Some Good Books

Here is a summary of some of the good books that I've read. I would recommend these books myself. They cover different finance related topics and theres likely to be something here appropriate for most everyone:

The Unofficial Guide to Real Estate Investing is a very comprehensive introduction to investing in real estate. The book covers everything from valuing properties, buying and financing, tax implications and 1031 exchanges all the way through being a landlord.

The Insider's Guide to Buying a New or Used Car is a complete guide to buying either a used or new car. They discuss topics such as : researching cars, getting loans, doing a trade in, test drives, figuring dealer costs, buying tactics, countering the dealers sales pitch, and good and bad negotiating tactics. There are a lot of good tips on negotiating sales and I think that's the section I got the most out of.

Investing for Dummies by Eric Tyson. Reading a Dummies book doesn't mean you're literally a dummy. Topics include overview of different types of investments, discussion of risks and rewards, stocks, bonds, mutual funds, real estate and small businesses. The book does a good job of pointing out things to avoid and giving tips on various topics.

The Complete Idiot's Guide to Getting Rich is focused on obtaining and growing wealth. Don't let the title throw you, its not a get rich quick scheme. The book covers all the phases of wealth building and I particularly like their 5 stages of wealth.

The Millionaire Next Door is mostly statistics on millionaires. I found it a very interesting read but honestly it doesn't have too much along the lines of advice or plans to help you. The book does a great job of laying out the case for how people who live below their means have the best shot at wealth.

Book Review: Nickel and Dimed : On (Not ) Getting By in America

This is a review of "Nickel and Dimed : On (Not) Getting By in America" by Barbara Ehrenreich.

The concept of the book is to run a real world test to see if the author could "get by" on a low wage job. The author worked in Key West, Maine and Minneapolis working as a waitress, maid and at Walmart for a month each to test her ability to make ends meet. While it is an interesting and at times an entertaining read, the book fails to accomplish its goal of demonstrating the real difficulty in low wage work.

Nickel and Dimed was a entertaining and easy read. First of all the concept of testing out the difficulty of living on low wages is an interesting idea to me. The stories of her daily work and interaction with management and co-workers were interesting. I laughed out loud more than once. But unfortunately I was most entertained by the stupid things the author did and said.

Let me be clear that I think it can be very difficult for someone to support themselves on minimum wage. Its not impossible for a single person to survive but it isn't easy. Supporting a family on one minimum wage income is not very realistic if not basically impossible. I generally agree with the authors belief that its hard to make it on low income wages but I feel she did a horrible job proving or arguing the point.

My biggest fault with Nickel and Dimed is how poorly she proved her point. First of all she set out with the assumption that it couldn't be done. Its not hard to fail if you believe you will fail. More than that she didn't do much at all to really prove her point. She was able to find work pretty easily. She rarely talked about the actual dollars she was spending. She didn't seem to do a good job at being frugal at all in my opinion. About all she did was demonstrate that work can be hard, bosses can be jerks and low cost housing can be hard to find. I didn't need to read a over 200 pages to find that out. The biggest difficulty she had was the cost of housing. If she had simply gotten a roommate then her budget problems would have been fixed. She could have made a lot better argument for her point if she covered such topics as the cost of health care insurance, the cost of child care, unexpected emergency bills or high cost of gasoline but she didn't go into these topics much if at all.

Unfortunately the author had some significant personal biases that detracted from the actual topic. While working as a waitress she decided that 'visible Christians' were bad tippers and felt necessary to share that opinion with us. It was a pretty judgmental and stereotypical declaration that I don't expect is based on anything credible except a couple anecdotal incidents. The author is an atheist. So it seems to me she's really just voicing her anti religious views. She also spent a significant amount of time whining about how she disliked drug tests. She went so far as to suspect that its 'demeaning effect' was appealing to employers. These points are pretty irrelevant to the struggles of an individual earning low wages. They really only seem to be in the book as a reflection of the authors biases. The author later revealed an obvious bias on that topic when she feared she might not pass a drug test due to her "chemical indiscretion in recent weeks". I guess if you use marijuana as she had then the idea of a drug test might be a concern. An atheist drug users dislike for religious people and drug tests doesn't have anything to do with how hard it can be to make in on low wages. When she went into those topics it was distracting and detracted from the legitimacy of her points.

