simpledollarbooksmall The Simple Dollar Review

The Simple Dollar by Trent Hamm was the 9th book I have read for my book challenge and I must say I thoroughly enjoyed it. The book really is all of the advice from Trent’s website, The Simple Dollar.com, all wrapped into a book. The experiences he has had while going through his debt recovery and the valuable tools he has found along the way are all outlined in this book. Some of the things in this book were not new to me and were things I was already doing but other items were fresh ideas that got me thinking. Here are a few of the segments I enjoyed the most:

  • Unprepared for the good. This was a thought provoking concept when I first read it. Essentially it means that if we are not living financially responsible life, when an opportunity that would be good to try presents itself, we are unable to pursue it because of current limitations. It got me thinking about the current decisions I am making and would they hinder me in the future.
  • The Key: Short Term Goals. I have always been a planner, sometimes to a fault, so coming up with long term goals is not hard for me. In fact I am constantly coming up with projects and things that need to be done. What I forget about doing is to set short term goals. I forget how important they are. In Trent’s book he shares how important short term goals are. Short term goals keep us on track and motivated for the long term goal. They are the building blocks for the big picture. Without them, we can easily get off track and headed in the wrong direction.
  • The Broadening of Community. I am involved in numerous volunteer activities in my life, sometimes more than I should be. But no matter how busy I get I seem to go back for more. The communities I have become involved in have helped me so much in my life. They have helped me develop skills that I have now transferred into my full time job; they have helped me get jobs that I wouldn’t have heard about otherwise; they have even lead to building some really great friendships. Taking the time to be a part of different communities that share the same interests as you is a great way to help reach your future goals.
  • The difference between frugal and cheap. It is far to often that people get these two mixed up. You don’t have to be cheap to be frugal. Being frugal means that you cut back on the things that aren’t important to you so that you can be flexible and put time and money into the things that are important to you. If you really enjoy a certain activity that costs you money  per month, make sacrifices on the other things that you don’t care about as much. This allows you to enjoy the things you like doing while preventing yourself from getting into debt.

There are a ton of great tips to be read in this book. It doesn’t matter if you are just starting to consider living a frugal and financially responsibile life or if you have been doing this for years, there are important tips and reminders throughout this entire novel. I would recommend this book since it is an easy read with valuable step by step breakdown chapter summaries.

Have any of you read this book? What did you think?

The Simple Dollar Review Miss T has written 579 articles on this blog.

Related posts:

  1. Can You Keep A Secret Review
  2. