I'm 71 With No Retirement!

janice is with us in oklahoma city to start this hour hello janice how are you hello dave uh I'm fine I'm really quite worried about my finances I'm 70 years old I don't have a

retirement

my husband and I neither of us have a

retirement

we don't agree on what we have to do with the cash we have we have 25,000 in cash there are no cds nothing that's all the question is we owe 27,000 for our house and the value of the house is approximately 250,000. We have a thousand dollars in debt for a car. My husband wants to take the money we have and pay off the car and then says he should apply the entire car payment of three hundred and fifty dollars to pay for the house.

My problem is me. I'm so stressed that I at least want to have a house to live in and the way I look at things, I don't think I can live anywhere cheaper than where I live now. I don't think I can even live in an apartment for how long. We would be paying a month for our house, so I need help here. What do you do for a living? What is your income? We have two thousand dollars a month in social security combined. I have some income that I make on top of that with a job that I have, but it is quite physically challenging. um, I can do it now, but you know, I don't know how long I'll be able to do it.

How much will you earn? Probably another two grand a month on that. Okay, can your husband do it? job, he has a part-time job, uh, it's like when the store owner needs him, so he has occasional income, but nothing we count on is that he can work a little, so he has physical limitations, yeah, it does well. health issues, yeah, okay, and that's part of, you know our situation, we've had big medical bills and we've also made some really bad cash investments, what do you do to make two grand? I clean houses and it's physically demanding, okay? good money but it's physically demanding um hmm hey how many cars do you have?

We have a very reliable old truck paid off and then we have the only card on which we have the pending deaths. We also have an old roadster that I would probably say is worth ten thousand dollars I'm sorry but the roadster is no longer good no I'm sure that will break your heart but I'm sorry it's gone and that gives us ten thousand dollars to put towards the house um, because the roadster will sell for enough to pay off your car, we can leave 15,000 in your emergency fund, put 10,000 towards the house and then that leaves you 17 to go and you guys dedicate yourself to the business of the next 17 months or so paying off that house is okay because without any debt you can do it, it won't be pretty, but you can do it right, you know, we don't spend money, I mean, everyone spends money, it costs money to do it. anything but the main thing we do is go out to eat and that's not much, let's not go here's the thing here's the thing if you want to keep this house you're going to start living like you're completely broke because you have to clean up this mess, You have no wiggle room here, that's where all this stress in your stomach comes from and why did you call me so you can't eat out, you're broke, eating out is forcing you to clean the bathrooms, okay?

Yeah, I agree, yeah, and then you know I'm sorry, you might be able to do it in the future, but right now you have to sell a roadster, you have to pay off your car, and you have to pay off your house. and you have 25,000 in a roadster to achieve all this and an income of 2,000 which is questionable because we don't know how much longer you can do this at 70 years old, so we have to get you out of here. this debt before you start losing the ability to work like he did, otherwise you'll end up selling this house and buying a condo for a hundred thousand and you'll have a hundred thousand dollar slush fund to live on and have a life now you can go and do that now if you want okay, I'm hearing you right, you have a 250,000 house, yeah, so if you sell it today you won't have any debt, take a hundred thousand dollar condo for one hundred thousand dollars. two bedrooms, move into it and that is your retirement home and that is how you will retire and that allows you not to be stressed or worried and you have a hundred thousand dollars to invest there. make a little money and you know it's a much better mathematical equation, but I guess that would cause a lot of emotional pain and you also know that hoa thieves wouldn't be a problem, no, no, no, you can. living in a 100k condo in oklahoma city it's all going to come down to making the decision, janice, like you have to make a decision, you're either going to get out of this debt or you're going to have to. let it go like something has to give, this isn't working right now, that's why you feel that tightness in your chest, but you can fix it.

You have several ways to solve it, but you have to make a decision and commit to doing it. He can't, he's going to have to work, all his health will allow, you're going to work, all your health will allow, you're not going to see the inside of a restaurant unless you're working there, you're going to sell the roadster and you guys are going to take each other seriously. paying for this, otherwise they'll have to sell it and move into a hundred thousand dollar condo, they'll be better off or something.