The author seems to have some problems with management or maybe authority in general. She frequently assumed or implied that the people in charge had evil motives for everything. The worst example of this kind of thing on her part was when she called the owner of the house keeping business a 'pimp' for no real reason I could see other than that he was a man who employed women.

At times Nickel and Dimed came across with a condescending or arrogant tone. Here's a good example of that "You might think that unskilled jobs would be a snap for someone who holds a PhD." To even suggest that having a PhD means you'll be a good waitress or maid or have an easy time of those jobs is arrogant and condescending in my opinion. She declares in her conclusion "I am an unusually fit person" which isn't what I'd call humble. I found it amusing how she was surprised that nobody she worked with seemed to care that she was writing a book.

With all its faults, I have to admit that I actually enjoyed reading the book. The concept was very fascinating. The writing and story was interesting enough to keep my attention. But the author failed to make a good argument at all and had some views that would offend many people. Its sad though since I do think there is a real story to be told about the difficulties of the working poor in America. Nickel and Dimed simply doesn't do the topic justice at all.

There is a preview of the book on Google Books if you search for the title.

But the bottom line is : I can not recommend this book.


If you're interested in the topic then I'd recommend instead watching the "Minimum Wage" episode of the TV show 30 Days from Morgan Spurlock. You can watch the full episode on the Hulu site. They do a LOT better job of discussing the actual finances without all the attitude that Ehrenreich had.

Free copy of "The Difference" by Jean Chatzky

You can get a FREE copy of The Difference by Jean Chatzky. You can get the book courtesy of Oprah.com.

The Oprah site says the following about The Difference :

What can The Difference teach you?

• The top five things you can do to not just survive but thrive during tough times
  
• The eight things that make The Difference (i.e., the key traits and abilities of people who describe themselves as financially free)
  
• Advice for those having job insecurity as well as strategies for finding a job
  
• Why money doesn't breed happiness—but happiness can breed money
  
• The direct connection between The Difference and your health
  
• How people who know The Difference make a difference for others
  
• Myths and facts about the wealthy

I heard about this from Happy Money Medium's article that I found on PFblogs.

Is a Kindle a frugal purchase?

Every time I go to the Amazon page it seems you see something throw in your face about their Kindle. Honestly it makes me wish I could 'opt out' of their hyperactive Kindle promotional campaign. But still I'm a fan of electronics gadgets and the Kindle is pretty neat. It lets you store 100's of books that you download directly from Amazon on their wireless network. I personally love how it reminds me of a Star Trek Tricorder. However as neato a gadget as it is, the new Kindle 2 costs $359 to buy. That is quite a lot more than the $1-2 which I usually spend on used books. The books for the Kindle do come at a discount price over new print copies so theoretically you could end up saving money in the long run with a Kindle. I decided to take a closer look at the Kindle to see if it can save you money or not.

New Print Books

First lets look at a few somewhat randomly selected popular new titles. I grabbed the following books off the front page of the Kindle section on Amazon.

Here are the titles and their costs for traditional new and used print versions:

THE PLUTO FILES = $12.99 used, $16.29 new
Kill for Me = $7.72 used, 11.55 new
Up To No Good = $12.88 used, $16.32 new
The 4 Day Diet = used $14.30, new $14.97

Average used prices $11.97, Average new price $14.78

Savings with Kindle : $4.83 versus new, $2.02 versus used

At least when looking at this small sample it looks like the Kindle will save you about $2 over used versions or little less than $5 versus new copy when buying newly published books.

Older print books
Personally most of the books I read are not brand new books. A lot of the books I read were written years or decades ago. How does the Kindle do when you're buying older print books?

To test this I selected a few of my favorite titles and then checked the Kindle price versus new and used on Amazon

The Grapes of Wrath = Kindle $9.99, $2.5 used up to $11.05 new
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy = Kindle $6.39, $0.01 used up to $15.6 new
Ringworld's Children = Kindle $6.39, $2.33 used, $7.99 new
Children of Dune = Kindle $7.19, $16.49 new, $0.64 used
Battlefield Earth = Kindle $6.39, $2.99 used, $29.99 new


Totals : Kindle $36.39, Used $8.47 + $19.95 s/h = $28.42, New $81.12 + s/h

For older print books the Kindle price is $7.97 more expensive then buying used and at least $44.73 less expensive than buying new. On average thats $1.59 more expensive per title for used and $8.95 less expensive per title for new. Note that the savings on new versions is a bit skewed by that rather pricey $30 new copy of Battlefield Earth. If you remove that from the averages then the savings per new title is $5.28 per new title.

