The Faithful Money Framework: Step Into Financial Confidence

Hey, everybody, and welcome to the very first episode of Financially Confident Christian Live.

I'm Ralph Estepp Jr. And I am so glad you're here today.

This is the show for believers who want to grow in confidence with their money and break that cycle of financial shame that so many of us live in and really find a place for confidence.

Now, this is a show that's not about shame.

It's not about pressure, and it's not about pretending anymore.

This is a show where we're going to have real conversations, conversations about fear, about pressure.

We're going to talk about things like debt and stewardship, and we're going to talk about hope.

And what I'm going to hope to leave you with every week is the next right step.

So if you're here live, I just want to say thank you again for being here at the beginning.

And if you're listening quietly, you are welcome to join us, too.

My goal here is to make everyone feel safe.

This is not a room for judgment.

No question here is too basic, no stories too messy, and no one is going to be shamed here.

This is a place for honesty.

This is a place for grace, a place for wisdom and a place for growth.

Tell me right now you don't have to sound polished.

You certainly don't have to have it all together, because I don't have it all together.

You just have to be willing to be real.

Now, if you're on Clubhouse, you can raise your hand and ask your question live or you can drop it right in the chat.

If you're joining us from another platform, post your question in the chat right here.

So every week we're going to help you solve real money questions.

I'm going to help you break that cycle of financial shame.

And I want to talk to you right now about what I've developed is what I call my faithful money framework.

And this is where we're going to sort of put all this stuff into the way we talk about it.

So the first thing in that framework, and you'll be hearing this as we work through the questions today.

The first part of that money framework is we've got to face reality.

We've got to really say to ourselves what is really going on here?

Because you're never going to solve a financial issue if you don't start with clarity.

The second thing we're going to do is we're going to aim to see clearly what does better look like.

What is that beautiful thing, that vision that you see in the future?

The third thing I'M going to encourage you to do is identify timing because it's so important that you understand where you want to go.

But you've also got to put a timeframe into that.

When could this realistically change?

If you want to really see lasting change and dynamic change in your financial life, you got to think about what timing that is.

We talk about in the Christian faith, what season you're in.

The fourth thing we're going to talk about is options.

And I think options is where we can spend a lot of time.

What are the possible ways forward?

It's so easy for us to get stuck in that oh, we've always done it this way mentality.

But I'm really going to encourage you to try to do other things and look for other possible ways forward.

The fifth part is probably the most important part and that is how do we build a plan?

What are we actually going to do moving forward?

The sixth part, hey, this is where the faith comes in.

We bring in faith and terms like surrender.

What do we need to bring before God?

Because the truth is, I really believe this with all my heart.

Most of this stuff is really hard to do on your own, but when you look to God for some help, it really makes it easier.

The seventh thing I'm going to encourage you to do is understand your progress.

What is already better than it is or when it was when you started.

Because if you don't understand the progress that you're making, it's really difficult to build that momentum.

And last but not least, we always look ahead.

What is the next step?

So if nobody jumps in right away, I just want to thank everybody for being here today.

Thank you for joining me on this inaugural episode.

And what I'd like to do right now is I'd like to jump right into our first question and this is a question that we got from one of our listeners.

Now this listener writes this and if you're interested in commenting, you can put comments right in the chat.

Abby, my producer is here with us today and she's going to help me navigate the 15 screens I have open.

Because we've got platforms like Clubhouse and we've got YouTube and we've got chat going on.

So bear with us as we learn all this technology today.

But there's our first question and this listener wrote this.

She says, I'm a 31 year old female, I have no debt and my bills are around $900 a month.

I make $12 an hour full time and I doordash on this side.

I only started my 401k a couple years ago.

I feel so stupid.

Everyone in my family always lived paycheck to paycheck, and no one ever bothered to talk to me about money.

I have $800 in savings and I feel like I'm one emergency away from having nothing.

I suppose I'm just venting.

Well, first of all, you're not venting.

And I really appreciate you bringing this question to me today because this is something we can really work with together.

I always want to start with scripture because one of the things that's so important to me is my faith.

And I found this scripture reference that I think kind of sets the stage.

And it's actually from Isaiah, chapter 43, verses 18 and 19.

It says, forget the former things, do not dwell on the past.

See, I'm doing a new thing now.

It springs up.

Do you not perceive it?

I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.

Now, the reason I want to ground us in scripture is because it's so easy to get stuck in our own heads.

We tell ourselves things like, well, I'll never be good with money, I'm behind, and all that sort of thing.

So I think if we center ourselves and in a place of faith, first it helps us, but now I want to apply that framework.

As I mentioned earlier, we got to face reality first.

The reality here.

And actually, when I read this, I thought, I'm not sure where this person lives because $12 an hour, I'm not sure too many places that are still paying $12 an hour.

But we have to come to some reality here.

The real issue is not just low income.

I think that's part of it.

But what I hear you saying in your question, it's not only low income, but you've got this feeling of shame.

You mentioned in your question that you feel like you weren't given any tools when you were brought up.

You feel like you're behind everybody else.

I gotta be honest with you, at 31 years old, I think you're actually doing pretty well.

You've got new debt, you've got a little bit of money that's going out every month.

I think there's some room for improvement, which we can talk about.

But listen, even the fact that you're putting money into your 401k speaks volumes.

I work with.

I've been doing accounting work for 30 years.

I say to people, I've been doing it since I was 8 years old.

So not quite that made me a little bit older than that.

But I've been doing it myself in my own firm for 30 years.

A lot of people that I see never contribute to the 401k at all.

So don't feel stupid.

And one of the things you mention here is that no one ever taught you this stuff.

And that's one of the biggest problems I think we have.

But let's face the reality.

So the reality is you've got low income and you feel shameful about that.

