Are 0% Balance Transfers Smart?

Brought to you by the EveryDollar app. Start budgeting for free today. Is it smart to do a balance transfer that is offering a zero percent APR for 20 months to take care of a portion of a personal loan that my husband and I have? A personal loan to who? Uh, it's with a SoFi loan that we have. Oh gross. What, how much is SoFi screwing you for? We have $15,000 left. And what's the interest rate? 12.31 percent. Aren't they helpful? I know how they paid for that stadium now. Okay, 12 percent, huh? On $15,000 and what's your household income? Uh, before taxes, uh, $112,000. Okay, so how fast are you going to pay off the $15,000? Well, we would like to pay it off within a year and a half. That's awful. Is there something ahead of it? Is that why it would take so long? Like, do you have other debts you're attacking first? We have, um, we still have $1,000 left to pay off on a furniture that we brought. And then we also have a car loan. We have $18,000 left on that. Okay. And then starting back in July. I was going to say the car shouldn't come before the $15,000. Okay, our payment is pretty high. Our payment is $679. Right. So what we have learned is the fastest way to get out of debt and the most sure way to get out of debt when it comes to everything, but the house is to list your debts, smallest to largest pay minimum payments on everything, but the little one and attack the little one with a vengeance. And I mean, no eating out. I mean, no vacations. I mean, nothing scorched earth on your lifestyle. And you attack these debts. You make too much money to be this freaking broke. And if I'm you, I'm going to pay all of this off in just over a year, a year. Yes. But you have no life during that year. You understand me? And right now you're right now you're trying to slow walk this and figure out some interest rate that gets you out of debt. There is not an interest rate to get you out of debt. What gets you out of debt is when you get so pissed off that you've been screwed over by that you attack this stuff with a vengeance. Are you guys doing anything outside of your normal jobs? Any side hustles, anything to bring in extra money? You know, those free samples at the store that are up for grabs for anyone? Well, that's basically what's happening with your personal information online. Data broker sites collect stuff like your address, phone number, email, even your family's information and just post it online for anyone to grab. And that's why I use delete me. They remove your personal info from hundreds of data broker websites and keep it gone. So stop letting random websites treat your data like it's free samples. Get 20% off your annual plan at join delete me dot com slash Ramsey. Are you guys doing anything outside of your normal jobs? Any side hustles, anything to bring in extra money? No, we aren't. That's the key. I'm telling you, that's the key to knock this out. Because the longer the horizon on this, the less likely you are to complete it. If you're not attacking this with intensity, it's just going to be, ah, I'm tired of doing this. Oh, we've done it long enough. We paid off the car. That's good enough, right? You've got to be intense, which means the income that's going towards this debt has got to be as high as possible. And the outgo is nothing. I mean, I'm not kidding. Do not see the inside of a restaurant unless you're working there as your extra job. Because if you did that, if you committed, if you and your husband both said, man, we're both going to do a side hustle. We're both going to bring in an extra two or $3,000 a month. Oh my goodness. So Rachel, here's the deal. Okay. You can wander into debt and we've helped more people get out of debt than any other organization in America. We know what we're doing. You can wander into debt, but you cannot wander out. You have to get angry about this situation so angry that you become sacrificial in your lifestyle because you want rid of this because it's standing between you and prosperity. It's standing between you and becoming a millionaire. It's standing between you and changing your whole family tree. You got screwed by SoFi, but you allowed it. You signed up for it. You got screwed by the car company, but you allowed it. You signed up for it. So no more, I'm not going to, I'm not going to, I'm not going to be the, the person that gets stepped on anymore. And I'm going to punch back so hard that it goes away. When you do all of that, your question that you called in with becomes almost irrelevant. That's right. Because 12% on $7,000 is not your problem. That's seven, $800. Yeah. That's $800 for a year. $800 does not fix a $30,000 problem. And you have a car debt, a SoFi debt and a thousand dollar debt. That's 30,000 bucks. And so you've got, you know, and you don't have an $800 problem. You have a $30,000 problem, $2,500 a month for one year. And you're done. Now, where are you going to get it? You don't get it from cutting lifestyle and increasing income and cutting lifestyle and increasing income. And you're going to go so hard that your broke friends think you joined a cult. Now, I don't know if you're ready to do that or not. I can't make that decision for you. If I could, I would. Because I know that the 10 year from now version of you would love you. The time is going to pass anyway. And you're going to go, ah, if only I had listened to that guy on the radio. Oh, and here's the other thing. The faster you get out of debt because of increased income and sacrificed lifestyle, the more likely you do get out of debt. The more you drag it out and slow walk, the better the chance is that you just stay in debt forever and it just becomes normal. Well, everybody's gotten screwed by so far, so we might as well just be like everybody else. And your brain starts to normalize the stupidity that is America today. And so, and then we've got Gen Z saying, I can't afford to buy a house because Congress screwed them with student loans. Their, their college screwed them with student loans, Ford motor company, Lexus motor company, Toyota motor company, put them in $1,200 car payments. So far, I put them in 12% personal loans and we're here to help you with your money. Oh, bull crap. You're here to help you with my money is what you're here to help. We know who you are and you know, this is, this is it. And you know, when you look at Gen Z, they got record credit card debt, record car loans, record student loans. And then they say, well, I can't afford to buy a house. Well, no kidding. Yeah. Cause you got screwed by everybody in sight. And the only thing I would do if I was Gen Z is I'd get really angry about that. And I would clean this mess up and take these villains out of my life and say, never again. See, I was, I was 28 when I went broke and American express called my house and asked my wife why she would stay with a man that wouldn't pay his bills. And she called me crying at the office and said, I was thinking the same thing. I got so mad that I'm 65 and I'm still mad. If American express calls my house now, it's a wrong number because I'm not going anywhere near anything that freaking company does ever. They screw people for a living. I don't want anything to do with city bank. What's in your wallet, money, not your crap. That's what's in my wallet. So you got to get that thing going like that. That's swagger. And, and, you know, that's what happened with Jayden. Sam said, I'm not living like this. I've had it. Yeah. I'm done. Yeah. You have to get to the point where you're, you're, instead of blaming people, you're just, you're just mad about it. And you're realizing, oh, the same people that screwed you. Aren't going to come save you. You know what I'm saying? Like they're not going to help you. So you have to help yourself. That's the only way. That's the only way you get out of this. It's the only way. Yeah. When you get twisted up about it and you say, I'm looking around out here and none of these people have my best interest at heart. Nope. And including the balance transfer, 0% credit card, where, you know, you know what that is, they're betting you're not going to pay it off in 20 months and you're not going to pay it off in 20 months. If you don't change the way you're doing this. And they're just going to send you more offers. Well, no, they're going to jack you to 28%. They're going to make sofa look like a good deal. Yeah. At the end of 20 months, they're going to hand you a, you know, Oh man, it's going to be bad. I'm going to hand you a new piece of paper and you're going to go. I think I got a little throw up in my mouth. Yeah. Cause I I've signed, I did it again. I signed up with one of these companies, fifth thirds here to help. Give me a break. They're going to screw you. When you walk into the finance company or the finance office of the car dealer, it should have a sign over the top of it that says enter here to get screwed. Cause that's what they're going to do. They're going to jack you up and it's to their benefit, not yours. All you get out of it is toxic smell from the plastic that's new in the car. And we call it new car smell. It's the plastic that's new and it's toxicity. Let me help you with this. Create your free every dollar budget today. The simplest way to budget for your life.