Books aren't the only thing you can get with a Kindle. They also advertise the ability to get newspapers and magazines delivered to your Kindle. Lets look at how the prices on news print stacks up for a Kindle.

Magazines

U.S.News & World Report $1.49 on Kindle
Note that they say the Kindle version "contains most articles found in the print edition, but will not include all images"

Or you can get a print subscription of 50 issues for $19.99 or $0.40 an issue

Time $1.49 each on Kindle
Again you get "most articles" and "not include all images" on Kindle

Or you can get the print subscription for 84 issues for $20 or $0.24 an issue

For magazines it looks like the Kindle is typically over $1 more per magazine edition than the print versions.

Newspapers
USA TODAY $11.99 / month
Kindle offers "most articles" and "will not include all images"

Or you can get the print subscription for 12 weeks for $30 or $10 a month

The New York Times the Kindle is $13.99 a month
"Also, some features such as the crossword puzzle, box scores and classifieds are not currently available."

Home delivery on the West coast is Daily Delivery (7 Days) for "just" $6.70 per week or $26.80 a month.
Or there is also an Online version including crossword for $14.95 a month

The Kindle is about $2 more a month for USA Today. With the NY Times though you can save money with the Kindle. The online version is $1 more a month and the print version can be up to $12.80 more a month.

So with newspapers it depends, they can be a bit cheaper or a bit more expensive.

Cost comparisons in summary

New print books: Kindle saves you $2 per title versus used or $4-5 versus new
Old print books : Kindle costs you over $1 more per older title versus used copies or saves $5-8 per new.
Magazines: Kindle magazines are over $1 more each
Newspapers: Kindle subscriptions to newspapers can be more or less expensive depending on the title in question.

Keep in mind that I'm only comparing the Kindle to buying print books off of Amazon. You of course might find the same books cheaper elsewhere like at a local used bookstore or thrift store.

Also when you buy print books you can resell them after you read them for a fraction of the purchase price. I can normally trade in my used books at the local bookstore for half credit towards another books.


What is the pay back / break even point for a Kindle? Ok so now we know how much roughly you might save per book if you have a Kindle. How many books do you need to buy to make up the purchase cost of the Kindle itself? The Kindle 2 costs $359 to buy. I am going to assume that the Kindle will last you roughly 5 years before it breaks down or becomes obsolete. So you'll have to save at least $71.80 per year in book costs. That equates to about 14 new recently published books or 35 used recent titles.

To have any chance of breaking even on a Kindle purchase you'd have to buy at least 15 new books or over 35 used copies a year. That a pretty large number of books.

To be fair there is something to be said for the convenience factor of a Kindle. The Kindle is lightweight and portable. I've got a few bookshelves full of books at home that a thin little kindle could replace completely.

Overall I would say that the Kindle is usually not a particularly frugal purchase. You only save a few dollars per new title and the Kindle is often more expensive per title than used books. Magazines on the Kindle are overpriced and newspapers are hit or miss. I'm sure there are some exceptions where people might make good use of a Kindle and save a few bucks on books over their existing book buying habits. But the Kindle is still not likely to be their most frugal option.

Your more frugal options than a Kindle:

• Buy used books and then resell them on eBay or at the local bookstore when you're done with them.
• Use a service such as PaperbackSwap.com
• Last but not least, simply get all your books virtually free at the good old local library.

One last point, Amazon is fudging numbers a little.

To me there seems to be a little bit of exaggeration by Amazon on Kindle book savings.
When you look at Amazon Kindle stuff they seem to show the list price of the new book and compare that to the Kindle price. So for example with the book The 4 Day Diet they show the list price as $24.99 and compare that to the Kindle price of $9.99 So you look at that and it seems that the Kindle is saving you $15 on that one book. But if you then go and look up the price for that same book on Amazon in print version its $14.97. So you're really only saving maybe $5 for the title. Why wouldn't Amazon use their own prices for print books when they're comparing Kindle prices? The only reason I can see is that they're purposefully trying to inflate the book savings for a Kindle. I think it is a bit disingenuous on the part of Amazon.

