The Smartest Money Book You'll Ever Read: Everything Yo… (2024)

The Smartest Money Book You'll Ever Read
Everything You Need to Know About Growing, Spending, and Enjoying Your Money by Daniel R. Solin
5h 26m narrated by Joe Barrett, 290 pages

Genre: Personal Finance

Featuring: What's The Point?, Epigraphs, Mint.com, Wrapping Your Mind Around Your Money, Master Your Universe, Freedom From Debt, The Home Dilemma, Rest Insured: Solving the Insurance Rubik's Cube, The Investment Industry: Friend and Foe, Don't Fight the Markets, Putting Your Money to Work, Real Retirement Planning, Life (and Death) Events, Putting It All Together, Sources, Support, and Supplemental Reading, The Lifestyle of the Broke and Homeless, A Map Won't Help Without a Destination, Focus on Your Net Worth,The Thrill of a Budget Beats the Agony of Poverty, Pay Yourself First, Build Savings Muscle, Investing in Your Home, Home Economics: Should You Buy or Rent?, Foreclosures and Short Sales, Annuities, Beating the 401(k) Rip-Off, Index Funds, Making Your Money Outlive You, Sources of Cash in Retirement, Life (and Death) Events, Kids Cost Money, College, Teaching Your Children About Money, Giving Back, In Sickness and in Wealth, Estate Planning Basics, Get a Budget, Get Out of Debt, Get a Home, Get Insured, Get Invested, Bulletproof Your Plan, Sources, Support, and Supplemental Reading; Glossary, Appendix, Risk and Return Summaries, Acknowledgements, Publisher’s Note, Index

Rating as a movie: PG

Quotes: "It’s sad that so few people achieve financial independence. Less than 3% of the U.S. population has $1.5 million or more in assets, free of debt, and this includes the equity in their homes. A recent study found that nearly half of Americans probably couldn’t come up with $2,000 in 30 days. (If you’re not familiar with terms like assets or equity or if you come across any other financial terms that you’re not sure you know the meaning of, you will probably find them defined in the glossary.) This reversal of fortune for so many Americans is dispiriting. This book will help put you on sound financial footing. This is not a book about how to get rich quick. But even if you are 60 and broke, I can show you how to become free of financial worries in a year or so and then rebuild from there. If you have 5 to 10 years, I can show you how to become financially comfortable. If you have more time, or have a good starting base of assets, I can show you how to become wealthy. You don’t need a lot of money to implement my suggestions. You can start small. If you don’t have a high income, if the value of your portfolio or your home has fallen, or if your retirement plans have been derailed, you can rebuild. The secret is to plan and budget."

"Here’s what you can expect to learn: 1. How to rebuild from the devastating financial reversals of the past several years. 2. How to free up money to invest and begin the journey to put you on sound financial footing. 3. How to access the tools at Mint.com (if you choose to do so) for budgeting, tracking, investing, and shopping for financial services. 4. How to avoid becoming a victim of financial institutions who remain dedicated to making money at your expense. 5. Why financial planning is an absolute necessity in the current financial climate of turbulence and uncertainty."

My rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟💵

My thoughts:📱37% 2:01:06 Chapter 19 - Annuities: Don’t Toss the Baby Out with the Bathwater - This book has a lot of good points but some of the data is dated, it would be nice to know how the seniors are doing in 2020, but the 2009 information made its point.
📱55% 2:58:30 Chapter 27 - Why Index Funds Work for Investors - Crooks everywhere, no surprises here.

This is a pretty good money book. I'm glad I finally got it off my TBR. I need to pass this one on to my kids and do a refresher in the future. I would love a revised and updated publication of this book.

Recommend to others: Yes. There is a lot of good information that helps you avoid the financial industry taking advantage of you.

Because I am of a certain age, I am not a fan of mint.com. The cover of this book has a seal of approval saying “endorsed by mint.com” I should say so! This book may as well have been written by mint.com for all the “mint hints”, which are available to mint users and therefore, useless to me. I wonder if Mr. Solin received compensation for the endorsem*nt. If you like mint.com, you will probably love this book.
I did find some value in the material presented and perhaps I will try one of his other books, but I do not think this is “The Smartest Money Book You’ll Ever Read”.

