You deserve straight talk on your money, but if you walk into a bank, or talk to a “financial advisor”, you are more likely to get a sales pitch. You expect a sales pitch when you walk into a car dealership; that’s what sales people do. But you don’t expect a sales pitch when you walk into your bank to make a deposit. Surprise. The “teller” is now a “customer service representative”, which is a fancy word for “sales person”. “Congratulations, you qualify for a $10,000 line of credit”, they say. That’s cool. The bank thinks you are worth it. You are happy. Being told you “deserve” a line of credit is an emotional hit. You feel great. You get the line of credit to prove your financial acumen, not realizing that you just got “sold.”
In his 30 year career, Licensed Insolvency Trustee Doug Hoyes has watched as intelligent, well meaning people let their emotions get the better of them as they follow the conventional financial wisdom and get into serious money trouble, often leading to bankruptcy. The inescapable conclusion is that, in many areas, everything you know about money is wrong.
Doug Hoyes shatters the conventional wisdom, explaining why a good credit score may be detrimental to your financial well being, why a house is not an investment, why you should never pay a collection agent, and why you should never loan friends or family money, and that’s just four of the 23 chapters.
Most financial professionals will disagree with most of the advice in this book. Experts believe budgeting is important; this book will explain why budgeting is a waste of time. Experts will tell you to pay yourself first, and that everyone should take full advantage of tax free investments. This book will tell you the exact opposite.
But Straight Talk on Your Money is not simply a book that casts stones at financial glass houses. This is a book that dismantles conventional wisdom, but then replaces it with practical advice to show you how to prevent financial problems before they happen.
With simple stories to illustrate how conventional wisdom can lead you astray, the author then shows you the simple tweaks you can make to your approach to money management that will leave you debt free and stress free.
Times have changed, and what was good advice for your grandparents may be bad advice today. The world is fast moving and complicated, with the big banks wielding more power than ever before. Consumers are at a disadvantage. How can they resist the billions of dollars the big banks spend convincing us to get another credit card, a second car loan, and a bigger mortgage?
The answer is that consumers today have access to more information than ever before, and with someone to point you in the right direction you can make informed decisions.
Straight Talk on Your Money is an important book because the big banks and the financial experts have sold you on what’s in their best interests. This book evens the score, giving the average consumer the insider information they need to make informed decisions, and live a stress free life.