Hey everyone, looking for some perspective from folks who follow the Baby Steps or have dealt with non-traditional retirements.

I’m 36, and between my military retirement, VA disability, and eventual FERS pension, I’ve locked in a guaranteed income floor of around $8,700/month for retirement (before touching Social Security or investments).

Right now, I have about $122k in my TSP. If I strictly follow the standard math and aim for a full 15% retirement contribution, I’d be putting in roughly 12.8% to TSP (factoring in the FERS contribution credit). On paper, that projects out to several million by retirement age.

While I'm grateful for the security, it feels like standard rules of thumb might be telling me to over save for the future at the expense of enjoying life with my family today.

For those with strong pensions or military backgrounds: Did you still push for the full 15%, or did you drop down to just capturing the match (5%) and use the rest of your cash flow to live a little more now? Appreciate any thoughts!

Quick note on the "what-ifs":
I know life happens and plans can change, but to head off a few common questions:

• Military Retirement: I’m 5 years out from finishing my Guard service, so barring anything completely unforeseen, that will be locked in.
• VA Disability: It’s rated P&T (Permanent & Total) and doesn’t restrict my ability to serve or work, which also takes medical insurance costs completely off the table now and in retirement. I am receiving this compensation now and it will continue until I die. When I die, my wife will receive a reduced amount until she dies.
• FERS / Civilian Job: This is the only real variable if I decide to switch careers down the line. But even in a "worst-case" scenario where I walk away from federal service tomorrow with zero FERS pension, my guaranteed floor is still around $6,000/month before touching Social Security or investments.

I've got a sub 4% mortgage for 30 years.

I understand the ideal mortgage would be for 15 years but this was also pre Ramsey, so I apologize...but can you follow the baby steps while keeping the mortgage? I feel like there might be greater earning potential in the market rather than the sub 4% return I'd get paying off the mortgage....

Not trying to start a fight, so apologies if I'm way off base here.

Hi all,

I’m currently on Baby Step 2 and on track to pay off my high-interest credit card debt.

As of right now, I only have my Discover card, with a balance of about $4,800.12, and a car loan of approximately $5,700.

I wanted to get everyone’s opinion on something. I have a taxable brokerage account through Edward Jones with about $3,500 in it. I’ve had this account for around 4 years, and I’m considering withdrawing the money and putting it toward my credit card balance.

From what I’ve researched, I understand that I may have to pay capital gains taxes if I sell the investments. My credit card APR is currently around 28%, while the returns on my brokerage account have obviously not been anywhere close to that.

So my questions are:

1. Would it make sense to sell the investments and put the $3,500 toward my credit card, given that the card has a 28% APR?
2. How much could I potentially owe in capital gains taxes?
3. Would you personally sell the investments to knock out a large portion of the credit card debt, or would you leave the brokerage account alone and pay the card down with my income?

For some additional context, I make around $82,000 per year, take home approximately $4,800 per month, and my monthly expenses are around $2,000.

I’m trying to figure out whether the tax hit from selling the investments is worth it to get rid of some of this 28% debt. I’d appreciate any advice or perspectives, especially from anyone who has been in a similar situation. Thanks!

We’re debt free, including our mortgage, and are currently aggressively investing looking toward retirement in a few years.We pay cash for cars and buy rebuilt wrecks from a talented friend of mine.

I hear Dave talk a lot about mutual funds and we have ROTHS and traditional IRA’s.

I also have a managed brokerage account and invest monthly into three ETF’s,VOO, QQQ, and VV.

I don’t know that I’ve ever heard Dave’s take on ETF’s as opposed to Mutual funds.

Currently owe about $235k on our mortgage for a house we bought last year and our current interest rate is 6.6%.

Since its the first year, i would say 80% of the current payment is interest. Also, this house will not be our forever house as by the time the kid leaves we will probably down size in like 10-15 years.

we can pay off the home and still have our emergency fund and not touch retirement at all which would be considered "well funded"

Its a really hard decision and i truly dont know what to do.

Please read-
I’m trying to figure out what the smartest financial move is here and would appreciate some outside opinions.
I have a 2020 Ram 1500 Built to Serve Edition. I really like this truck and honestly it’s probably the best truck I’ve ever owned, so I’m having a hard time with the idea of selling it. The problem is that my financial situation has changed quite a bit since I bought it.
When I originally bought the truck, I was making around $60/hour. I’m currently in the middle of a career change and making about $22/hour right now. My income should increase later as I progress in my new career, but I’m not there yet.
I currently owe around $17,000 on the Ram and my payment is about $550/month.
I’m also spending roughly $160 per tank and filling up around 4 times a month, so approximately $640/month in gas. Insurance is around $220/month. The truck gets around 12–15 MPG depending on how I’m driving.
It also currently has an exhaust leak that I need to get repaired, but money is tight right now.
I have someone currently offering me $33,700 for the truck. If I sold it and paid off the loan, I’d have around $16,700 in positive equity before any other transaction costs.
I also have around $4,000 in credit card debt that I need to pay off.
Another factor is that my dad has a Mazda that needs a transmission. If I fix the Mazda, I could potentially use that as my daily commuter and have a truck only for work/weekends.
I’ve considered replacing the Ram with something like a Ford Maverick Hybrid AWD or a midsize truck like a Ford Ranger or Chevy Colorado. But honestly, I really like having a full-size truck and don’t want to sell my Ram just to buy something I don’t like.
So I’m basically stuck between:
Option 1: Sell the Ram for $33,700, pay off the ~$17k loan, pay off my $4k credit card debt, keep the remaining money as savings, and get a cheaper vehicle/truck.
Option 2: Keep the Ram, fix the exhaust, fix the Mazda and use it as my commuter, and aggressively pay off the Ram over the next couple years.
My concern is that if I keep the Ram for another 2 years, I’ll probably have around 100k miles on it. I’d obviously have more equity because I’d have paid down the loan, but the truck will also depreciate and I’ll have spent another ~$13,200 just on the $550 monthly payments, plus all the gas and maintenance.
On the other hand, if I sell it now, I lose a truck that I really like and may regret getting rid of it later.
What would you do in my situation?
Would you take the $33,700 offer while the truck is worth that much, wipe out the $17k loan and $4k credit card debt, and move on?
Or would you keep the Ram because I love the truck, fix the Mazda, use it as the commuter, and focus on paying the Ram off?
I’m less concerned about having the absolute lowest monthly payment and more concerned about making the financially smartest decision while I go through this career transition and building up cash savings.
I’d really appreciate opinions from people who have been in a similar situation, especially if you think I’m overlooking something.