OK Book : How to Pinch a Penny Till It Screams

This is a review of the book How to Pinch a Penny Till It Screams by Rochelle LaMotte McDonald. The copy I read was published in 1994.

The book presents a variety of cost cutting tips. There are probably a few hundred tips overall. There are a number of chapters organizing the information into a few broad categories: grocery bills, housing, energy, car costs, leisure time and others.

Most of the the tips in How to Pinch a Penny Till It Screams are pretty basic in nature and covered in a variety of other resources. There are few suggestions that were new to me personally. There were also a couple tips that I strongly disagreed with. At one point the author suggested leasing a car and in another section they said renting furniture. Neither of these are generally going to be a frugal route and I don't think they belong in a book that is about penny pinching.

How to Pinch a Penny Till It Screams wouldn't be a bad read. It presents the tips in easily digestible way so you can easily skim through the book and capture any new information and make sure you're not missing anything. But the book is really geared towards the beginner audience. If you're already pretty frugal and consider yourself familiar with cost saving measures then this book isn't for you.

So, overall I'd recommend the book marginally for someone who is a beginner to penny pinching. How to Pinch a Penny Till It Screams isn't bad for a quick skim. But I don't give it a strong recommendation since it doesn't cover advanced topics much and virtually everything in it is pretty common cost savings practices. I'm sure there are better books out there on this topic. I give it an 'ok' recommendation only for beginners. Check to see if your library has a copy.

Good Book : Warren Buffett Speaks

This is a review of Warren Buffet Speaks : Wit and Wisdom from the World's Greatest Investor by Janet Lowe. I read the hard cover from 1997 but there was a 2nd edition published in 2007.

The book is a collection of quotes from Warren Buffett. The quotes are collected by the author and presented in chapters on various categories such as About Life, About Friends, About Work, About running a Business and About Investing. There are 170 pages with quotes from Buffett. The quotes are sometimes introduced with context information.

If you like Warren Buffett then this should be a fun and interesting book to read. The quotes are often entertaining and insightful.

A few quotes I liked myself:
"Never lie under any circumstances" pg. 26
"Someone's sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago" pg. 29
"Current finance classes can help you do average" pg. 94
"of course the investor of today does not profit from yesterday's growth" pg 105

Warren Buffet Speaks : Wit and Wisdom from the World's Greatest Investor does not have instructions or tips on making a lot of money. The book does not go into how to practice value investing or otherwise offer investing information other than what you can glean from investing related quotes, which really isn't too much.

The book is a quick and entertaining read and as I said before if you like Warren Buffett then you'll probably find it interesting. Look for a copy of Warren Buffet Speaks : Wit and Wisdom from the World's Greatest Investor at your local library.

Good Book : The Millionaire Next Door

This is a review of The Millionaire Next Door. Its by Thomas J Stanley and William D Danko and was published 1996.

If you're interested, you can read the first chapter here.

The Millionaire Next Door is a landmark book in personal finance. It gives us insight into who millionaires are and how they got there. The book discusses the traits and habits of millionaires in America. The big revelation is that most millionaires are living middle class lives, driving older American made cars and have never bought a Rolex watch. Millionaires made their wealth by living frugally. The book is a good read and has a nice mixture of stories of example millionaires and statistics on millionaires that the authors have researched.

From the book here are some basic facts about millionaires:
1. They live well below their means
2. They allocate their time, energy and money efficiently, in ways conducive to building wealth.
3. They believe that financial independence is more important than displaying high social status
4. Their parents did not provide economic outpatient care.
5. Their adult children are economically self sufficient
6. They are proficient in targeting market opportunities
7. They chose the right occupation.

The book discusses two groups which they call Under Accumulators of Wealth (UAW) and Prodigious Accumulators of Wealth (PAW). The UAW has less net worth then average and the PAW has much higher net worth than average. The PAWs are better at saving and accumulating wealth and thus they turn out to be millionaires more often than their peers. The Millionaire Next Door gives a simple formula for your expected net work:

Expected Net worth = Your age * Your income / 10

If your net worth is half the expected net worth amount then you're a UAW and if your net worth is twice expected then you're a PAW.

There are some other specific topics in Millionaire that are interesting. They dedicate an entire chapter to how millionaires buy cars. They discuss how many buy new versus used and how many shop around dealers. They take a chapter to talk about what they call Economic Outpatient Care. This is a term they use for parents giving money to their adult children. In general they say that EOC is detrimental to the financial health of the adult children receiving the money as it removes their incentives to gain wealth on their own.