But now let's talk about our aim.

What I said it in my framework is to aim clearly, to aim clearly.

The goal here is not wealth first.

Honestly, I think your first goal needs to be to build stability.

I think that's really what we need to work on first.

So you face the reality.

Here's the truth on the ground, here's what you've done, here's what you haven't done.

But now we got to talk about what do we get to.

And in my professional and personal view, I think the goal was to build stability first.

Now, because we're talking about building stability, I think as we identify a timing, if we say, hey, let's do this over 90 days, I don't think we're looking at 10 years down the road.

We're not even looking at a year or five years down the road right now.

We're looking at this 90 day problem.

It's clear to me that you're worried about not having an emergency fund.

You don't have any fallback to go to.

So right now you're wondering, what am I going to do here?

So let's identify this and let's really talk about building a 90 day plan.

But now we get into the brainstorming part.

This is where I can really help you, what I call think of options.

You've already mentioned one of them.

You said you're going to keep the side income.

I think that's a great idea.

Doing doordash.

Now, listen, I got to be honest with you.

A lot of clients I've worked with doordash, I'm not sure it's that profitable.

It depends on where you are.

It depends.

If you're in a big city, that might be a great thing.

But if you're spending a lot of money on mileage, if you're spending a lot of money on fuel and maintenance for your car, that might not be a great idea.

But at the time being, I think I would keep the side work.

The other thing you could do is look for better paying work.

Like I said, when I saw $12 an hour.

I got to be honest, I was kind of taken back by that.

I believe there are probably some better options.

Another thing you might want to consider, and you didn't mention this in your question, so I'm sort of digging around here, but you might want to think about looking at some training.

Maybe there's a trade that you can get into a certification program or maybe some remote work.

So as you're thinking about those options, I think keeping the side income is a great idea, but look for other ways to build that out.

So now we've thought about where we are, we've talked about a timeframe, we've talked about what that timeframe looks like, we've identified the options.

Now it's time to really put this to work and that's to build a plan.

The first thing you've got to do is you've got to update your resume and start looking for better paying roles.

Now you might find that you're not getting those better paying roles.

You haven't mentioned education, you haven't mentioned any of those things.

I don't know what your situation is, but this may be a time to really reevaluate where you are with your education or certifications.

One of the things that I will tell you in my practice, a lot of my clients are in the trades like plumbing, H vac, electrical.

They are dying for people to work in those trades.

They there are great options out there.

But I think at the same time you're doing that, I think you've got to have a plan to build a safety cushion.

You hear a lot of people talk about that emergency fund and a lot of people are scared off by the emergency fund because they hear, well, you need three to six months worth of income.

I think that's a great thing to get to eventually.

But I don't think that's where you need to be right now.

I would say let's build a 90 day cushion.

Now let's get to the faith and surrender part because here's the thing, I want you to really change the dynamic.

God can really change your life here.

You haven't started that late at 31.

Honestly, you haven't started that late.

I'm going to be able to give you a simple confession here.

I didn't start my actual retirement planning till about five years ago.

Now I'm 53 right now.

So that means I started when I was 48 years old.

So it's never too late to get started.

Would it have been better if I started sooner?

Absolutely.

You're at 31 and you're already putting money into your retirement.

Don't compare yourself to other people.

A lot of us get stuck in that trap.

That's their race.

You're running your own race.

So right now I want to go ahead and allow.

There was a comment that Junaid had made.

Junaid said, good day, friends.

Junaid, thank you so much for sharing.

And Jonathan Howard actually put in our clubhouse chat that a and has a savings.

Yeah, absolutely.

Jonathan, you're absolutely right about that.

That is a huge thing.

So don't undersell yourself.

Which is why I get to the next state of my framework.

And that is understand progress.

The fact that you have no debt is amazing.

That is progress.

The fact that you have a job and you're working, that's progress.

The fact that you're contributing to a 401k plan, that's progress.

So don't undersell where you are.

But now I think it's time to look ahead.

I think you honestly need to look ahead.

What is that next simple step that you can take?

As we talked about, do you build your resume?

Do you look for certifications?

Do you look for a better job?

Do you look for some other opportunities?

Because one of the big things I would say right now, you know, looking at it from the outside, is you've got to figure out a way to raise your income.

I think that's definitely something you need to do and at the same time, build that emergency cushion.

So that's the framework.

I want to offer this to the chat.

If that question sounds like a story you're going through, maybe you've been in this same position.

I feel.

I almost feel sad for younger people right now.

I was talking with a client yesterday about the affordability for things.

It is really hard to afford a house today.

It's.

The rents are high.

So right now in the chat, if you're feeling the same feeling, tell me, put the word in the chat.

Like, maybe you feel pressure or you feel hope or you feel tired or maybe you feel ready.

I would love to hear what other people are feeling here in the chat because this question, I think resonates with a lot of people.

I know it resonates with me.

And to be very candid with you, and I'll share a little bit too much again.

When I was 31 years old, I was not debt free.

I had debt because I had decided, hey, I'm going to go get everything I want and just charge it up on their credit cards.

So I really want to Commend you.

Because sometimes I think what we're really talking about here is that fear of being behind.

And that's what I really hear in this question.

You're comparing yourself to other people.

You've got this fear like you're behind everybody else.

But the thing is, you need to understand where you're at and really take a strong assessment of where you really are.

And you're doing a lot better than I think you're giving yourself credit for.

But let's move on to our second question.

This one was a doozy.

Wait till you hear this one.

So this listener wrote, ralph, I logged into an old 401k plan from a previous employer, and I found the balance is zero.

I'll tell you what, I would have been shocked if I saw that.

So they go on and they say the funds had been converted.

And that's what they put in quotation marks.

We're going to talk about what converted looks like here in a second.

They say to me, they were given no notice.

They called adp.

So ADP must have been who their payroll provider was.

And they told me it went to Fidelity.

So we got one of these going on.

This one went this way, this one went that way.

So I reached out and I called Fidelity, and Fidelity has no record of it.

Then they say to me, what's going on?

Is this even legal?

That's a whole other discussion.

I'm not an attorney.

I don't play one on tv.

But we could talk about that here in a second, too.

But how did this happen with no notice to me whatsoever?

This was, like I said when I got this question, I'm thinking, there are a lot of people that don't think about this.

How many of us have had jobs?

And maybe we started putting money into a 401k and.

And either we got downsized or we quit, went to another job, and we didn't think about, you know what?

I've got some money sitting out there, and we just, oh, well, it'll be okay.

We'll just let it sit on the sidelines.

And if you don't think about actively managing that, this is the kind of stuff that happens.

Now, I want to get into the scripture, and I found this one in the Book of Proverbs, chapter 27, verse 23.

And it says, and this one hits home for me.

They use it.

Those of you that don't know me, well, I actually raise Black Angus cows here on my farm.

And this one's talking about, again, Proverbs 27.

23, It says, Be sure to know the condition of your flocks.

Give careful attention to your herds.

Well, I'll tell you, my herd right now, I can look out the window here.

There's a couple of them sitting out there right now.

But I've got to pay attention to them.

You've got to do the same thing with your money.

Well, let's get into my framework.

First thing we're going to do, like I said earlier, we're going to face the reality.

The reality here is you're scared.

You logged into your account and you saw zero.

And listen, seeing zero would shake anybody.

If I logged into my bank app right now and all of a sudden I saw zero, I'd be freaking out.

So I get it.

So the reality here is that you see there's an issue.

But let's talk about aiming.

We said the second step that is always to aim.

Clearly, I want to say to this to you and I want to say this gently, the goal is not to panic.

Your first initial instinct in your flesh as a human being is this is terrible.

I got to go figure this out.

I'm panicking.

The goal right here, now is not to panic, but it's to find the paper trail.

Because what you're talking about there is a paper trail.

We just got to get in there and figure out what it is.

Well, let's talk about identifying the timing.

Here's the thing I'm going to tell you.

It seems to me like you've been putting this off a little bit.

So this action needs to happen now.

You need to put this on the calendar.

Not someday, not next week, not when.

Oh, when I'm feeling better.

No, this is a, this needs to be resolved right away thing.

So as we think about the identifying the timing, we got to do action right now.

But let's pivot a little bit.

Let's talk about the options because you've asked me a very specific question that I'm going to give you a very specific answer to.

Here's some options.

First thing I would do, reach out and contact the former employer.

It might seem like a no brainer, but reach out to them.

If it's a small employer, call and speak to the manager you used to work with.

If it's a larger employer, I would reach out to their HR people and just start there and say, hey, I work for this company.

I realized I have a 401k.

I went to log in and check it and it's gone.

I can't figure it out.

The second Thing you might want to consider is you can contact the plan administrator.

When you got signed up for your 401k plan, you would have been assigned what they call a plan administrator.

My chances are you probably don't have that information, but that's at least one thing you could do.

Another thing you can do, as we did research for the show today, there's a thing called the Federal Lost Retirement Resource Safe.

There's a place online, we'll link in the show notes of how you get to that.

It could have went there or the other thing it could have did.

And this happens in Delaware all the time.

Delaware has this thing called unclaimed property.

And a lot of states have this.

And if there's no activity on an account for a certain period of time.

Now in Delaware, it's actually five years.

It's if you've got an account that there has been no activity on other than maybe interest posting or dividends posting.

There's a thing called the Delaware State Escheat Office that's E S C H E A T. It's kind of like you think about they're cheating you out of your money.

That's kind of what it is.

But it goes to this unclaimed property office.

And that unclaimed property office is a place where you want to reach out and say, hey, do you have any unclaimed property?

Now I will speak for Delaware.

I, I used to run a credit union and when I worked for this credit union, we would have to look at any accounts that hadn't had any activity in five years.

Now we would notify, we called them members.

When I was with the credit union, we would notify the members and say, hey, you've got this account you haven't looked at.

But once it got to five years, the only option we had was to write a check and send it off to the unclaimed property.

Now that doesn't mean it's gone.

It just means that it's sitting out there in unclaimed property.

So those are some of the options that I think would be helpful.

There's also the Department of Labor has a retirement savings lost and found database.

I guess it's kind of like that lost and found box.

But you might want to contact them.

And the USA.gov says most unclaimed money is held by state unclaimed property office, which is exactly what we talked about.

So we've talked about the reality, we've talked about the timeframe and now we've talked about some options.

But now it's time to have a plan.

Here's the thing I'm going to recommend that you do.

Write down every single call, every single point of contact, get their names, get the dates, ask for notices, ask for documents.

But really document this thing so you can go back and say, I talked to this person on this date.

They were supposed to do this.

I talked to this person.

Because the more documentation you can get, the better off you're going to be.

But let's talk about faith and surrender here.

One of the things, I'm going to criticize you a little bit.

I said I would never be critical.

But.

And no judgment here, but stewardship by its very nature means paying attention to these type of things.

So if you're listening, if you've joined us here and you're thinking, you know what, Ralph, this could affect me too.

Think about that.

Be aware of what's going into your retirement accounts.

A lot of people have this belief that they just said it and forget it.

I think that's a bad approach.

I would definitely be checking your account statements at least once a quarter.

Make sure that the money is going in from your employer, if you're contributing it.

Don't let that scare you.

If there's market ups and downs, a lot of people don't want to look at it because they're afraid that the market's going to go up and down and they've lost money.

But log in and see where things are.

Now, let's talk about the next start of the framework, and that's understanding your progress.

Once you've done your plan, you started to put this into action, you check that account, you're going to find a problem here pretty quickly.

Your money is not missing.

It's not gone.

Somebody has it.

And recognize once you get to that point, that is progress.

But now I want you to look ahead a little bit.

The next step is that first phone call and then the next one until you get this money resolved, until you get to the point where everything's resolved.

Well, let me ask the chat right now.

Has anybody else been through a similar situation for like, how many of you have had an old account somewhere where you hadn't checked it in a long time?

And then you were like, wow, I totally forgot about this account.

I can tell you.

It happened to my grandfather when he passed away.

And this has probably been, oh, close to 30 years ago, he had passed away.

He was about 73, 74 years old.

I never get three or four years later, I was looking through the newspaper here and I saw my grandfather's name pop up and it said that there was money in an unclaimed account.

So my grandmother was still alive.

I picked up the phone, I called her and I said, guess what?

I said, this such and such bank says that they've got money of yours.

Turns out he had $4,000 in an account that nobody knew about.

Well, the good news was my grandmother was able to provide a death certificate.

And guess what?

She got the money.

So the money's not gone, it's still there, but you just have to work through the process of getting that money back.

Okay, well let's.

Does anybody have any questions they want me to talk about here in the chat?

I always want to give you an option to ask questions.

If not, I'm going to go forward with the next question we got from a listener.

Okay, let's get to the next one.

You thought the last one was good.

Wait til you hear this.

One listener writes this.

My boss is beginning to change our company to only 1099 employees.

Now, I want to use a little bit of jargon right now.

A 1099 employee, when somebody uses those two words together, they're the opposite of that.

If you're a 1099, that means you're an independent contractor.

But a lot of people don't understand the difference.

The difference is as a 1099, you're not an employee.

You actually are self employed and they are paying you for your service.

Whereas if you're an employee, you would get a W2.

But let me continue.

He says, As a W2 employee, I was making $32 an hour and now he wants to pay me $38 an hour as a 1099.

Ralph, I can't figure out if this is good or bad for me.

Well, the good news is you've already started to think about why there is a change here.

And we got to start there.

But let's get into our first Bible verse for this one.

This one, when I was thinking about this, when I said this really thinks, I think about this as the words of Jesus.

And In Matthew chapter 10, verse 16, he says, I am sending you out like sheep among wolves.

Therefore be as shrewd as snakes and innocent as doves.

That's a pretty profound Bible verse if you think about it.

Shrewd as snakes and innocent as doves.

But I wanted to start there.

But let's get into my framework.

We'll start by talking about what's the reality here.

The reality here is this isn't just a raise question clearly you understand there's something more to this.

If your, quote, employer wants to take you from $32 an hour to $38 an hour, hint, hint, they're telling you something here.

Why is there such a difference?

Now, it could be that they're not going to give you benefits.

You might not qualify for vacation time or any of those sort of things because now you're not an employer anymore.

But you've got to think a little deeper on this one.

It's a tax issue, it's a benefits issue, and it's a classification issue.

Now, we can get into a whole discussion about whether this is a justifiable classification or not, because there is.

It's not as simple, and I'm going to talk about that in a second.

It's not as simple as your employer just saying, well, I now name you a subcontractor.

Does it quite work that way?

But that's what we really need to start with.

What is the reality?

It's not just a raised question.

There are a ton of other pieces to this.

But let's move into our framework of aiming.

Clearly, better here does not mean a bigger hourly number.

And I'm glad you've kind of alluded to that because your question already addresses this, because I think you've kind of done a little research here.

Just because that number is higher doesn't mean it's a better situation.

Better to me means a better full picture.

Now, it could be that this is a better option.

It could be that the differences that are going to happen because of this raise are worth it.

But we got to dig in a little bit of that.

Here's the thing.

I'm going to talk to you about identifying the timing.

This is not a place to answer this too fast.

If your employer presented this with you, I wouldn't answer that.

A lot of people think, well, if my employer said something, they got to know right away.

No, wrong answer.

Go out and talk to other people, do some research.

If you have an accountant, somebody like me, pick up the phone, schedule a consultation and really understand what's going on here.

Because you don't want to move too fast on this.

So as we think about timing, this is one of those things.

My grandfather did some carpentry work and he used to say.

He would say, grandson.

He called me Ralphie.

A lot of people don't.

You don't call me Ralphie.

But he could.

So anyway, he said, Ralphie.

He said, here's what we do.

When we're going to cut wood, we Measure twice and we cut once.

And you got to think about that here, too.

But let's talk about the options.

Now, you haven't told me whether your employer offered this, but in my view, you've got a couple options.

You could stay as a W2 employee.

Now, maybe that's not an option.

Maybe they're just deciding, hey, everybody's going to be a subcontractor.

I think they may have some issues there.

The second thing you could say was, okay, I see you're giving me a raise of $6 an hour.

Maybe you can negotiate a different rate.

Maybe that $6 an hour isn't enough to cover the benefits or cover the tax changes or cover the other pieces of this puzzle.

That would be important.

Another thing I would do, especially when it comes to employment stuff, is ask for written terms.

I want this written out, exactly what my expectations are.

I want to understand what your expectations are, because think of it like this.

When you're an employee, most employees that work in a state are what they call at will employees.

Your employer can let you go at will, but what you're talking about now is different.

This is not a typical employer employee relationship.

So I would get stuff in writing.

And then once you get stuff in writing, you've got to look at benefits.

Maybe right now you've got medical coverage that's being covered, or maybe you've got a flexible spending account.

They're not going to be able to do that if you're a subcontractor.

So think about that.

Look at how much those benefits are going to cost.

There's going to be a change in taxes.

When you're self employed, you have to pay something called self employment tax.

That's basically an additional 15.2% tax on top.

That's one of the reasons they're giving you a higher wage.

There could be expenses related to this.

And there's also some issues about protections when you're an employee.

You're covered by workman's comp insurance.

You're covered by other protections that go along with being an employee that you might not have as a subcontractor.

So those are the options.

That's what I call like the green light thinking, the brainstorming phase.

But then you've got to develop a plan.

And in that plan you've got to run the real math.

And I've worked clients through this many times.

Take a look at if you get paid $32 an hour as an employee, what does that mean?

If you get paid $38 as a contractor.

What does that mean?

You've got to think about things like the cost of benefits, the cost of taxes, because you can't compare rate to rate.

A lot of people think, oh well, they're giving me a $6 an hour raise.

Ralph, this is a no brainer, I'm just going to go do this.

But it's not a no brainer.

You've got to actually look at your take home pay to take home pay because that's going to change here.

If I'm going to add another 15.2% tax on top of this, your take home pay is going to change.

If you've got to pay for benefits, if you've got to pay for insurance, all those type of things are going to mean you may need to make your take home pay might go down.

Now here's the thing I was going to talk about a second ago.

The IRS has guidance in this and that's why I'm not sure the whole situation.

Generally employers can't just say willy nilly, well, we're going to bestow everybody to be contractors.

They want to do that because when they do that, they're not paying workers comp, they're not paying unemployment taxes, they're not matching your Social Security or that self employment talks.

We talked about it.

But the IRS and the U.S. department of labor, there are overall issues and I don't really want to get into them there because we don't really have the time to cover that.

But it's not necessarily true that they can just say, oh, we're just going to make you subcontractors.

I've had a lot of clients that have said to me over the years, well I'm going to hire some subcontracted employees and I just want to come across a desk and smack them because the two things are not the same.

And here's the thing, the the IRS could come in, the U.S. department of labor come in and say this is not right.

Now I'm going to just give you a little caveat here.

There is actually maybe you're an employer listening to this.

If you really want to get the skinny on this, you can do what's called an SS8 form.

That's a determination form you can send into the IRS and ask them, hey, does this work?

While you're doing that, the IRS will also give you guidance about that self employment tax.

Because if you have self employment tax, there's also annual tax returns you're going to need to file as a quote contractor.

And you might have to pay estimated taxes, because all of a sudden the other side of this, and this gets a lot of people in trouble.

Maybe they were an employee before.

Well, when you're an employee, your employer takes money out of your check every week or every two weeks.

When you're a subcontractor, you got to figure that out on your own.

And then comes April 15th, and it's terror.

But let's get into the faith and surrender part of this, because this is a big decision.

This is not a simple decision.

So this is where you look for wisdom and ask those hard questions before you sign.

And then we'll talk about understanding your progress.

The fact that you asked for guidance here to me speaks volumes about your intelligence and your desire to make the right decision.

You've asked questions before, agreeing, and that's progress.

But then look ahead.

What's the next step?

You know, look at that comparison.

Compare if I do this job or if I do this job and really focus in on that.

Take home pay.

Look at the cost of benefits because benefits are not cheap.

Look at the cost of those benefits and decide what works best for you.

Let me ask the group this question.

I'll ask this in the chat, if anybody wants to comment.

Have you ever had a work offer that looked better on paper than it felt in real life?

Have you?

Many clients call me and ask me this exact same question.

Their company was going through a change and they just said, wait a minute, this sounds like a really good deal, Ralph.

But sometimes it's not a great deal.

And here's the other thing I was going to put in here.

Some money problems are about the job.

Some are about family patterns.

And that's what I want to go to next.

The next question.

This is one of those questions where you're dealing with family and money and family are two things that are really complicated.

But let me get into our next question.

This question comes to us from a young person.

I say young person because I think anybody younger than me is a young person.

At this point, it makes myself feel old.

But at 53, I guess I am old.

Anyway, here's their question.

Says, I'm 16.

My mom is in $60,000 in debt.

She needs to borrow $1,000 to $3,000 a month from her elderly parents just to survive.

So here we go.

You got a young person, 16 years old.

They're saying that their mother is in debt, $60,000 in debt, and they're hitting up grandma and grandpop for $1,000 to $3,000 a month.

These people are elderly just to survive.

But here's the kicker.

And then this person tells us and spends about $400 a month on doordash.

Now, we could have a whole discussion about doordash.

But here's the next thing they say when I try to help her, she says, this is how I prefer it.

Stop trying to be in my finances.

Sounds like mom's a little defensive.

But then they asked me the million dollar question, should I try to help her or just move out as soon as possible?

Now you're 16.

I don't think you're moving out anytime that soon.

But I do appreciate the fact that you're seeing a pattern here.

It actually is really reassuring that you see there's an issue here.

But let's start with scripture.

And this scripture I came up with Here is Proverbs 22:3.

You'll notice in the show I use a lot of proverbs.

Proverbs is a great place for real wisdom.

But this is Proverbs 22.

3.

It says the prudence.

See danger and take refuge.

But the simple keep going and pay the penalty.

And I think you're seeing that.

But let's work through the framework.

The first thing I want you to do is face the reality.

On its surface, this seems like a money question.

You got a mom that's got a lot of debt.

She's borrowing from grandma and grandpop to make ends meet.

So on the surface, this seems like a money question.

But honestly, and you're not going to like what I'm getting ready to say.

I think it's also a boundaries question.

But this is a boundary that goes both ways.

At 16, I can't even imagine saying to my mom or dad.

Now, I had a different situation, but I can't imagine saying to my mom or dad is like, here's a I want to tell you how to run your finances.

Now you might realize, hey, there's a problem here, which is a different boundary.

And that's a boundary where I think your mom is sharing too much information.

Your mom is putting a burden on you that you should not have to bear.

At age 16, this is a terrible situation for you to be in.

And my suspicion is you're feeling a lot of fear.

You're probably thinking, man, are we going to have a place to live?

Are they going to shut the lights off?

What's coming around the bend?

You see that your mom's not good with money.

I'm just happy the fact that you saw that.

But let's talk about the next Step.

And what is your goal here?

The next step in my framework is to aim.

Clearly, you gotta take a step back here.

The goal is not fixing Mom.

That's not your role.

That's not your responsibility.

You're not the parent.

Now, it sounds to me, based on what you're telling me, that you've kind of been the parent, and I have empathy for you in that situation.

I lived through a similar situation.

My mom and dad split up when I was 8.

And the last thing my dad said on the way out the door, son, you're the man of the house.

Well, guess what?

At 8 years old, nobody is ready to be man of the house.

And my mother passed away a few years ago.

I love my mother dearly, but my mother put a lot of stress on me.

My mother was the person that would say, hey, kids, you know, we can't afford that.

I always used to hear, we don't have that kind of money.

I asked my dad one time, I said, do you have a different kind of money than mom has?

He just kind of chuckled and he says, no, not really.

But you see what I'm saying?

In a lot of ways, your mom is putting this stress on you.

The fact that you know how much debt she has, the fact that, you know she's borrowing from Grandma and Grandpa, that's information you should not have to understand.

It's not stuff that you have to digest.

But at the same time, you have a goal here of protecting the future, maybe protecting your future.

I don't know what you're looking at.

You're 16 years old.

You might be looking at college, and you're thinking, well, how's mom ever going to pay for college?

That's a legitimate concern.

But those are where you got to set your goals.

This is not your responsibility to fix Mom.

You've done a lot.

The fact that you see all this at age 16 is really impressive to me.

But your goal needs to be, how do I protect my future?

And here's where we're going to identify timing at 16.

Your preparation needs to start now.

And I don't disagree with you when you say, I got to get out of here.

I think having an independence plan is a really smart thing to do, because unfortunately, unless your mom changes the way she looks at life, these habits aren't going to change.

You can't change them for her.

So you've got to start realizing that at 18, when you can move out, you need to start thinking about building an independence plan.

Now, I'm not saying to Go do that right now.

And I'm not saying as soon as you turn 18, this is the thing to do.

But I think what you're seeing here are some big red flag warning signs.

So your independence needs to come as soon as it's wise and it's possible.

So let's talk about how do you do that?

Let's talk about some real brainstorm things when we think about options.

One of the things that I would recommend that you do, and you didn't mention whether you did this or not, I think it's time to get a job.

Now, I will tell you, when I raised two boys, my boys are 24 and 28.

I always encourage them not to work while they were in high school.

I'm saying at 16, you're in high school, but it might be a good idea for you to get a job on the evenings or the weekends or something like that so you can start to build some money for yourself.

Now here's the thing.

Don't get yourself trapped in supporting mom.

That's not your job.

That's not your role.

If you do get a job, open up a savings account and start putting money aside so that you can build that independence plan so that when you make the decision, I got to get out of this crazy house, that you have some money set aside to do that, look for some trusted adults, maybe reach out to your grandparents, maybe the ones that are funding this, you might want to go alongside them and say, hey, Grandma and Grandpop, you know, can you, can you help me understand how I can get out of this?

Or maybe that's not in your family, maybe at your church or some other trusted person, you can, you can find a trusted adult.

But I think you're going to need to get some support here.

You're in a really tough situation.

You are being put into an emotional and financial situation at 16 that unfortunately I'm going to tell you right now, is going to impact you the rest of your life unless you get some support and really understand what you can do and what you can't do.

The other thing I really love about your situation though, is this is going to allow you to learn money skills early.

One of the things that I see all around us with young people, again I'm using that term young people, but when young people is a lot of them don't have good money skills.

And in your situation, I can understand why you never learned those.

Your mom doesn't have good money skills.

So how in the world would you have good money skills if you not learn those if they weren't modeled around you.

So that's what you got to think about.

What can you do but have that plan?

Now, here's what I think your plan needs to be.

Number one thing you've got to do is start saving.

Don't give your mom access to your account.

Set up a separate Savings account at 16.

I think you can pretty much do that pretty much anywhere.

Set up your own savings account.

Put, put that money aside.

This is a great time to learn.

This is a great time to understand what finances look like, join shows like this, go on YouTube, go on podcasts and go think about, listen and learn about the different things you can do.

Prepare yourself and build a path out.

Like I said, I'm not telling you to walk away from your mom.

It's definitely not time to do that at age 16, but it's time to start thinking about what is my path out of this.

Because you recognize this pattern is not going to be good for you long term.

But let's talk about faith and surrender, because I really want to dig in here for a second, and I'm going to say something rather bold.

Loving someone doesn't mean drowning with them.

And I want to say that again.

Just because you love somebody doesn't mean you have to drown with them.

Now, I know you might be saying, but it's Mom.

I get it.

That's tough.

But you don't have to drown with them.

And the good news about this, as I talk about my framework, is understanding progress.

You already see a pattern here.

You already recognize that something is not right here.

There's something broken here.

When you see that pattern, that, to me, you've got huge stars in my book.

You've got a huge amount of maturity for 16 because you already see that something's not right here.

But then don't forget about this.

You got to start looking ahead.

Your next step is building your own foundation.

And I am very.

I have empathy for you.

I'm sorry that you're in a situation that you're in.

It's very clear to me that I don't want.

I don't like to use the word abuse, but you're living in an abusive situation, neglect, you know, your mother is putting stuff on you that she shouldn't be putting on you.

So you just got to think, I got to put that to the side and I got to start building my own foundation.

Now, I know some of us are not 16 anymore, but we may still be dealing with someone who we love right?

Now, who resists help?

And I'm just going to say in the chat, if you want to volunteer, if you wanted to come up and talk about a situation like that somewhere that you've been in that same situation, you're welcome to talk about that here, too.

Or if you want to send me a message, that's fine.

I'm happy to help you in those situations.

But this is a tough situation.

And, you know, we all know these people that we try to help them.

We try to just don't drown with them.

I guess that's my big takeaway for this question is, you know, they might resist the help, but don't drown with them.

You don't have to go down with their ship.

All right, well, let's move on to our next question.

And this question is a question about salary.

So let's jump right into this.

I'm just checking the chat, make sure nobody wanted to contribute, which is cool.

But let's move on to our next question.

And this question says this.

It says, I went from $105,000 salary to with a $30,000 bonus.

That's pretty good, I think, to $210,000 salary with $100,000 bonus.

Man, I got to get a job where this person's working, plus roughly $60,000 in RSUs.

Now, I'm going to take a break here and say what an RSU is.

An RSU is a restricted stock unit.

So what they're basically telling us here is they got a big raise, they got a big bonus option, plus their employer is giving them stock options and a $30,000 relocation package.

Man, where do I sign up?

This is a great deal.

But they continue on.

I have four kids.

My spouse stays home.

We have zero credit card debt.

Both cars are paid off.

I was raised poor and never taught about finances.

Kind of goes along what we just talked about with the last question.

So they asked me this question.

How do I turn this into generational wealth?

How do I not miss this golden opportunity?

What a great question, honestly.

And the truth is, you're in a really good position.

But it's very cool when I think about this.

You got a great earning.

You got a wife that stays home.

You got four kids.

You got zero credit card debt.

Your cars are paid off.

You're in really good shape.

But let's get into Scripture, and we're going to go to the Book of Luke, chapter 12, verse 48.

It says, but the one who does not know and does things deserving punishment will be beaten with few blows for everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded.

And from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked.

And you probably heard that through your life, maybe not even from scriptures.

People say, well, you know, to whom much is given, much is expected.

But it's biblical.

You can go check that out.

Whenever I talk about the Bible, I'm going to encourage you.

Go check it.

Luke 12:48.

You can see that in our show notes when we republish this.

But I really believe there's some.

That's what you're feeling here.

So let's get right into the framework.

The first thing I would say is face the reality.

The reality for you is this is a blessing.

This is a huge blessing.

You are in a fantastic situation.

But I love the other side of this.

You also have a responsibility, because you said to me, I've got four children.

I have a wife that stays home.

So you've already realized.

I'm in a great shape, Ralph, but I don't want to mess this up.

I want to think about.

You used the word generational wealth.

What you're saying to me is you want to make sure you provide for your children.

And there's the Bible verse about, you know, you take care of your children's children.

So you're already thinking through that.

You don't want to just squander this away and go buy a new Mercedes and go buy a beach house and be.

You've already started thinking, like, wait a minute, there's something I can do about building responsibility.

So you see this as a blessing, and you see this as a responsibility.

So your aim here, your goal.

When I say aim, clearly the goal here is not lifestyle inflation.

It'd be really simple for.

And listen, most of us will be tempted to do that, wouldn't we?

If we got $100,000 raise, we'd be thinking, hmm, well, I could certainly upsize this car.

I don't have any car payments, but, man, I can go get a new one.

I'm making big money now.

You might think it's time to buy a vacation house, time to buy some better clothes or some jewelry or anything like that.

It's real easy to fall into that trap of lifestyle inflation.

But I love the fact that you're thinking differently.

Your goal is legacy.

So that's what we really need to key in on here.

The plan that you want to make is about legacy, but let's talk about timing for that.

In my framework, I talk about identifying timing.

The first years matter.

So slow down.

You don't have to make any big decision right now.

You've got a nice salary coming in, you don't have any debt.

So let's talk about what you can do.

Let's think of the options.

First thing I would do, you haven't mentioned this.

I suspect you probably already have.

This was to build a robust emergency fund.

One of the things you did say is you work for somebody, if you work for somebody, that business can close down, they can go through an economic downturn, they might decide they don't like you anymore and out the door you go.

So the number one thing I would do, and as your income increases, I actually think this is more and more important, expand that emergency fund.

I am a firm believer in having three to six months worth of net take home pay in an account.

In your situation, I might try to push that out to 12 to 18 months.

Especially if you've got the money.

If the money's going to sit on the sideline anyway, build that up.

The next thing I'm going to encourage you to do, and you didn't mention this, is what does your retirement savings look like?

Are you maxing out your 401k?

Are you putting money into other investment options?

That's a huge thing.

Another thing you want to consider is tax planning.

A lot of people don't think about tax planning and I do taxes every day.

But one of the things I'd be thinking about right now is tax planning.

It's one thing to prepare your taxes after the fact.

There's not a lot of value in that, to be honest.

The value is in tax planning.

And you're getting into a situation where you're going to need some tax planning as your income goes up.

There's limitations on credits, there's limitations on deductions, there's.

And with those RSUs you talked about, there are issues related to long term capital gains.

This is a great time to sit down with a qualified accountant, with somebody who does this type of work and actually put together a tax plan.

Not just think about, hey, can you do my taxes afterward?

That's really important.

Another thing I want to encourage you to do is think about college planning.

You said you have four children.

I don't know what their ages are because you didn't share that.

But this is a great time to start putting some money away.

