The One-Page Financial Plan REVIEW | brokeGIRLrich
Looking for a last minute gift for the financially inept in your life?
I recently won a copy of The One-Page Financial Plan by Carl Richards and actually really enjoyed it. If there’s someone in your life (or you are) expressing an interest in learning more about personal finance but isn’t quite ready to make the leap into setting up budgets and sorting out their net worth just yet, this book could be for them.
Some books are about motivating and some books are about concrete steps. I’m a big fan of the concrete step books and I think perfect books blend the two, but The One-Page Financial Plan is more of a motivator.
That being said, I do still think it has it’s place. It’s all about sorting out your feelings towards money, what sort of goals you want to achieve and a little bit on how to get there, but let’s face it, you can only get somewhere once you’ve got a roadmap of where you want to go. The One-Page Financial Plan helps you set up that roadmap.
Step one. Set goals.
Carl Richards points out that a lot of people get overwhelmed when they finally take an honest look at their finances. His writing is also full of examples of couple working through their money goals together, so if you have a significant other and haven’t had a solid money goals talk with them, this could be a great book for you both to read to spark it.
Towards the end, it does advocate some useful things, I particularly liked the emphasis on how lots of little things personal finance bloggers get stuck on, like cutting out lattes, doesn’t have nearly the same effect as focusing on making more instead of spending less.
Making More Beats Spending Less – almost every single time.
If, upon reading this book, you’re still struggling with some of the basics on how to do something, a simple Google can take you to about 8,000 ways to set up a budget. My own are here, if you’re looking for something to print, or you can use an awesome website like Mint or Personal Capital. I’d also recommend following it up with Money Girl’s Smart Moves to Grow Rich – still the best personal finance starter book I’ve ever read.
The One-Page Financial Plan is a great primer for anyone who is a little overwhelmed by all the options out there and just needs a simple approach to take their first steps into financial awareness.
This sounds like an interesting book. The illustrations have my curiosity piqued as they seem very unique being drawn on a napkin. If wanting to make a budget, and not just tracking spending &net worth, I think Mint is the better of the free services between them and Personal Capital. Although PC is a less “clunky” platform, in my opinion.
Josh recently posted…Merry Christmas From Money Buffalo!
I’m honestly a much bigger fan of Mint, but Personal Capital does seem to have quite the following in the pf community.
This is on my to-read list. I heard his talk at FinCon15 and I really enjoyed it.
Cat@BudgetBlonde recently posted…3 Last Minute Gift Ideas that Don’t Seem Last Minute
Also on my to-read list. Thanks!