“You’re Going To Get Screwed”

[Music] brought to you by the every dooll app start budgeting for free today I am a longtime listener and uh firsttime caller okay I'm on baby step six and I listen to your show all the time and you recommend never to coign for someone correct but I have I'm in a situation when I do want to co-sign for somebody under a certain circumstance so my my my husband's cousin for cousin she's been on Section 8 anyway she lost that now she's in her 60s she needs to get an apartment there's a special needs trust that her parents have set up for her and in order for her to get into an apartment um she needs to have someone cosign or her brother who is the trustee refused to do so and I was wondering warning warning why would her brother who loves her more than you do he's her brother for God's sakes not want to cosign he he's he doesn't love her oh boy he doesn't mind if she goes home yes no that's true I don't believe it is totally true it's from a very dysfunctional family he's not willing his wife is telling me he's willing to let her go homeless if I have to there is more to this story than you are telling or believing well she's uh she has a problem she has personality disorder yes that's right okay she she's in her 60s she's never worked in her life she always on Section Eight she lost that who who is the who is the custodian of this of the Special Needs Trust her brother her brother so would will you have access to the funds for this apartment or does she have access to the funds right so what I'm gonna ask if it's okay if that works if you agree that's just a you know right thing for me to do I can try to ask a brother for 14 months of pay in an account to me and then I will transfer that to her monthly MH is that okay funding is available for a whole year is it safe for me to cosign I wouldn't what if she trashes the place she well she won't trash the place but she might you know have no she's not like that but she will she might have trouble with neighbors that's the only that's the kind of problem she has or gets kicked out or there's four has four people over or gets she won H people over she'll just like she loves cats she'll probably you know take care of break all the rules rules don't apply to her typ rules don't apply to her yeah and Judy we're we're we're going to tell you no if if this money's available then she can get the apartment under her name you can write the checks every month for her if she can't do that that's fine but you don't need a coign but I but how do I prove to the apartment people that there's money available well you would have to have the money available yeah a statement yeah and can I show do I show them what what do I do because we're in California there's a lot of these places and I don't live in the same town as she does so it's not easy for me to like take her somewhere and talk to someone you know well you get on the phone with the apartment manager and you say this is what's going on she has a Special Needs Trust brother's going to send you documentation he's going to end the documentation send it to the property manager and say uh we'll set aside the first 14 months and go ahead and just prepay the rent for 14 months months that's fine too oh just prepay yeah but you don't cosign and they're going to try to get you to cosign because you have a blind spot here kiddo this this lady H is uh she's gotten a hold of your heart and she's sweet and she does need someone to help her but we need to Define help very carefully help involves her behaving and you're not willing to make that requirement nor can you make that guarantee based on her 60 years of misbehavior right you're going to get screwed if you do this please don't do it okay it's going to go up in the apartment okay so I tell the apartment that I have money but I need to show some proof right to the trust yeah the the the brother's gonna have to send documentation and by the way you don't have this money Judy you still have to go through a guy that you say doesn't even love her doesn't care about her doesn't care if she ends up on the street right so all of this is like two hypotheticals removed from ity and let me help you with this okay it's not that he doesn't love her it's from the 16 times he tried to help her and it burned him and he's done being burned so he's putting up a boundary that's different than not loving and you got you're calling it not love and a dysfunctional family I'm calling her a dysfunctional person who needs love and help but has burned everything around her to the ground to the point her own brother won't help her you can't put that on him I'm not going to let you do it yeah I don't even know him and I'm not going to let he's not the jerk in this story okay and there's not a jerk in the story there's a sad lady with mental illness and you're going to get burned to the ground when her mental illness activates if you're signed on the documents yeah I don't sign just I I don't know an apartment complex it won't take your check if if you got it so if they won't take your money so she can get her own place listen I'm a landlord if I know what's going on here I'm not putting her in there that's fair that's fair because prepaying the rent ain't half my problem it's the 93 cats that end up in my building right or all the neighbors or whatever or she burns the neighbor cat live in the front yard I don't know what's going to happen here I don't know I don't know what's going on with her no I don't want her as a tenant under any circumstances co-signer prepaid double paid no thank you yeah Life's too short to sign up for drama as a landlord so that's what you're going to that's what you're going to face H more than anything else so you're please honey don't don't confuse this and and you you're trying to do a nice good Noble thing in a really um naive and unwise way that was that was kind that's the best way to say it and I I think this is a bigger conversation Dave when you want to help somebody and you get all these scenarios in your mind and then you spend all these nights and weeks worrying about it all of this phone call could have been already headed off you could have already sat down with your brother you could have already called an apartment complex and taken all these worrying very Ables off the table so that you know okay here's the final step here and you probably would have found out a long time ago you either don't need to do be a cosigner or nobody's going to let her live there you're going have to come up with another option right but there's all like well then I might do this and then after that I'm GNA do you don't even know if all this is is is going to happen and you're so spun up about it just go find out find out I co-signed for stuff when I was young and foolish and I ended up paying it one poor guy cosigned for me I went bankrupt he ended up paying it I had to go back and pay him later his wife still don't like me yeah 35 years later so it's okay it's valid I mean she got screwed they didn't ultimately get but I mean she thought she did and so I get it I completely get it Proverbs 17:18 says in the scripture one lacking in sense co-signs for another when I cosigned Judy I was lacking in sense if you co-sign this the Bible says you're lacking in sense I didn't say it get mad at God don't do it that was that was that was pretty good I mean you you kind of brought the Bible out so there you go there we go brought the Bible out yeah that that's the final right there that's the final one that's the one open phones at 8825 5225 Kim is in New York hi Kim how are you hi thank you for taking my call sure what's up so I wanted to know how to save uh money for a mortgage down payment whilst you're paying right very hard it is yeah um are you how much debt have you got um I can go through the numbers and I can tell you just how much debt have you got just give me the total uh I want to say about 40,000 how much is that your car well me and my husband's together it's about uh he owes six I owe 16 and he owes about 20 okay how much is the car my car total with the insurance just insurance or just the car no the debt on the car how much debt is on the car about 16 okay all right of your 40 or of your yeah of your 40 so half of it your car okay so here's the simple answer but it's not a simple answer is when you don't have any debt payments you'll have more room in your budget so before you start worrying about saving for a down payment on a house let's clear the debt off that may mean selling a car it may mean taking an extra job it will mean not eating out it will mean not going on vacation so that I can get out of debt cuz if you didn't have any payments oh you'd have money to save for your down payment that's where it comes from your most powerful wealth building tool is your income don't give it to somebody else and then you'll have it to save for a down payment simple but hard create your free 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