Dave Ramsey trashes owning gold

[oneeye]

Last night on his radio show he said under no circumstances should anyone own gold. His logic was than "gold itself has no intrinsic value" and that its value exists simply because people want it.

I too believe Dave knows his stuff on debt reduction, but the statement above totally contradicts itself. Did he really says this, or are you paraphrasing him? If people "want" something, it has VALUE! That is the definition of value.

Gold has value to humans for thousands of years and will continue to have value.

With that said, I am more interested in buying silver. JMO.
Dan

 

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[Immy]

That was an actual quote. He doesn't realize how absurd that is. Using that philosophy, nothing has intrinsic value.

I don't listen to him regularly but has he said anything about silver? Or is his belief about gold consistant for all PMs.

Just wanted to clear up that I'm not a Dave hater at all. I used his method to wipe out about $4K in debt several years ago, and I didn't even realize it! (A friend passed it off as her advice)

 

[kai_gold]

I used his method to wipe out about $4K in debt several years ago, and I didn't even realize it! (A friend passed it off as her advice)

And he borrowed it from others. The idea of rolling over debt payments has been around for a long time. Every now and then some guru comes along and tries to brand the idea his own by calling it a snowball, vortex, whatever. Easier to borrow common sense than to create common sense.

I agree with a lot of his stuff, but question some too. He favors mutual funds too much for my taste. If the economy totally collapses, his mutual funds will be worthless too. Some security.

I'm not so sure about buying a ton of gold now in case it is a bubble that crashes soon. If the steep increase in price continues, then I think we are in trouble as an economy. Doesn't speak well for the value of the dollar. Wish my wages were going up that fast.

But at least the gold is tangible when compared to mutual funds. Even if you lost some money on it, you will still have something.

 

[StevoCBR]

I have noticed that to. I like Dave Ramsey on everything he says but that. Kind of shame I think. Wonder what is reason is. I'm sure there is a story.

 

[Daedalus]

He can have his paper money , and if you look back over the thousands of years Gold and Silver is what was wanted and used. It may not be of much value for awhile if there is a huge collapse , but it will be not to long after as Nations put them selves back together .

Now I can see not basing everything in gold only .

 

[mrs.oroblanco]

Dave Ramsey knows his stuff - no doubt about that.

I think you need to extrapolate on what he said about gold. Sell it - pay off your debts.

Though I don't think he "gets" gold ownership, I think his major point is that it is stupid to own gold when you are thousands of dollars in debt.


Beth

 

[BlueDuck]

With a several thousand year track record Ill stick with gold.

 

[Dave44]

I am still not sure about Dave but I will say this. The difference between the depression of the 30s and what could happen now is that people owned their property and as a rule did not lug around near the debt that we do now.. that could make a depression now the most cataclysmic event to hit this nation since its inception. Pay off debt,, and then prepare your house. I like gold, I like silver better.

 

[mrs.oroblanco]

No arguement here - I'll take precious metals over just about anything else. No matter what, someone will always be willing to trade you something for gold and silver.

Of course, we're going to hope that everyone got some before it reached the price it is now.


B

 

[Texas Jed]

Dave said the same thing about one year ago about silver. A woman called him for his advice because her husband wanted to invest a large sum of money in physical silver and she was concerned. Dave told the woman on air that her husband was an idiot and not to let him do it. Silver was like 17 an ounce then. So who is the real idiot.

 

[mrs.oroblanco]

Yep, I've definitely heard him say things like that. He does not appreciate the value of precious metals.

He did a whole show about 8 months or so ago about it. The only 2 valid reasons I heard (and of course, he had lots of other reasons), was not to buy stuff when you are in debt, that investment comes after paying off debt, and the second thing he said was that the government can make precious metal ownership null and void with the stroke of a pen - which is true and has happened before.

He thinks a good fund that pays 12% no matter what, is the way to go. IMO, the answer is really somewhere in the middle. Have a good retirement account (run by yourself), and buy gold and silver. Precious metals are volatile, like oil, goes up and down - but always has a value.

