Book review: Orman’s Young, Fabulous, & Broke
I like to think I’m fabulous, I’m avoiding being broke, and — well — youth is subjective. With only one out of the three adjectives applying to me, why would I read Suze Orman’s The Money Book for the Young, Fabulous & Broke? Because I wanted to find out if I knew as much as I thought I knew about money and –let’s face it — none of us know as much about money as we should.
In these tough economic times, I think a lot of people want to know how to prioritize their expenditures, how to decide if they should pay off credit cards or save for retirement, or make other tough money decisions. This book explains what people should consider when trying to make these decisions.
What are the issues Orman discusses?
1) Know your credit score and how to improve it
2) Career moves
3) The credit card game
4) Student debt
5) Saving your money
6) Retirement
7) Investing
8) Purchasing a car
9) Purchasing a home
10) Love and money
These topics apply to everyone — from the newly graduated to the newly downsized (and everyone around and in between).
Everyone will find a useful tip in this book. The tip that was new to me was the one about making sure to max out my employer’s 401(k) match, but not to invest more than required to obtain the full match. Any additional retirement saving should be done through a Roth IRA. Orman’ll explain it better than I ever could, but it has to do with the fact that I am (hopefully) making less money now than I will in the future, so it is better to be taxed on my retirement savings now. When it is time to retire and start withdrawing money from the Roth IRA, I will only be taxed on investment income.
My only warning about this book is that it was first written pre-2008 recession. It looks like she is now selling an updated paperback edition. If you have a choice, try to obtain the updated book.
(Even if you don’t plan to read the book yourself, it might make a nice gift for the recent grad in your life.)