I liked The Millionaire Next Door overall. It was an enjoyable read with some pretty interesting bits of information in it. If you want to become a millionaire then its a good idea to look to the habits of other millionaires as role models and inspiration.

On the negative side I thought that Millionaire was a bit lacking in concrete usable information. You could sum up large sections of the book with a single sentence and there isn't a lot of take aways for us to use in our own lives.

Overall The Millionaire Next Door is a good book and I'd recommend it. Look for interesting tidbits on millionaires spending habits and general attitudes, but don't expect much useful personal finance information. You can probably find a copy of The Millionaire Next Door at your local library. I'd recommend checking it out.

Good Book : The Complete Idiots Guide to Getting Rich

This is a review of The Complete Idiot's Guide to Getting Rich. It is by Stewart H Welch III and Larry Waschka. I read the 3rd edition of the book.

Here's the description from the publisher: "With advice on investing, saving, and money management, the latest edition of this popular guide expands on the habits and strategies that will bring financial success. The authors present succinct and complete information on knowing the wealth index, using the debt pyramid reduction program, hiring financial advisors, and more."

I have to admit when I picked up the book the title made me a bit cynical. "Getting Rich" seemed much too like "get rich scheme". But don't let the title fool you too. The book is full of legitimate financial advice with methods for developing wealth. There was one good quote in the book that ensured me it wasn't a gimmick book: "Building wealth is not about buying fancy cars and clothes. Its about living within your means."

As the title suggests The Complete Idiot's Guide to Getting Rich is focused on obtaining and growing wealth. Its a decent overview as you'd expect from a Complete Idiot's Guide title. The first part covers the basics of getting rich with intro topics on what it means to be wealthy, tools for building wealth, their 5 stages of wealth, good versus bad debt, saving money, secrets of millionaires and getting rich as an employee. Part two covers investing. There is a chapter that discusses 'fools' gold' or investments to avoid, list of good investments, getting into the market, building a 'brain trust' of advisors (CPA, lawyer, insurance reps, financial planner), and then 'advanced' investment strategies. Part 3 goes into running a business, Part 4 is about building and preserving wealth with topics on real estate and taxes.

There were a few bits from the book that I found particularly interesting. One of them was their 5 stages of wealth.

They define 5 stages of wealth:
Stage 1 : Meet a target savings goal
Sage 2 : Your asset growth equals your savings goal
Stage 3 : The return on your investments is enough to meet your living expenses.
Stage 4 : Return on investments is double your living expenses
Stage 5 : Return on investments is 5 times your expenses.

I like this way of thinking about it. I personally think that defining and setting progressive goals that you can work towards accomplishing is an excellent way to get where you want. So I really liked this way of splitting up the road to wealth.

More than once in the book they disagreed with the conventional wisdom of investing a portion of your investments in bonds. The old rule is to subtract your age from 100 and that is the percent you would put in stocks and that the rest should be in bonds. The authors of the book however feel that people will live longer lives and that the old rule of thumb is outdated. They recommend putting all your investments into equities and they say that this is the best way to ensure your return is enough.

When they discussed running a business they have full chapters on avoiding the #1 and #2 reasons that businesses fail. The #1 reason they say is lack of capital and the #2 reason is poor management.

In the real estate section they had an interesting idea on using a real estate investment to help subsidize college expenses for you children. They suggest buying a house with a few bedrooms near your child's college and then having your child live there and renting out the other rooms. There are a few benefits to this idea. First your child has a place to live and renting out the other rooms should cover the mortgage. Second you get tax benefits of owning rental property. Third you should see some equity appreciation in the property over four years. Finally your child gets some valuable experience while managing the property.

On the negative side, I found the organization of The Complete Idiot's Guide to Getting Rich slightly awkward at times and the editing could have been a touch better. For example, on page 200 they said that 80% of small businesses fail and then on page 208 they said that 90% of small businesses fail in the first year.

I would recommend The Complete Idiot's Guide to Getting Rich if you're at the stage in life that you're looking ahead to building real wealth. It has a lot of good content with some interesting ideas. It has some good solid advice to use when planning to build your own wealth. Look for it in your local library.