We call squirrel it away for college planning.

Maybe set up some 529 plans.

Maybe your kids are young.

It's a great time to think about doing that.

Another thing I would encourage you to do is sit down with an estate planning attorney.

As your wealth increases, the options that you have increase as well.

I'm amazed how many people I work with every day that don't have a will, they don't have any medical directives, they don't have any planning documents at all.

Start there.

Go do that.

Now.

Here's one thing you probably weren't expecting me to say.

Another thing I think you should do is consider generosity.

I'm a faith guy.

I believe in tithing.

I believe in giving back.

If you are truly this blessed and as clear as you are, I mean, you're in fantastic shape, how can you help other people with that?

How can you give back some of that?

How can you be generous in that?

I think there's a calling here to be generous.

Another thing I don't want you to lose sight of.

This is a great thing to teach your children.

You can.

As compared to the last couple of questions we got.

This is a place where you can show your kids generational education.

You can show them ways to make great decisions, include them in this process, but have a plan, too.

That's the next step here is have a plan.

One of the things that when I work with people on budgeting, or what I call an intentional spending plan, is, is you've got to give every dollar an assignment.

Think about it like that.

Like every dollar gets assigned something.

This money goes to this.

This money goes to this.

Because one of the things you mentioned, you didn't want to mess this up.

You didn't want to screw this up.

Make a plan before the money even comes in.

Have a plan.

This is much is going here.

This much is going there.

This much is going there.

And then revisit that.

Now let's get into the faith and surrender part of this.

This more that you're feeling.

It's not just an opportunity like you alluded to.

This is a responsibility.

In my personal view, God has stewarded you.

God has given you this blessing.

It's not yours.

This is something he's given to you.

Now, yes, you may work hard for it, but this is a blessing.

So you've got a responsibility in all of this.

But I want to circle back to something you said because you mentioned that you didn't want to mess this up.

Let me just lay some truth on you.

You've got no credit card debt.

That is huge progress.

Your cars are paid off.

That is amazing.

And you've got a stable household.

All of those things are progress.

So don't sell yourself short.

You've made some great decisions.

And as we look ahead, you know, what is the next step?

Maybe the next step is building that wealth plan, meeting with an attorney to build an estate plan, meeting with an accountant to build some tax planning.

All of those things are amazing.

Well, I just want to take a minute and thank we're just about ready to wrap up here today, but I wanted to thank everybody for joining us.

I see Mark was in the audience and Dave and Jonathan, 10 and Jim as well.

It is so great to see you guys here joining me today.

And this is going to be every Friday at 1 o'.

Clock.

If you want to come again next week, I be happy to have you.

But bring your questions if there's something.

And like I said at the beginning, there's no stupid questions.

There's no small questions.

I've been doing this kind of stuff for 30 years.

There's not too much that I haven't seen that I can't help you with.

But if you've got a question about debt or budgeting or those job changes or marriage or money starting over, retirement, fear, whatever it is, let me help you with that.

That's what I feel like my calling is.

We talked about in the last caller, in the last question about what do you feel like you want to do?

That's what I want to do.

So let me ask you this.

If you just want to I know a lot of people haven't participated today.

If you just want to type this in the chat, what are some topics that you'd like me to talk about?

Is debt an issue for you?

Is budgeting an issue?

Maybe saving?

How about increasing income, Ideas that stewardship or how about this is a real zinger, maybe.

We got some questions next week on this one.

Marriage and money.

I was talking to somebody yesterday.

I truly believe the biggest struggle in most people's relationships is money.

So if we can figure out a better way to do that, we're going to figure out how to do that.

But if you've got things that you want to share, feel free to email me.

You can email me@ralphskralph.com and before I forget, let me just tell you this too.

I've also created a document and I want to show you this.

I'll put it right here in front of me.

There's a document called the Faithful Money Framework and I would love to give everybody a copy of that.

Now the easiest way to do that, we have a private group and you can get to that by going to financiallyconfidentchristian.com join.

We'll put that in the show notes, but let me give it to you again.

It's financiallyconfidentchristian.com join.

I'm not going to ask for your money.

It's a Patreon site.

It's a free now if you want to donate to the show, you can do that there.

If you want to support the show, you can do that there.

But it's a place where you can go and see the other content we're putting out.

One of the things that if you don't know this, I do a daily show.

It's called Financially confident Christian, just 10 minutes a day.

But in that Patreon group, which is absolutely free to you to join, you can ask questions.

We're going to put this actual document right there in the group.

So again, that's financiallyconfidentchristian.com join.

Now as we close, I want you to remember this.

It's never too late.

It's never too messy.

You're not disqualified because you were never taught these things.

And you're not alone in this.

This is what we do here.

We face reality.

We aim clearly, we identify timing, we think of options.

We build that plan, we bring it to God.

We recognize progress and we take the next faithful step.

That is the faithful money framework.

And that's how we're all going to break that cycle of financial shame and find confidence.

And that's how we build that confidence of money.

God's way.

I just want to thank you so much for being here.

I want to encourage you to come back next week.

It would be great if you invited somebody who needs to hear this conversation and bring your real questions.

If right now I'd just like to pray for us all as we close out today, Lord.

I just want to thank you for every person listening today, Lord.

Thank you for being president even in our fear and in our pressure, Lord, and our questions.

And we know we have hope in you.

So as we close today, give us all wisdom, give us peace, give us courage, Lord, and help us to take that next right step.

And we ask this in the name of Jesus.

Amen.

Listen, I just want to say again, thank you so much for joining me today.

I hope you got a great deal of value from it.

I certainly have loved being here with all of you.

And again, reach out and get our free giveaway@financiallyconfidentchristian.com join.

Thank you and God bless you.

Have a great weekend.