tithing

Dave Ramsey Financial Peace University Review: The Final Analysis

May 20, 2010 By Maggie Ellis 9 Comments

After thirteen weeks, Financial Peace University has come to an end. So, was it worth it? Was it something that I would recommend to someone in financial trouble? The answer isn’t a simple yes or no. There were many things about the class that I enjoyed, but there were many things that left me shaking my head, too. The easiest conclusion is that Dave is great for some people, but others would be better off following a different program. While I went over the specifics of each lesson in earlier posts, I wanted to take this last opportunity to discuss the overall value and worth of the class.

Is Dave Ramsay’s Financial Peace University Worth the Price?

First, let me address the price of the program. You don’t have to pay the $100 for the class to learn the same material. All of what Dave teaches can be learned for free. If you want to follow Dave, you can buy or borrow his books and do the program on your own. The concepts he teaches are very basic and are commonly available in many other books and on many websites. There are also independent websites devoted to following Dave’s programs. If you are self motivated, you will have no trouble learning his information at your own pace without paying for the class.

That said, $100 isn’t a bad price for the program. You get thirteen weeks of lessons, many materials (although there was nothing special about the website and certainly nothing I would continue to pay for once the class ended), and a fairly entertaining evening. If you have a great small group, you can also make some new friends. It’s far cheaper entertainment than going to the movies every week. I came to regard the Monday night classes as a chance to spend the evening with my spouse and socializing with some other interesting adults. I would say that if you are really strapped for cash you should try to learn the material on your own. Use the $100 to pay a bill or build an
emergency fund. However, if you have the money to spare and think you would enjoy the class, there’s certainly no harm in taking it and you might find it fun.

Financial Peace University Too Religious for Some

If you do decide to take the class, you need to think about whether the religious aspects of it will bother you. It is a Christian based program with scripture worked into the lessons and discussions of things like tithing and prayer. Tithing comes up again and again and is the most prevalent religious topic. However, there’s no overt attempt to convert you or force you into a Christ-centered life. It’s pretty mild as religious programs go. However, what happens in your small group may be different. You may get a small group that really delves into religion. Mine only touched on it briefly, but each group/class/church is different. If this sort of thing will bother you, you should find another program. If you’re able to enjoy those topics or ignore them, then you won’t have a problem. Just be aware that religion is a component of the program and decide accordingly.

Financial Peace University Best for Money Newbies

The class itself is a basic introduction to financial concepts. If you’ve never worked with money before you’ll probably find much of the material valuable. The lessons don’t go into anything very deeply, though. Much of it is in the category of a “quick overview.” However, it may inspire you to look for more information and learn more on your own. If you already know how to budget, are familiar with retirement vehicles, insurance, and property sales, much of this will be repetitive and you might be better off looking for a more advanced program.

Dave can be a good starting point for learning, but you need to be willing to look for additional information. Dave just can’t provide enough information (even in thirteen weeks) to teach you everything there is to know about personal finance. If you do the class and assume you’re set for life, you’re going to fall behind again. The early lessons about getting out of debt and budgeting are pretty comprehensive, but when the class gets to the bigger topics like insurance, investing, retirement, and property the lessons become more superficial. Once you’ve done the class you still need to learn a lot more about insurance, investing, and retirement savings if you really want to have a secure financial future.

Class Quality Depends Your Motivation and Your Group

If you’re familiar with financial concepts but not good at implementing them, the class can be motivating. You may know the material, but Dave may provide you with a kick in the pants to get on the right track. Dave is good at firing people up and making them want to get their financial house in order. Taking the class does make you more accountable than doing it on your own. You’re expected to contribute to the group discussions and to do the homework. Just the act of showing up each week may make you more accountable and therefore more successful.

Which brings me to the next point: To get the most out of the class you need to participate. If you’re not willing to do the homework or speak up in small group, you might as well go it alone. You won’t get anything out of it if you don’t do the work. Filling out the worksheets and getting to know your financial status is the whole point. If you don’t do that, you’ll be amused by the class but very little about your situation will change. In the busiest weeks the homework took a couple of hours. If you can’t commit to that, don’t waste the money on the class.

Finally (and this is the one thing you can’t really know about beforehand), a good small group makes all the difference. If you’re fortunate enough to get into a group with great leaders who can really direct a discussion and great participants who want to share, that can be worth the price of admission on its own. Those people can be great sources of support and information and may even become long time friends. The group can hold you accountable and push you to a level of success you might not reach if you did the program on your own. On the other hand, if you get a dud of a group with poor leaders and people who won’t talk, it can make for long nights. You can’t control how great your group is but if you get stuck in a bad group, ask your class coordinator if you can switch.

Final Thoughts

Dave, just like any other financial guru, isn’t for everyone. If you think you might want to take the class but aren’t sure, see if you can find someone who is currently taking it. During the program there were nights that we were allowed to bring guests so you might want to try that and see how you like it. You might also want to read his books first and see if the material interests you. If you don’t like his books, you won’t like the class. In the final analysis I found it to be a good, but not great, program that hits the high points of finance. It can be motivating for some, irritating for others. Some people find it helpful, others find it boring. I hope that over the last fourteen weeks I’ve given you the information you need to decide whether nor not the class would work for you.

Finally, if you aren’t interested in attending the course yourself, consider getting the Dave Ramsey Financial Peace University DVD Home Study Kit (9 Week Course) 2012 Release. It retails for between $185.00 and $199.00 on Amazon.com.

This is the final column in a series of posts about what you will find in Dave Ramsey’s Financial Peace University course. You can find the previous posts here: week one — week two — week three — week four — week five — week six — week seven — week eight — week nine — week ten — week eleven — week twelve — week thirteen

Dave Ramsey Financial Peace University: Week 2

February 25, 2010 By Maggie Ellis 13 Comments

This is a series of posts about what you will find in Dave Ramsey’s Financial Peace University course. This is week two (week one)

This week’s lesson is about money and relationships. I was excited about this week because relationships are something that everyone has to deal with, no matter how much money they do or don’t have. I was interested to see what advice Dave would give to deal with those times when money strains relationships. Money fights are probably more common when a family is struggling, but everyone fights about money from time to time, even those who have plenty of money. Some couples are complete opposites and one is a saver and one’s a spender. Other couples are closer to each other in terms of spending habits, but money can still cause problems. In my house, despite the fact that things are going well money-wise and we’re both natural savers, we still have times where we argue over spending or saving priorities. Rather than focusing in detail on relationships however, this lesson jumped all over the place.

It started with a discussion of the stereotypical roles that men and women play in marriage. Men like to negotiate, women prefer to bargain hunt. Women like security, men like risk. Women like to shop, men can’t stand it. Men tie money to self-esteem, women tie money to security. Men handle the money, women handle the kids. In other words, women and men approach money very differently and this is the source of friction. While I understand that drawing such generalizations makes it easier for Dave to make his points, it did get old after a while because I know many couples that don’t fit these stereotypes. I found myself wondering if he makes these generalizations just for the laugh factor and for simplicity’s sake, or if this is really how he sees the world. I can’t answer that, but knowing he comes from an extremely conservative worldview, it makes me wonder.

Despite all the generalizations, his main point for the lesson is that both partners have to take an active role in the family finances if there is to be any success. There also has to be open communication. He spends a lot of time talking about free spirits — those who don’t really care about money and just want to spend as they see fit — and nerds who are the ones who like budgets. The nerd is often guilty of trying to control or browbeat the free spirit and the free spirit is often guilty of blowing off the nerd’s suggestions. If this is your relationship, I can certainly see the problems. However, Dave doesn’t spend any time dealing with what happens when both partners are nerds (my house) or both partners are free spirits. In my house, we tend to over-control the money, sometimes to the exclusion of some much needed fun. Couples who are both free spirits would have a hard time staying out of debt and ever saving anything, I imagine. I doubt that most couples are as directly opposite as Dave would like the class to believe.

Related Articles

Dave Ramsey Financial Peace University: Week One

Dave Ramsey Financial Peace University: Week Two

Dave Ramsey Financial Peace University: Week Three

Dave Ramsey Financial Peace University: Week Four

Dave Ramsey Financial Peace University: Week Five

Dave Ramsey Financial Peace University: Week Six

Dave Ramsey Financial Peace University: Week Seven

Dave Ramsey Financial Peace University: Week Eight

Dave Ramsey Financial Peace University: Week Nine

Dave Ramsey Financial Peace University: Week Ten

I do agree that, whatever your natural tendency, be it nerd or free spirit, honest communication is essential for financial success. You can’t have each partner off doing their own thing and expect to stay on budget. You can’t have opposing goals, either, unless you negotiate how to save for both. You can’t have a partner sneaking off and buying things, or lying about how much they cost. Eventually the other partner is going to find out and stuff is going to hit the fan. Communication and openness is key and on this I agree with Dave.

The lesson hit briefly on the challenges faced by singles and then moved on to teaching kids about money. This probably could have been a lesson unto itself. There are many challenges involving kids and money, starting with the “allowance,” which is essentially giving kids money for nothing. Dave expects kids to work for the money and he calls it a “commission.” I like this approach because it begins to tie the concepts of work and money together for even the youngest kids. He also believes in making kids pay their own money for their “wants,” even if it means they are disappointed or frustrated at times. He also wants us to teach kids to give at a young age by giving a portion of their “commission” to the church. I’ll get to that in a minute.

While I don’t have kids, I have to agree with his advice here. This method of teaching kids about money seems far preferable to the approach taken by one of the members of our small group. This woman admitted that they have been giving their kids all the money they ask for for years. Now that the kids are teens, they have no real concept of where money comes from or what it means that there is no more. Now that the parents are trying to get their financial house in order, the kids are having fits because they aren’t getting what they used to. The woman is afraid that it might be too late to help her kids and I fear she may be right. It will be interesting to see, as the class goes along, whether this woman can get her kids to understand money.

Now, about the giving: In just two weeks of this class, the concept of giving to the church or “tithing” has come up no fewer than twenty times, both in Dave’s lectures, in the small group, and during the general administration/recap period that precedes each class. It’s also mentioned often in the workbook and in Financial Peace revisited. I understand where this is coming from. Dave makes no bones about conducting these classes with a Christian worldview in mind. As such, he urges people to give to the church. And the church where this class is taught would really like us to give there, so they also put in their pitch.

I don’t have a problem with the message per se, although I do wish it were uttered a little less frequently. However, if the concept of tithing bothers you, be aware before you sign up for the class that you will hear it often. If it bothers you, you can try to reframe it in terms of giving to an organization other than the church. The main point of the class is that, once you have enough money for yourself, it’s your moral obligation to give back to society. If that’s the church for you, great, but there are a lot of other charities out there that can benefit from your generosity that might suit you better.

My other growing beef with the lectures is the constant sales pitches. So far I’ve heard pitches for Financial Peace Junior for kids, Dave’s program that can be taught in high schools, the envelope system (of which we received a free version, but apparently there is a deluxe version that we can pay for), the website (that we get for free for now, but we’re encouraged to pay when our free membership runs out), and tickets to see Dave live. The workbook is peppered with ads for everything from Dave’s apparel and water bottles, to all sorts of other tools and books that we should consider. I get it. Dave is a business and needs to make money. But at the same time this is irritating to me because many of the people in the class are deeply in debt and don’t have any extra money to spend. Tempting them and making suggestions about things that can “help” them seems wrong, somehow.

When we moved on to small group, it was inspiring to see what a difference the quickie budget has made to most people in the class. Several people reported having already paid down some debts using money they freed up once they did the budget. Several more people reported that, now that they can see where the money is going, they were able to trim their spending and save up large amounts of money already. One couple got paid just as we were beginning the budget and they were able to save $390 out of that paycheck. That’s more money than they’ve ever had in the bank before. When they added the proceeds from some sales of unneeded stuff, they had managed to accumulate close to $500. They are halfway to their emergency fund in one week. Other couples had similar stories. The point is that seeing where the money was going gave them some control. So far, the plan is working for many people.

As for me, I’ve managed to put away about $50 in coupon savings that I transferred directly to savings, plus I racked up about $65 from some rewards programs, rebates, and found money. I sold a few DVD’s we no longer watch and made another $20. I didn’t count my regular contributions to savings because those aren’t “new” to me. I’m trying to come up with $1,000 of money as though I didn’t have the extra income to just put it away easily. I’m at $135, although next week I should get some more because I have some payments for side work coming in.