Good Book : The Money Book for the Young, Fabulous and Broke

This is a review of the book The Money Book for the Young, Fabulous and Broke by Suze Orman. I read the first edition from 2005 which I believe is the only version thus far.

The book is by Suze Orman. If you don't know who Suze is then you might check out her show on CNBC and browse her website at SuzeOrman.com. Many people love Suze's distinct style and personality but I've heard of others who are turned off by her. I'd recommend watching a segment of her show first to see what you think of her. If you do or don't like her style in general then you'll probably also think similarly of this or other books by her.

As the title indicates The Money Book for the Young, Fabulous and Broke is targeted at young people who are "broke". Since the book is focused on young people the topics and answers are geared towards people in their 20's or 30's. She covers topics more applicable to younger people like student loan debt, buying your first house and getting started in a career. She also covers general topics like credit scores, saving money, investing in general and working towards retirement. All of the information and advice is geared towards younger people in general. While there is a lot of good advice here that applies equally well to everyone (like raising your FICO score) since the book is targeted at younger people, if you are middle aged or older then theres probably better books out there for you.

The book is very easy to read and the information is presented well. She discusses topics in general and then has several question and answer sections addressing typical situations young people might find themselves in. There are online resources at her website that the book points you to such as calculators or worksheets with more in depth information on specific points.

I thought the first chapter on credit ratings and your FICO score was very informative. Suze discusses how your FICO score impacts your financial situation and why its so important to try and keep your score as high as possible. For example she shows how different FICO ratings will impact the rate you pay on a home loan:

	720-850	700-719	675-699	620-674	560-619	500-559
30 year fixed rate mortgage	6.00%	6.10%	6.70%	7.80%	8.90%	9.50%

In general if you have a good FICO score this makes the rest of your financial situation easier. Suze frequently stresses making your debt payments on time and working to improve your FICO. This is very helpful and practical advice that you don't often see emphasized.

One point of the book that I'm not so much in agreement with is when Suze approves of using credit cards to pay for basic needs if needed. She is only saying that you could use credit cards if you really need to pay basic necessities. But I think its probably not the best advice in general. The last thing most people need is advice saying its OK to use credit cards and accumulate debt even if the advice is qualified and only meant for real needs. Most people have difficulty with credit cards and its very easy to fall into the trap of rationalizing to yourself why you 'need' something that is really a luxury or frivolous. So I disagree with Suze's advice there in general. If people really do NEED to use credit cards to pay for groceries or and they're responsible enough to do so then they'll do that without Suze's advice.

I was pleased to see that in the section on saving money Suze gave some advice on cutting back on sports hobbies (golf & skiing) by using cheaper or used equipment and scaling back your fees payments. That advice echoes what I discussed in my own previous post on saving money on hobbies. Even though the book was written in 2004 there were at least a couple points where Suze was cautious about real estate market. She seemed wary early that the housing boom at the time was not going to last.

Overall The Money Book for the Young, Fabulous and Broke is a good book and I'd recommend it for someone who is in their 20's and looking for some practical financial advice. Look for it in your local book store.

Good Book : Investing for Dummies

This is a review of Investing for Dummies by Eric Tyson. I have the 2nd edition copy dated 1999. They are now on the 4th edition and a 5th edition is due out soon.

When I reviewed Small Business for Dummies I commented that I like the Dummies series. Reading a Dummies book doesn't mean you're literally a dummy but its just a conscious admission that you have more to learn on a topic.

Investing for Dummies is by the same guy that wrote Small Business for Dummies. He covers overview and basics of investing as a Dummies book typically handles a topic.

Topics include overview of different types of investments, discussion of risks and rewards, stocks, bonds, mutual funds, real estate and small businesses. The book does a good job of pointing out things to avoid and giving tips on various topics. The books strength is that it covers a broad amount of information on investing from the bottom up. If you're brand new to investing or just know a little then Investing for Dummies is sure to have some valuable information for you.

Here is an interesting tidbit: When discussing risks in investing he points out that 8 times from 1890 to 1999 there were plunges in the stockmarket that 40% or more over 2-5 year periods.

I'd recommend getting a copy of Investing for Dummies if you are new to investing. I'd recommend looking for a more recent version than the one I have since it has gotten a little out of date. Look for the book in your local library or thrift stores.

Good Book : Small Business for Dummies

This is a review of the book "Small Business for Dummies" by Eric Tyson and Jim Schell. I have the 2nd edition from 2003.

I personally like the "Dummies" series of books. They provide no nonsense guides for a variety of topics and put it into terms that everyone can understand. They generally provide good comprehensive overviews of topics. Some might be a little put off by the "Dummies" title since it implies the reader is a dummy, but lets not take it personal.

"Small Business for Dummies" covers all the basics of starting and running a small business. It starts with first by asking if running a business is for you and even gives a quiz to test yourself for "Small Business Owners Aptitude". Then it delves into finances about business with topics like covering your own health insurance and retirement and making sure you have personal assets to support yourself while you're in startup. Financing, organization (corporations and LLC), Buying a business, franchises, evaluating and negotiating to buy business.

The next major section of the book is on running a business. It focuses on operations including hiring employees, accounting, leasing property, marketing, dealing with customers, handling cash flow, managing inventory. The last major section of the book discusses keeping the business successful and afloat. They talk about hiring good employees and keeping them running, dealing with legal issues and obeying laws and regulations and then there's a chapter focused on tax issues.

The information in "Small Business for Dummies" is a good start if you are thinking of starting a business of your own. I'd recommend taking a look if you're interested in starting a business. Look for a copy in your local library.

Good Book : 202 Things You can Make and Sell for Big Profits

This is a review of the book 202 Things You can Make and Sell for Big Profits by James Stephenson I have the 2005 edition of the book.

This book is pretty straight forward and primarily gives a list of 202 things that you can make and sell. Its generally aimed at home or small start up businesses and people looking for a good side business. But the information could be used to start a full time business too.

The first 100 pages or so of the book are general information on starting a business. It covers legal and financial basics, setting up shop, dealing with inventory and going online. Its overview level information on starting a business.

The meat of the book is the remaining 200+ pages which are the list of 202 things to make and sell. The list of items has a wide variety of things with varying skill levels and start up costs. Each entry lists the skill level, start up cost and some references for further information. There is roughly a page for each idea. The ideas range from building large items to making and selling snack food. Examples are garden sheds, party-in-a box, canoe paddles, pinatas, snow cones, soap and utility trailers. A few items I thought were particularly interesting are little league cards (like baseball trading cards), personalized children books and greeting cards.

There are enough ideas in 202 Things You can Make and Sell for Big Profits that its likely you'll be able to find 1 or 2 items that would work for you. Because the book is primarily a list of 202 items you will probably skim through it and skip many items pretty quickly.

I'd recommend 202 Things You can Make and Sell for Big Profits if you are looking to start a business primarily focused on making something. Its good for ideas. Look for it in your local library.

Good Book : The Insider's Guide to Buying a New or Used Car

This is a review of the book The Insider's Guide to Buying a New or Used Car by Burke Leon and Stehanie Leon. I have the 2nd edition from 1997. The book is now in its 3rd edition.

The book is a complete guide to buying either a used or new car. They discuss topics such as : researching cars, getting loans, doing a trade in, test drives, figuring dealer costs, buying tactics, countering the dealers sales pitch, and good and bad negotiating tactics. There are two major sections of the book the first is on new cards and the second is for used cars.

There are a lot of things I like about The Insider's Guide to Buying a New or Used Car. Its a thorough guide to car buying for a car buyer. There are a lot of good tips on negotiating sales and I think that's the section I got the most out of. Americans do not haggle for many purchases so negotiating for price isn't something many of us are as experienced at. The book has other tips on getting a good deal like 'how to dress' and there's a chapter specific to 'special concerns of women'. There is also an appendix with several car buying checklists. The author has been a car dealer for years so they know the industry.

On the down side I didn't like that the authors seemed pretty open and friendly to using a lease to purchase a new car. I'd never look at a lease and I think its a very poor financial choice. I also prefer buying used cars and the book focused more on new cars.

I would recommend reading The Insider's Guide to Buying a New or Used Car if you are considering buying a car and are new to the process or looking for some tips. Look for it at your local library or thrift stores.

Good Book : The Unofficial Guide to Real Estate Investing

This is a review of The Unofficial Guide to Real Estate Investing. The book is now in its 2nd edition. I have the 1st edition so my review is based on that version.

The Unofficial Guide to Real Estate Investing is a very comprehensive introduction to investing in real estate. The book covers everything from valuing properties, buying and financing, tax implications and 1031 exchanges all the way through being a landlord. The basic topics covered are : investment concepts, figuring returns, valuing property, financing investment, different categories of real estate, creating your own investment plan, planning for taxes, purchasing the property and managing tenants and expenses.

