Beating Broke

Personal Finance from the Broke Perspective

Investing Made Simple

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Investing Made Simple: Index Fund Investing and ETF Investing Explained in 100 Pages or Less

By: Mike Piper (ObliviousInvestor.com)

I had the opportunity to meet Mike at the first FINCON in Chicago last year.  He’s a thoroughly nice guy.  I knew him from his blog and website, but for some reason I hadn’t known the extent of his authorship.  I found out at FINCON that he’s written several books (9 of them if I count right) on personal finance.  They mostly lean towards the topics of investing, but even encompass Social Security and business structure.  After meeting Mike, and learning about his books, I made it a point to pick one of them up to read and review.  Well, over a year later, I finally made it to the reading and reviewing part.

Since I’m not much of an investor, I thought that it would be a double good idea to pick up the Investing Made Simple title he wrote.  I can review something he’s written, while probably learning a few things along the way.  Investing made Simple is an excellent book.  It’s short, which makes it an easy read, and the writing style is light, without all the technical investing jargon that’s typical to investing books.

It’s not an in depth book on investing, but it wasn’t intended to be.  What it is intended to be is a short (100 pages or less) book that will give anyone the basics of investing while setting them on the right track to a successful investing portfolio.  I think he accomplished that.

I think one of the things that many beginning investors, including myself, get bogged down in is that the world of investing is a pretty big world.  There’s all these different ways to invest in something.  There’s shorts, longs, calls, margin, options, commodities, ETF, bonds, and the list goes on.  And on.  But, when the beginning investor, who knows little to nothing about investing goes looking for information to get them started, it’s a whole lot of overwhelming.  Piper lays it out simple and easy.  He gives you the meat of what you need to successfully invest for the long term, while quietly informing you that you’ll likely be better off ignoring most of the  stuff that’s confusing you.

What you end up with is a book with all the basics of investing in a small package.  But, you also end up with something that, for most people, is also a complete investing manual.  Keep it simple, and invest wisely is the order that I took away from reading Investing Made Simple.  I think it should be recommended reading for all beginning investors.

 

Your Money or Your Life

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Your Money or Your Life

By: Joe Dominguez and Vicki Robin

When this book first came onto my radar as a book I might like to read, it was with reviews from my fellow personal finance bloggers that described it as one that will change your life, and that will make your finances follow you rather than the other way around.  Both of those descriptions are pretty accurate.

For someone like myself, who’s been writing on personal finance for over 5 years (Beating Broke turns 4 next month!), I’ve seen just about every bit of advice and every bit of financial knowledge that there is out there.  Or, at least I think I have.  Then something like this book comes along and puts it all together in a different way, or expresses it in a slightly different way, and I learn something new.

So, here’s the short review.  If you find yourself struggling with your money, and with how your money and your life can meet, this is most certainly a book for you.  It’s not your typical personal finance book that’s going to tell you how to balance your checkbook, what to spend on (and what not to), or anything of the sort.  What it is going to do is give you the tools to tracking what you’re spending your money on and then coming to terms with whether those spending habits are habits that are putting you on a track towards a much more fulfilled life.  They go a bit further than that, and get into how you can take your reformed spending habits, track them, and then turn your life into something that you want it to be, that uses money as a tool to further your life-long goals rather than postpone them.

It’s not just a book for those that are struggling with money, either.  I found several small things that I’ll be working on implementing over the next few months that I hope will bring my finances into further alignment with goals and ambitions that have little to do with work, or money.

Have you read it?  What was your reaction?  Did you follow it’s steps, and how did they help (or not) you?

The Work Revolution

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The Work Revolution

By: Dr. Julie Clow

There are so many gurus and life coaches out there that are telling everyone that they can that the only way to truly be happy with work, is to leave work, and get on an entrepreneurial journey.  There’s books, seminars, and more than enough websites that are dedicated to helping you find a way to escape the daily grind that is your work.  Dr. Clow thinks there’s a better way to go about it.  In The Work Revolution, Dr. Clow lays down the argument that it isn’t that you need to find an escape from work, but that work as we know it is in need of a revolution.

The 9-5 workday has it’s roots deep in the factories and assembly lines of the industrial revolution.  Dr. Clow posits that we are deep into the throws of a new revolution.  An information revolution.  No longer are we constrained by the physical localities that we work, and often find ourselves working with others within our company that are in entirely different timezones, and even different continents, than we are.  Work needs to change, she says, and we have to help it.

Of course, the book isn’t all about just the hours we work.  And, it’s not just about what we as the employees and workers can do to change work.  Each of the sections has a dedicated section for employers and leaders on how they too can help change the way we work, and make our companies better.

If you aren’t ready to make the jump to self-employment and entrepreneurship, or just don’t want to, but aren’t satisfied with the work environment that you are in, take the time to read this book.  It’s full of lots of information and new ideas on how work can be given a push in the right direction towards change.

On a more personal note, it’s interesting to me that I ended up with this book for review at almost the exact same time that I was making a decision on returning to the workforce.  Many of the points that Dr. Clow makes on how work is broken, and how companies are dysfunctional stuck out to me as things that I had become unhappy with in my old job.  At the same time, I saw many of the things that she suggests as ways to make a move towards a work revolution that were already happening at what would become my new job.  Just that fact alone has made me much more comfortable with making the decision to take the job.  Proof positive that The Work Revolution is a good book to read even if you’re currently looking for a job!