefighter and a teacher with some years of experience in a nice district, roughly A lot of times, I think, because of all the stuff you see out there, people making that often probably don't feel like they're upper class.
Speaker 1:Right, you know what I mean, and some of it too, is perspective. We live in this metro area. This is all you see. I'm not from a metro area, I don't think you are either, and so my view of the world is a little bit broader maybe. But I mean, I think with inflation and just the comparison is, people in this demographic don't feel like they're upper class. People in this demographic don't feel like they're upper class and I think. But when you compare yourself to your friends and neighbors, you don't know what's going on there?
Speaker 2:I mean their whole lifestyle may be leveraged.
Speaker 1:What are some parting thoughts you have about all this Jared?
Speaker 2:Well, one of the things also is is I look at housing? Housing is so expensive. You know I grew Jared Um well, one. One of the things also is is I look at housing? Housing is so expensive. You know, I grew up in Birmingham, alabama, and you know you think it's kind of like way everywhere. But you know when and this was when I, when I was looking for a house, way back, way back when the average house was about $150,000 and you know there was no way I could afford that. So I bought a house.
Speaker 2:My first house was $78,500. And it needed a lot of work. And I'm not a carpenter, but I had to learn how to become one. I'm not a plumber or electrician, but you bet I learned how to be a plumber and electrician because I could not afford to pay these people to come in and fix my stuff, because they made way more than I did my average. I paid one plumber one time to come out and fix a leaky sink. When I bought my first house, I'd been there maybe a couple months and he worked for about 30 minutes and he took a week's pay from me. That's rough.
Speaker 2:I said right then, and there you know, I'm a plumber, I'm a plumber.
Speaker 2:I can learn it did not look like rocket science what he did back there. So if he can do it, I'm smart enough at least. I can at least get near it, you know, yeah, so I learned how to do a lot of things, and so even today I have a real hard time paying someone to do something that I can do. And a lot of people say, well, your time is worth something. It's really not Because you're investing in yourself or your property or what have you.
Speaker 1:And it's another skill, another experience to go through.
Speaker 2:It broadens your and I actually I hate to say it, but I kind of enjoy it. I don't when I'm doing it. You know I'm one of those guys that you know leave me in the basement and cover your ears because it might get colorful, you know, because it never goes, because I don't do it all the time.
Speaker 1:I'm not a professional plumber or something, so it never works out perfectly. But how much pride do you have when you finish it? When I finish it.
Speaker 2:I'm looking at it and I'm thinking that looks fantastic.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you found your chest. Even when I'm on the yard, I'm feeling good about myself, you know.
Speaker 2:But Just the housing has gotten to be so much that I hear. It pains me to hear. I just had a guy tell me this was just a couple months ago.
Speaker 1:He's probably mid-20s and he told me he and his wife.
Speaker 2:they just don't foresee in the future how they can buy a house and I didn't say anything. But I thought you're going to have to reevaluate what's important to you, because if I had that same mentality then I would have never bought my first house.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So the median home price now I think it's about $350,000. And that's just median and then. But one thing is, the median home size is a lot bigger than it used to be too. I mean, just go drive down in South city or or in C, homes that were built in the fifties, um, or um, uh or earlier, and I mean there's, there's smaller 1200 square feet, you know type of deal. And so we're just kind of a custom to um live is what seems normal is to now live in a. I would say the average house is probably over 2,000 square feet. I could be wrong, but it's significantly larger than it was in 1990. And HOAs, yeah for sure.
Speaker 2:I mean, not only do you have to pay this exorbitant price for this house, because it's got this brick sign in the front that says something that people recognize you know the cove, or whatever it says, you know and it's like, oh, I live in the cove. Well, now that you live in the cove and you have this house, that's, you know, probably a little bit it was a little tight to get in, but now every month you've got this thing called HOAs that you've got to pay in. They're the people that it's like still living kind of at your parents' place. They tell you what color you can paint your house, if you can have a car outside or not, what time you need to go to bed.
Speaker 1:I mean, all these things, they don't feel free.
Speaker 2:Right, right, and so I find that, if you can do, this is still America. You can still do what you want. It depends. You've got to scale it back, though, because what you do is like that house I bought, I worked on it, worked on it I mean, I was doing all that I could do for that house, and when I sold it, I made a pretty nice little profit from it rolled it into another house, got in that house, did a whole lot of work on that house, you know, sold it, rolled it into another house, got in that house, did a whole lot of work on that house, sold it, rolled it into the third house, and you keep doing that until that's how you can get. You can still buy that, say, $100,000 house, but by the time you're in your third house, you're still. You're paying $100,000, but you're buying a $250,000 house. Yeah, because you just keep rolling that equity into the other homes.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah. For the young people out there, it's not going to come quick. No, it's not fun and it's just brick by brick, step by step. But you might as well start today.