One topic they cover that I especially like is creating an investment plan for yourself. They go through how you can figure your returns and structure your investments in a way to mean your planned % rate of return.

They discuss various types of financing for real estate. I the only major criticism I have of the book is that they are not cautionary enough about ARMs, negative amortization loans and loans with very low down payments. As we all know from today's real estate market there is risk in highly leveraged and short term adjustable real estate loans. However, hey do not present real estate investing as a 'get rich quick' scheme. They are just a bit less conservative on loans than I'd like to see.

If you are interested in real estate investing then The Unofficial Guide to Real Estate Investing would be a good general guide to get you started. I'd recommend checking at your local library to see if they have a copy. You can also currently get it used via Amazon Marketplace for about $6 including shipping.

PaperbackSwap and cheaper alternatives

I've seen a bit about PaperBackSwap.com lately. Its a nice idea for sure. Using the service individuals can trade books with other individuals and just pay the cost of postage. There's no fee for the site involved. The website keeps track of it and gives you a credit for shipping a book to someone which you can use to request a book from someone else. They have over 2 million books available from members to trade. Overall its a pretty nice idea. BUT postage costs in the $1.50 $2.25 range to mail a book. So if you add this in then you're basically trading 1 book for 1 book + $2. Due to the postage costs I believe this isn't a particularly frugal option. There are a lot of ways to get books cheaper.

Here are some ideas for getting used books cheaply..

Use the local library and buy at library sales

The library is a great resource for books. The biggest advantage the library has of course is that the books are free to borrow. Of course you can only borrow books for a limited time, though you might be able to extend the deadline. If you're not good about returning books on time it can also cost you late fees.

Libraries or organizations that support the local library may have a book sale of either library discards, general used books or both. These can be great bargains for books with lots of selection and low prices. You can often get books for $0.50 to $1 at these sales and they may have deals like stuffing a paper sack full of books for $5. Try looking at the site Book Sale Finder to locate book sales near you. These sales aren't frequent though and are often only held annually. My fiancée and I visited such a library book sale this past weekend and bought about 20 books for $20.50 and about $7 gas money or $1.37 per book plus we had fun doing so.

Buy bulk lot of books on eBay

Go to the eBay category for books and then search for your favorite author and the keyword 'lot' for example if you like Stephen King then search for "stephen king lot" or if you have a genre of writing you enjoy you can tray a search for that topic name. Like if you enjoy romance books then you can do a search for 'romance lot'. Once you get the search results then sort them by 'Time: ending soonest". This generally works best for the more popular authors or genres and some books are more or less expensive on eBay depending on availability and popularity. I tried this for Stephen King as an example and I came up with an auction of 6 books going for $0.99 and $8.95 shipping which comes out to $1.66 per book. Keep in mind when you're looking on eBay you should check out the sellers feedback rating and add in the shipping and handling fees to the costs.

Trade and buy at used book stores

Used book stores will often have a trade system where you can trade in your used books for credit or a 2-for-1 trade system. So for example at my local used book store they sell their books for 1/2 cover price + $0.25. They give you 1/2 cover value in trade towards books for your trade ins. So if a book originally cost $8 I could buy it there for $4.25. Or I could trade in an $8 book and get half the value in credit and pay $2.25 additional. So for new books that retail for $8 I'd be looking at 1 book + $2.25 to get a used book, which is about the same as the PaperbackSwap site. But if you look at slightly older books that retailed for $5-7 then you come out cheaper. I could trade a $5 used book in and pay $1.50 to get a used $5 book. Buying at used book stores generally works out better if buying a book with a lower original retail price.

Try the local Thrift store

The local thrift store will probably have some books. Prices vary a lot but you might find some $0.50 or $1.00 books.

Last but not least, don't forget to keep your eye open for books at Yard sales. You can often find some cheap books for sale at yard, garage or estate sales.

There are pros and cons to shopping any of these methods. You should be able to find cheap books at all of these. The selection of books and convenience may or may not meet your needs. While in general I don't think Paperbackswap is the cheapest method of book shopping, I do see it has a lot of selection and convenience. I just urge people to keep their eyes open to the shipping cost involved and consider the other options out there.