The 10 Best Personal Finance Books to Change Your Life

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This post was originally published in June of 2017; here’s the new and improved version!

 

Special treat for this week’s happy hour! We’ve reviewed some of the most-often recommended books in personal finance to see which ones are worth reading, and which deserve a skip. So what made the cut for the 10 Best Personal Finance Books to Change Your Life?!

Quick caveat: We’re going a little broad with the term “personal finance”. You’ll see some investing and passive income books mentioned because they’re both a big part of personal finance as far as we’re concerned. Ok, on to the list!

The 10 Best Personal Finance Books to Change Your Life

 

I Will Teach You to be Rich

The perfect start for young adults! “I Will Teach You to be Rich” covers the debt problem facing our generation and outlines a beginner’s saving and investing plan. A few of the specific financial products mentioned are no longer available, but the website has updated info.

Just don’t go in expecting tips on building giant wealth like you’ll find in some of the other books on this best personal finance books list. This is more about building a solid foundation so you will eventually be rich.

Oh, and this one’s currently free with Kindle Unlimited.

 

Smart Women Finish Rich

“Smart Women Finish Rich” is close to my heart because it completely changed my life.

How many 19-year-olds have a retirement account? Thanks to David Bach, at least one! He made saving and investing perfectly accessible, even to the teenage mind. And “Smart Women Finish Rich” was super motivating. I couldn’t wait to set up my emergency fund, retirement account, and dream investments!

And, best part, a new expanded-and-updated version was just released in 2018. So all the info in the new version is 100% current to today’s financial markets.

The advice is super practical, with actionable steps at the end of each chapter. The readability, practicality, motivation-ality, and comprehend-ability still make this one of the best personal finance books available.

Also by David Bach: Smart Couples Finish Rich, Start Late, Finish Rich, and The Automatic Millionaire. And, coming literally this week, The Latte Factor! Shoot, I’ll read anything he writes!

 

The Millionaire Real Estate Investor

This book convinced me to buy my first property and start a real estate portfolio. It’s well-organized and lays out a clear plan for going from one small residential rental property to a complete real estate portfolio in short order.

It breaks down the steps needed to be a millionaire real estate investor. First you build a portfolio worth one million dollars. Then you grow that portfolio until it’s grossing a million dollars in income. And finally, you keep growing until you’re netting a million in income. The book makes the process so do-able!

If you feel like real estate investing is only for rich people, read this book. It will show you how to become rich through real estate, even if you’re broke when you start. It’s a life-changer.

 

The Total Money Makeover

For many people, Dave Ramsey is the authority on personal finance. He’s most known for reconciling money and religion. Like, many religious people saw money as the root of all evil, and then Dave Ramsey came along and offered Biblical principles for useful money management. How cool is that?!

We may not agree with every little thing he teaches in “The Total Money Makeover”. For example, we love using smart debt to grow net worth, and he’s super opposed to debt. But on the whole, there is so much great, actionable advice in “The Total Money Makeover” that it’s a must if you want to change your financial future. Or if you’re just looking to manage your money in a God-first way.

Also by Dave Ramsey: Finding Financial Peace and Smart Money Smart Kids.

 

The Millionaire Next Door

This classic was one of the first mainstream books to point out that literally anyone can become a millionaire.

In fact, we all probably know a millionaire. They live in normal middle-class houses and drive Hondas just like the rest of us. They just manage their middle-class incomes differently than the middle-classers struggling to make ends meet.

“The Millionaire Next Door” chronicles their secrets. And right now, it’s free with Kindle Unlimited.

 

The Little Book of Common Sense Investing

For those of you interested in learning more about investing, this is a great read. It details the power of indexing over trying to beat the market.

You know those Index Funds we like to talk about, right? They are a group of stocks or bonds from a bunch of different entities so they’re automatically diversified and they follow an index like the Dow Jones or the S&P 500. Over time, you’re more likely to get better returns following an index like this than trying to pick the single stocks that will get higher returns than the market.

This book is full of examples and a full education on why it just makes sense to invest in Index Funds.

 

Rich Dad, Poor Dad

Another classic in the personal finance world. “Rich Dad, Poor Dad” is a must-read, even if only for conversational and debate purposes!

Robert Kiyosaki has some brilliant ideas for growing wealth, like how the rich “invent” money, and how they don’t work for money. And he’s got some ideas that seem kinda terrible. Like, I don’t advocate living with your spouse in your vehicle because you don’t want to take a corporate cog job. Be a cog for a while if it means living in not-a-car! I also just feel really bad for the Author’s father, the “Poor Dad”, repeatedly held up as the example of how not to live. That’s rough!

You can just skim the intro and first 2 chapters. They’re not worth actually reading. They’re Yoda-esque with a bunch of fluffy, metaphorical nonsense. But I swear, it gets interesting after that! The good outweighs the bad so much that I’ve read several of the other Rich Dad books. I don’t recommend them all, but Rich Dad’s CASHFLOW Quadrant and The ABCs of Real Estate Investing are good reads.

 

Your Money or Your Life

This book isn’t my personal cup of Sangria, but it’s changed so many other lives, it deserves a place on this list of the best personal finance books.