Another story emerged in small group that I’m interested to follow. One couple has about $35,000 in debt, not counting the house which has an ARM that is about to reset. They don’t know what to do next, but even as the husband is recounting all of this, I hear an element of pride in his voice that he has a big motorbike in the garage, that he dresses well and travels often, and that he refuses to eat leftovers. Even as he admits that these things and habits are causing some of their financial problems, I can tell he does not yet want to change. He takes pride in consumption and it’s not something he seems willing to give up just yet. The wife says that the class was her idea. It will be interesting to see if the husband comes around to her way of thinking.

Next week we’re supposed to get into hard core budgeting with a detailed budget. This week for homework, in addition to reading, we’re to start saving all of our credit card offers that we get in the mail. At the end of the class we’re going to tally up how much potential debt was offered to the class. I probably won’t get many since I opted out long ago from the mailing lists, but I still do get a few that I’ll put aside. I’ll keep saving up that $1,000, too.

Next: Dave Ramsey Financial Peace University: Week Three

Charitable Giving When You Make No Money

April 10, 2009 By David G. Mitchell 18 Comments

Although I am frugal, I like to at least think that I am neither stingy nor greedy. I am quick to spend if it will make my family happy and I have always been quick to donate to a good cause. When I go through the checkout line at my grocery store, I always try to give to whatever cause the store is supporting and we always put our envelope into the collection basket at church on Sunday. When neighborhood kids are selling candy or candles for school fund raisers, we always buy something, even if we know that we will never use it. We like to help others and we enjoy the feeling that we get by doing so. Charitable giving is a win-win situation for us, or so I hope.

Lately, I have been wondering whether we are being irresponsible by giving to charity. It’s been almost ten months since I last drew a paycheck and cash has definitely been headed out the door much faster than it’s coming in. At what point, do we need to heed the adage that “charity begins at home” or the maxim that “God helps those who help themselves.” After all, every dollar that I contribute to help with a school fundraiser could be a dollar that I need in another few months to pay for some necessary item that my family might need.

With our church, the issue of charitable giving is particularly interesting. The church asks that we give ten percent of our income. I am pretty sure that very few people at my church are doing that but even so, does that mean that the church wants us to give ten percent of nothing? After all, if I am making nothing, I can give ten percent, twenty percent, even a hundred percent, and still give nothing. I am pretty sure that the church would give me a different way to calculate my weekly donation if I tried to fall back on simple math to avoid a donation.

Thinking about charitable giving, which is down in all sectors this year, I think that all of us, can and should donate to charity, even if we are out of work. Here are a few reasons to consider:

There is Always Someone Needier than You: I donate small amounts because I know that there are many people in far worse financial condition than me. Even if that were not the case, I would want to believe that there are people in far worse financial condition than me. Giving to charity makes me feel better about myself and that is well worth the contribution.

Any Contribution is better than No Contribution: If I donate one dollar to a good cause, that is one less dollar that the cause needs to raise. If everyone tried to find a way to part with an extra dollar in the checkout line at the cash register or when the collection plate came around on Sunday, a lot of good would come of it and we would all benefit from it. Think of that the next time you buy a bottle of soda at the checkout stand.

Contribute Time without Spending Money: You do not need to donate money to contribute to a charity. You can volunteer your time. I have time on my hands so this week I will be donating twenty-five hours to various local charities. I know I won’t be able to do that when I have a new job so I need to take advantage of my free time now, and who knows, by volunteering you may meet someone who can lead you to your next job or a better job.

Contribute Skill without Spending Money: Perhaps you have a skill that you can share with a charity. Are you a plumber, a craftsman, a cook or a seamstress? Many charities need skills such as yours. Take a day each month and set aside a portion of it to assist a charity that you support.

Support a Charity by Going to Its Events: Even if you really cannot afford a donation, you might still be able to find the time and the money to go to charitable events. If a band is performing a benefit concert, buy tickets and enjoy the show. If a restaurant is hosting a tasting to raise money for a charity, go to the tasting. The charity will get some money and you will be entertained or fed or otherwise get a benefit.

How and why do you give to charities? Does the current economic climate have you donating less? Are you relying on charitable assistance? Whatever your relationship may be with charitable giving, tell us about it.