Solin provides more information on budgeting, paying down debt, buying a house..with some repeat information on investing, financial advisors, wills, and insuring yourself and your family.

1- Save 7-10% of your gross (pre-tax) income.
2- 95% of actively managed funds fail to match their market indexes
3- Devote no more than 25% of your income to housing costs (mortgage, insurance, tax, utilities)
4- How much do you need to retire? Experts say 75% of pre-retirement income (that seems high considering how much of current income goes to housing costs, children/schooling/childcare, and savings). That means saving 15% of income every year for 40 years. Another rule of thumb is 20 times your annual income while employed.

4 stars. Informative.

Stop working for money
and put your money to work for you! Tens of thousands of readers trust Dan Solin's advice when it comes to investing, managing their 401(k)s, and planning for retirement. Now Solin offers the smartest guide to money management and financial planning yet.

From managing your debt, boosting your savings, and owning (or renting) a home to buying insurance, maximizing investment returns, and retiring when you want to, The Smartest Money Book You'll Ever Read is your road map to financial freedom-and to enjoying yourself along the way.

Just a heads-up -- this book recommends the use of Mint.com. On about every fifth page. That said, it's a good book. It covers the standard budgeting, saving, getting out of debt, making your money work for you, how to find the best insurance, whether or not you should own or rent a home, stock markets and mutual funds, estate planning, and how to navigate extenuating circ*mstances such as serious illness.

If you've ever read articles/blog posts/forum posts about personal finance, or a book about personal finance, this book will NOT be useful to you. This book is an introduction to personal finance, but not as useful as perusing reputable online sources.

It reads like a really long advertisem*nt by Mint.com. Mint.com is a very useful tool, but I did not enjoy expecting to read a book by a respected investor advocate, and instead reading a very long and useless commercial.

One star.

It's hard to find a money book to get really excited about because so much of the advice that's out there seems like it should be common sense. Spend less than you earn, save, invest, and avoid debt like the plague. It's all good advice and yet it's not that simple in reality.

The financial industry as a whole is full of people whose only goal is to take money out of your pocket and put it in theirs. Invest in an index fund with Vanguard. It's good advice but he doesn't tell you that you need $10,000 dollars as a minimum investment. I think I have 10k laying around the kitchen somewhere. It's a lazy 10k and needs a job. Ten thousand dollars is a lot of money for most people.

Solin also advocates paying off your largest debts before you start saving. It makes sense because you will pay more in interest than most savings products will give you. Dave Ramsey advocates building an emergency fund then paying down your debts from smallest to largest. Both methods make sense but Ramsey's gives you the ability to feel like you're making progress. We build on success.

This is essentially a book of tips and couldn't be anything else, considering the breadth. I find it useful to read on these topics. Even if I disagree with some of the tactics, it keeps me focused on my goals.

The Richest Man in Babylon is general principles that apply in any economy, The Smartest Money Book You'll Ever Read is specific advice for modern Americans. Exhaustive in scope, no one person needs all of this advice, but everyone could probably use some of it.

It seems that most financial advice writers have one piece of advice that they consider to be of paramount importance, and they feel the only way to impress their audience with the importance of this advice is to repeat it in the same words two or three times a chapter for the middle third of the book. The advice may be quite good, but the approach is not the soul of persuasion. If you want to cut to the chase, in this book, it's low-fee, passively-managed indexed funds and fund families.

It had too much in it to be truly effective. It had only like 230 pages but 47 chapters so you can understand how everything is shortened and condensed. It's a great book if you are just starting to read finance and aren't really sure of everything just yet because it gives a good overview of a lot (debt, retirement, owning a home, life insurance, investing, estate planning etc). But if you are looking for a finance book that is more detailed in specific areas geared to your needs, I'd recommend trying another finance book.