Beth

 

[billjustbill]

I'm not a "Doom and Gloomer", but I wonder what Dave would say after reading this article or looked at the FDIC list for weekly failed banks?

http://news.goldseek.com/InternationalForecaster/1301848531.php


http://www.fdic.gov/bank/individual/failed/banklist.html

Even though the first link/article is from those that eat, drink, and sleep on Gold and Silver, it's worth understanding some other's points of view.... It gets to the point toward the last....

It seems that for the coming days of 2011, JUST keeping what you've got is going to be a gamble. It's going to take work finding ways to keep what little dirt and dollars that we've spent our lifetime WORKING for....

 

[hombre_de_plata_flaco]

I went to some Ramsey seminar broadcast at a local church in early 2009. This was right after the "big bailout mess" started rollin'.

Ramsey was taking questions from the live audience via the web and someone asked about investing in gold and silver. He said something similar to the first post but I remember his quote being something like "gold and silver are just rocks". Rambled on about how the stock market consistently outperformed all the precious metals.

Whoops!

Like someone else mentioned - he should stick to helping people get out of debt because he really missed the mark on that particular question.

 

[Ron20]

Couple points to make about Dave Ramsey and gold. First, Dave Ramsey is worth several hundred million dollars, so I have to believe he knows a thing or 20 about making money. Second you never hear of billionaires buying up massive quantities of gold. And they know a thing or 25 about making money.

My wife and I went through the program and paid off almost 25k and saved an additional 10k to get my wife a decent car over a period of 2 years and an income of 60k. We now are stable enough that I don't have to have a job while I go to school for 2 years. Call me crazy, but I believe Dave.

Real estate will have the highest value when it hits the fan and assuming gold will have any value in a collapsed economy, your 5k or 10k in saved gold won't get you through it. Sell your gold, buy some land, real estate value has a better track record.

 

[hombre_de_plata_flaco]

I'm a Clark Howard man myself. I've never heard him trash precious metals, and he didn't go bankrupt in the real estate market like Dave Ramsey did. He also doesn't get all "preachy" during his broadcasts.

 

[Ron20]

I'm a Clark Howard man myself. I've never heard him trash precious metals, and he didn't go bankrupt in the real estate market like Dave Ramsey did. He also doesn't get all "preachy" during his broadcasts.

The fact that he went bankrupt 25 years ago and his net worth now is several hundred million dollars actually lends credibility to the fact that his process works. And he gets preachy because many of his ideas come from the bible, so there you go.

 

[jim4silver]

Couple points to make about Dave Ramsey and gold. First, Dave Ramsey is worth several hundred million dollars, so I have to believe he knows a thing or 20 about making money. Second you never hear of billionaires buying up massive quantities of gold. And they know a thing or 25 about making money.

My wife and I went through the program and paid off almost 25k and saved an additional 10k to get my wife a decent car over a period of 2 years and an income of 60k. We now are stable enough that I don't have to have a job while I go to school for 2 years. Call me crazy, but I believe Dave.

Real estate will have the highest value when it hits the fan and assuming gold will have any value in a collapsed economy, your 5k or 10k in saved gold won't get you through it. Sell your gold, buy some land, real estate value has a better track record.

I don't know who Dave Ramsey is and have never listened to him, so I cannot comment on what he says.

However, your comment about billionaires intrigues me. I am wondering how many billionaires, or even millionaires you know and have spoken to about their investments? You might be correct though that not many of them have been buying gold in the past, in the sense that sometimes it takes a while for certain investments to take hold. I would bet that as time goes on and our economy further tanks more billionaires and millionaires will convert some of the wealth into PMs. Just because someone has that much wealth does not necessarily mean they know everything about investments per se. Some have inherited their wealth and some have specific niche areas that have made them wealthy, but that does not mean they know everything there is to know about how to preserve that wealth over time as the economy changes. Fortunes are lost and made constantly.

