"You're At Retirement age and Broke!"

Brought to you by the EveryDollar app. Start budgeting for free today. My husband and I are almost to the retirement age. He will turn 65 next week, and I will turn 64 in the summer. We have no savings, no retirement. Our joint income is around $116,000. We have debt, personal loans, credit cards, and automobiles of $83,000, and we have a $28,000 mortgage claim that we disagree on, but we do have it against our primary residence. So my husband looked into getting a cash-out refi to grow all of our debt into one loan to free us essentially of all the debt. It doesn't free you of it. It moves it onto your house. Right. It moves it onto the house. You're not paying off anything. You're moving it. Right. And so I was trying to explain that to my husband. I said, look, this is a 30-year loan, and our mortgage is at $53K right now. Why would it make sense for us to roll all this debt into another mortgage loan? We're almost at the finish line. So the loan officer is tag-teaming me with my husband, trying to get me to agree that it makes sense to finance this loan again and put all the debt into one pot. And he's saying that I would be walking away with an extra $3,000 a month if I were to go this route. And if we added an extra $2,000 a month, we could pay off the mortgage in six years. I don't know if that makes sense to me or not. I need you to help me to sort this out. Well, what's bothering you is that nothing changed in your habits when you do this. Correct. And so when you're 70, you're going to be back in debt. I don't like that idea. I know, but that's what you're going to do because the system y'all are using now puts you here, and you're not changing anything in the system. And your husband thinks he can borrow his way out of debt, and you can't dig out the bottom of a hole and get out. So how much of the $83,000 is his truck? $32,000. Isn't that weird that I knew that? I'm prepared to sell my truck and just drive the other one. How much do you owe on the other truck? The Jeep is $24,000, and we have an F-150 that we paid cash for that he drives occasionally when he doesn't drive the more expensive truck. How many cars do y'all have? We have three vehicles, two trucks and one Jeep. Okay, and truck number one that he drives occasionally that's paid for is worth what? Maybe $6,000. Okay, and the other truck is worth $32,000 and owes $32,000 on that, right? And then there's the Jeep that you owe $24,000 on, right? Correct. Think I found the problem. Hey, George here for Church Hill Mortgage. Listen, with interest rates dropping, this might be your window to buy a home or refinance. Building equity through home ownership is still one of the best ways to create safety and security in your life, and you decide when the time is right. And my good friends at Church Hill Mortgage will give you a custom plan and a special offer so you can buy or refinance the smart way. Go to churchhillmortgage.com ramsayoffer. That's churchhillmortgage.com ramsayoffer. This is a paid advertisement. NMLS ID 1591. NMLSconsumeraccess.org. Equal housing lender. If I was 65 years old and getting ready to retire, and I was stone cold broke, I'd be scared. Oh, well, I am. Not looking for a six-year plan that some freaking loan officer gave me. That gives me chills. So y'all probably aren't going to do this because I don't think you and your husband are aligned on this, but mathematically what y'all ought to do is sell both these cars, both of them, and not do a cash-out refinance. Instead, pay your way out of debt and be debt-free sooner than six years. That's what makes sense to me. That's what I've been trying. I think you can pay off the house and everything in about three years at 68 years old, but you're going to be not driving these two cars. Well, I tried to explain that to him. I said, look, owning two vehicles with two notes didn't make sense to me to begin with. We have a concession trailer that we use occasionally. That's why he bought the truck to move the concession trailer around. But now that we have one spot, I don't see us moving it all the time. I see us trying to use it to get out of debt. Yeah. I really feel like not giving up the 53K that we have left on the mortgage and sacrificing for 185. Yeah. So $85,000, if you sell these two cars, gets you completely out of debt, mortgage and everything, and you make 116, you can do that in two to three years. And you should, because you're freaking retirement age and broke. Can you say that one more time? Because Bosley's not here, and I want to make sure that I got it written down just like you said it. You said you had $83,000 in debt, right? Not counting the mortgage. Yeah. Okay. And if I take 32 from that, I have 51. And if I take 24 from that, I have 26. 26 and 53 mortgage is 78. You make 116. How fast do you pay off 78 making 116? If you paid off 35,000 a year, you're done in two years. If you pay off $25,000 a year, you're done in three years. Okay. And that's no six-year plan that makes your banker rich. That's what I told him. I said, we can do this in three years. Yeah. The last financial planner you need is a loan officer. That's what I thought. That's why I've been listening to your radio station, so I don't get into these. I don't know if you're going to get a hubby to do all this. Well, you know what? I think it's time to try. Yeah. And by the way, the timeline Dave gave you speeds up if you guys are working extra. Yeah. You could do it in two years. While you got health. And if you got no house payment, no payments at all, I got your $3,000. Now it's $4,000 freed up to start saving some money. You start saving 50 grand a year and you do that for four or five years, you're going to have a decent nest egg in your seventies and you won't be retiring, eating dog food, Alpo, the breakfast of champions. It's like, Oh my gosh. You know? I mean, yeah, but here's the thing. We've been buying crap. We can't afford because we wanted it. And some loan officer told us this is a good idea. The guy at the car lot said, look, I got you approved. And like, we're supposed to celebrate that. Hello. You owe more on your cars than you do on your house. Oh, ouch. Fact pinch me. It's true. What is wrong with this picture, right? Yeah. She's been controlling the house thing and he's been doing the other stuff and now he's tinkering with the thing she's been controlling. That's right. And that's why she rose up. That's right. Good for you, kiddo. Yeah. I'm afraid I'm going to cause some marital discord and I'm happy to create your free, every dollar budget today. The simplest way to budget for your life.