It tackles money from a more emotional place than most other books in the genre. The author links personal finance to global issues like climate change, which resonates with a lot of women who want to see how their money habits fit into a bigger picture.

The most interesting concept the book offers is thinking of money spent as a direct exchange for hours of your life (exchanging time for dollars). When you consider that the dress you want costs 15 hours of your life in terms of your dollars per hour pay-rate, is the dress worth it? Hmm….

 

The 4-Hour Workweek

In direct contrast to “Your Money or Your Life”, “The 4-Hour Workweek” is a newer classic that promotes creating passive income streams instead of trading your time for money.

Tim Ferris is known for building a mobile lifestyle, traveling all over the world, pursuing whatever whim catches his imagination. And making serious cash doing it. Who doesn’t want that?!

He might make it all sound way easier than it actually is to quit the grind and outsource your work-life. But there are plenty of fascinating ideas and gems here to make this read well-worth your time. In fact, my copy is dog-eared like crazy so I can easily find the passages I need to reference over and over.

You might not think of this as a personal finance book, but with all the talk of building passive income streams (which is our favorite part of personal finance!), we’re perfectly willing to grant it a spot on our list of the best personal finance books.

 

Personal Finance that Doesn’t Suck

Ok, this one isn’t my favorite. But that’s because I find personal finance truly interesting, and this is written for people who don’t.

If you don’t get excited about finance, this is the book for you! Mindy Crary wants to show you how you can manage your finances without budgeting (what?! I love my budget!).

The book is entertaining and has some good lessons in fostering a useful money mindset.  And it’s currently free with Kindle Unlimited.

The Skip List

 

Why Didn’t They Teach Me this in School?

With this title, I so expected to love this! But I couldn’t. It’s overly simplistic. Really, even high schoolers could handle something a little more complex.

And in oversimplifying the info, some of the advice is just plain wrong. Like recommending that you don’t use credit cards at all. Credit cards can be super useful when you know how to use them responsibly! The author also advocates getting a good job as the best way to earn a living. I mean, that can be totally fine, but so many of us are hustling our way through the world as entrepreneurs now. And that’s just as valid a way to earn a living.

If you do want to check it out, it’s currently free with Kindle Unlimited.

 

Who Moved My Cheese?

Ok, 1) This is not a personal finance book. Even by our broad definition. It’s a generic lesson in adapting to change. Why is it on so many lists of the best personal finance books?

2) It’s 96 pages. I’ve written longer papers for school. And really, it could easily be edited down to about 10 pages. Mice are looking for their cheese in a maze. They can’t find it because it’s been moved. They can either sit there waiting for the cheese to magically reappear or go looking for it (i.e. adapt to the change). That’s it.

3) Personal preference: I have no patience for parables. They annoy me. And that’s all this book is.

4) The Kindle price is still over $15 for these 96 pages. What?!

 

Think and Grow Rich

This was a brilliant, groundbreaking book when originally published in 1937. And a lot of the principles still hold true. Focusing your mental energy on growing wealth will lead to getting rich. Why? Because if that’s what’s always on your mind, you’re always taking action to make it happen.

So why is this on our Skip List? Well, most of these brilliant principles have been carried forward and updated in more modern lit. And there are sections that just didn’t age well. Like the chapter on “Sex Transmutation”. It basically says men can channel their “sex energy” into other pursuits like career and money. Don’t worry, women, we’re not excluded. Our role in this is to make our men want us, which will increase their sex energy so they have more available to pour into their work. Right… 😐

If you decide to give this one a go, the good news is you can get it cheap, like $1. But you should also know that most of the e-reader versions have some weird page splits and formatting issues because of the old editions they were scanned from.

 

Millionaire Women Next Door

Some books that specialize in women’s finance have a lot to offer women specifically. This isn’t one of them. This is “The Millionaire Next Door” but with women. It offers nothing the original doesn’t, so it just feels gimmicky.

 

 

 

Bonus Section: My Summer Reading List

 

The Money Book for the Young, Fabulous & Broke

I don’t know how I haven’t read this yet. So many people talk about this as the Guidebook for 20-somethings. And Suze Orman is the go-to woman for personal finance. Time to see what all the fuss is about!

 

Get a Financial Life

This made my summer reading list because it’s one of the top results on Amazon, with a new edition having just been released earlier this year. So it should be a totally up-to-date guide. It’s also directly geared toward 20 and 30-somethings (our people!), so I’m expecting targeted advice for age-related asset mixes. Woo-hoo!

 

The Behavior Gap

“The Behavior Gap” refers to the gap between logical thought and the emotional behavior. Like it’s logical for us to be saving money to secure our futures, but shopping sprees feel good, so our behavior runs exactly contrary to our goals. I’m wondering what Carl Richards suggests we do to get around that.

 

Rich Bitch

An Instant New York Times Bestseller, this book has great reader reviews for being practical, conversational, and easy-to-follow. And great reviews from critics for catering the personal finance and career message to professional young women looking to climb the corporate ladder and rule the business world. Nicole Lapin sounds like our kind of take-charge chick.

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Have you read any of these? What did you think? Any recommendations we left out?