I do know a couple of coin dealers very well, and they have told me in the past that they have regular customers who buy $100K-$250K in gold and silver (mostly gold) EACH month for several months at a time, and some for the past couple of years. While they are probably not billionaires, they have to be fairly wealthy to be able to afford that. Further, very wealthy folks tend to be quite secretive about their investments and won't go blabbing on a blog, forum or the news about what they own.

Real estate right now is a terrible investment unless it is farm land or similar. You will see residential and commercial real estate fall further into the next couple of years in my opinion. At some time it will be very wise to convert some PMs into residential or commercial real estate, but I would not be doing that now personally.

Foreign central banks have been loading up on tons of gold in the recent past. I believe they might know something that us "little people" don't know. But I would not recommend a person put all their wealth into PMs, better to be diversified.

Everyone needs to make their own personal decisions about investing and it is better not to take anyone's specific advice in my opinion. But if I personally had to follow some else's advice I would look for people who have made fortunes and seem to be consistently correct in their calls, like Jim Rogers, who used to be in with Soros years ago and from what I have seen and read is correct much of the time. He is very bullish on commodities in general and bearish on the dollar.

Jim

 

[mrs.oroblanco]

Jim,

You are right - everyone has to make their own decisions about investing or any of their money decisions.

However, when real estate is in the dumps - real estate is cheap - and one of the best values you can get (assuming you do your homework).

I will say - these people who buy your scrap gold only give you HALF of what it is worth - at best. And if you sell gold coins to them - they never take into consideration the coin value - only the gold.

I'm watching a program right now about it on tv - they offered 500 dollars for a $3.00 gold coin - worth $5,000. I do understand that the buyers have to make their profit - but - half?

I have heard Dave Ramsey's course - and read some of his books - I don't agree with him 100% - but, I do understand NOT buying gold (or anything else) until you have all your bills paid and you are DEBT FREE. Which, is his motto. Rice and beans and beans and rice, no going out to dinners - nothing - "live like no one else, so that you can live like no one else".

Beth

 

[hombre_de_plata_flaco]

I think the poster above may be a spambot or something that crawls the web looking for negative posts about Dave Ramsey to reply to.

A poster decided to make his first post the moment I said something bad about Alex Jones as well. Probably a robot or cyborg of some kind.

 

[JD-GA]

Jim,

You are right - everyone has to make their own decisions about investing or any of their money decisions.

However, when real estate is in the dumps - real estate is cheap - and one of the best values you can get (assuming you do your homework).

I will say - these people who buy your scrap gold only give you HALF of what it is worth - at best. And if you sell gold coins to them - they never take into consideration the coin value - only the gold.

I'm watching a program right now about it on tv - they offered 500 dollars for a $3.00 gold coin - worth $5,000. I do understand that the buyers have to make their profit - but - half?

I have heard Dave Ramsey's course - and read some of his books - I don't agree with him 100% - but, I do understand NOT buying gold (or anything else) until you have all your bills paid and you are DEBT FREE. Which, is his motto. Rice and beans and beans and rice, no going out to dinners - nothing - "live like no one else, so that you can live like no one else".

Beth

For many of us "in the business" these cash for gold places only help people like me get more business. Once one of these places blows someone out of their store ,and I double or even better the offer they received at one, I have gained a loyal customer who passes my name to the next. There are plenty of outlets that pay WAY over half value. You just have to do due diligence and find them. Unfortunately those spending the most on advertising, screaming the loudest, and using 5 people holding signs up on street corners are being seen enough to rip plenty of people off. This week alone ive had a deal where a girl was offered $80 for 25 grams of 18k gold by the local we buy gold folks. I payed $750 for what the cash for gold store offered $80. My payout was 83% of melt leaving me more than enough room to earn a living and keep a young lady from getting robbed. Ive now had 2 of her family in my store since she was in on monday.