Speaker 2:And the Dave Ramsey plan is a way to get you there. I think faster Probably the best thing going out there. I think it's faster because you're going to come to this one way or the other. I think You're going to have a one day. You and your family is going to have a sit-down, yeah, and it's going to be like we've got to do something because what we're doing is not working.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the pesky shackles of reality always end up winning, don't they Right? Always end up winning, don't they Right. All right, jared Well hey, buddy, I appreciate you and it's always good talking to you. Thanks so much for your time.
Speaker 2:Can I leave you one last? Thing, yeah, please. Number 10 on the I think it's the 107th of the plan is what I think is the most exciting to look forward to. That's the one where you can give.
Speaker 1:Yeah, build wealth and give Right, and so you donate to things that you think are important Church, maybe the server you have.
Speaker 2:Give her a hundred bucks. Yeah, Haircut girl, she's telling you a sad story. A hundred bucks, you give her a hundred bucks. You're not out that much. Yeah, you just changed her week, her month.
Speaker 1:And the feeling you get from that is longer lasting than the feeling you're going to get from buying that new pair of shoes. And so if your goal is to optimize your length of life and quality of life, your return on investments typically better with giving.
Speaker 2:And by that point you're already to the last baby step, so everything's paid for. You've got your next day, you're pretty much should be set and you're making a positive difference in this world, and now you can go out and you can help others. Yeah, and that's the only thing it was. Just you know, once you get to the very end, it still continues. Yeah, because now you have a chance to change someone else's life and be positive.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And you sympathize with people who are kind of in the same position. You were a long time ago. We've all been down the same road. You bet Most of us.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I mean for sure. Yeah, everybody's going to have tough times and we're all in this world together, right, and we got to try to take care of each other, but it really you got to take care of yourself too. Right to right, and you're you're. There's something called a Monte Carlo simulation and we use it for radiation calculations, but it's a Monte Carlo. Is that a roulette wheel? Okay, and so it started off doing multiple runs on a roulette wheel, so you just it would be like a thousand balls in a row and seeing what numbers it landed on, and that's called a run. And it became a mathematical way to simulate things.
Speaker 1:And if you looked at your life like a monte carlo simulation, like over the next 20 years, your life, there's there's a thousand different use that could exist. But if, if you're making moves today that are going to help, kind of any of those potential use, if you looked at your life like a simulation, a lot of things could happen. But you want to do things that kind of, have some respect for the future version of you, whatever that may be, and it could be anything and and I think you know, having the discipline to do that, finding meaning in your life and purpose. I mean people will keep working even if they're totally financially free, because they feel like they have obligations to charities and obligations to people or family or whatever, and they feel good about that, their legacy.
Speaker 1:I think in life it's good to have purpose, it's good to be on a mission, it's good to try to make a positive difference in this world and most people who what's the meaning of life, that's what it is Find things you think are important and try to make them better. Um and um. You know you'll get all kinds of philosophies, but I think if you put them into an AI and averaged them out, it would be something like that and it, it, I know it's, it's, it's gratifying for me to give it's. Probably the happiest moments of the year are when you're, you know somewhere and you have the opportunity to give a little bit Right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Like you said, you got to help yourself first. It's like they say on the airplane you always put the oxygen on yourself.
Speaker 1:Yeah, save yourself, because if you, start putting it on others.
Speaker 2:You're of no good to anyone.
Speaker 1:And you know, another good kind of saying about life is nobody's coming to save you, Right. You've got to save yourself, exactly, and that's good news and bad news, because I don't want to be somebody else up to somebody else, but the bad news is I've got to do the work.
Speaker 2:And hard living, hard choices, I think, have escaped most people these days. Yeah, a lot of the youth that are coming up are not being told no, are not doing without. They don't understand doing without. Doing without is like a timeout for 10 minutes with their favorite game. You know not that I can't, we can't afford that game. Yeah, you can't have that game, we won't get that game yeah, it's a, it's a.
Speaker 1:Hard people, uh, create good time. You know, bad times create hard people. Hard people create good times. Good times create, create hard people. Hard people create good times. Good times create soft people. And it feels like we're in that phase of the cycle and you've got to develop self-discipline. In anything in life, we're not perfect. Forgive yourself for sure for Um, for your weaknesses and your past transgressions. We all have them. Just move forward and figure out. You know how can you have some respect for your future version of yourself? Exactly All right, buddy.
Speaker 2:Hey, good seeing you Good talking to you as well. It's always fun.
Speaker 1:Thanks, chris for for um for your work here today. And, Todd, as always, always. And Kelly, we appreciate everybody in the staff. That's all for today. Jared Barton, you're my man. All right, Thank you.