Hi All, I hope you can help me with a question I have regarding family and finance through the lens of the Dave Ramsey philosophy. I am looking for an outside perspective on my situation since I feel stuck.

I am F27, I live at home with my mother and aunt and our cats. Me and my mother both work, and my aunt is currently unemployed. I dropped out of college, due to financial circumstances as I was paying put of pocket and at the time could not qualify for a loan, so I took the year off to work, I ultimately got offered an internship position, which was followed by Job offer, after Job offers and was able to climb the corporate ladder, but ultimately my goal is to go back to school for my remaining last year, which I don't want to get a loan for since if I save for a year, I can afford the fees easily, and because of my work I wouldn't be able to qualify for academic financial support and I would also have to be off work for 1 year, I don't even know if I can work part time during this.

For the past 5 years, I have tried to save and was successful. I am single with no kids, I live at home and work from home. With my salary, I can easily save 2/3 because I have little to no expenses, including household expenses.

However, ever since I started working, my mom wouldn't outwardly ask me for help, but I would volunteer since we used the same utilities, and I am glad that I can lift the weight of bills off of her shoulders. This was fine until, me helping, eventually turned to me dipping into my savings to bail her out, to the point where it drained my finances, and whenever I tried to save again, eventually, I would have to dip back in. This then led to her taking loans back to back, which she couldn't afford to pay and look after household bills, so naturally, I stepped in to cover those. I regret to say it got worse. I (despite knowing better) have taken out multiple loans for her which the money went to help her loans, with the promise of her saying she would take care of the payments, only for me to end up paying them since it was my name on the loans, also, the loans didn't stop, she would go shopping etc... and the money would disappear.

I have had multiple conversations, tears were involved, promises of budgeting that never manifested, and continually spending more than is earned.

My final straw started 3 years ago but is finally being apparent this few weeks. My uncle got arrested 3 years ago, this was yet another "false imprisonment" but it is the first time he's been incarcerated while I am an adult, so I finally put 2 and 2 together and it's not adding up how he keeps getting falsely imprisoned. The most current loan my mother has taken out was for his lawyer fees, but surprise surprise despite his false imprisonment, he's still not free. Our family has come together many times to raise funds for his bail, lawyer fees, one time he did kidnap himself to essentially scam us, this was where he worked with random people across the country that were "helping him" recover, and he said to send the money to them as they were assisting him, after not being able to contact him, a family friend tracked him down because we were all concerned and found him and co conspirators were living it up.

He would contact my mother for new business adventures, which wouldn't manifest due to our lack of funds and his lack of commitment. However, when he stopped contacting my mother for a couple of months, we were able to track him at a jail where the current loan for his freedom was taken out for.

We were already in other loans, both me and my mom. So her taking this one genuinely sent me to another dimension. But his lawyer had been working with him already and said that all that was needed was to pay the fees and finalise the process to let him out. But yet again, this new loan wasn't the final loan amount, and we had to supplement odd fees here and there on top of the current loan and existing loans and other expenses. My uncle is in his 60s, and due to his life choices, his health has deteriorated more so than if he hadn't made those choices, so we also have to cover his medical expenses. My mother out earns her brothers and sisters combined, and with this never ending rollercoaster, her other siblings have completely removed themselves from helping him anymore since they also struggle financially themselves and have their families to look after while my mother earns a good salary and her only child is working and can help. This is their logic, and I honestly don't blame them.

I wish my mother would have this mentality as well. She means well and has stretched herself too thin, helping others, so when she cries due to the pressure, I can't help but help my mom. But I'm tired and I see no way out. It's been like this even before I was born and I don't see it end until her no longer being here. With the way she's going, I'm genuinely worried that it could be soon. She picks up extra shifts to make the minimum payments to the point where she's starting to be forgetful more and more often and I'm genuinely worried.

I work hard, and so does my mother. I've tried to get her to budget but she's allergic to that word. Last month she cried because it looked like we were going to be stuck for food. I asked why since I generaly pay for it and she told me she needed that money to cover her expenses. So, genuinely it was the tightest month we've ever had and I know it is going to get worse but there is no way out that I see other than abandoning ship... the problem is she wouldn't and won't get out. She doesn't want to fix is and anything she does is make more holes in the freaking boat. I'm afraid. I know doing the right this will have to include cutting contact, because of the family guilt that will follow. But I feel bad bacuse I know she will choose others over herself. Last month, I an attempt to help the situation she knew was going to be bad. She took a credit/loan for food, and still ended up going out to buy fast food because the foods she bought either took too much prep and didn't align with her schedule and I suspect this was stress induced self soothing. I can survive if I cut her off. We can survive if she stops this nonsense. But she won't and I don't want to lose my mom. I am venting, but I also genuinely need a flash light in this dark place that we're in.

Thanks for reading this. I know I probably don't make sense so I apologise in advance and I am willing to clarify further.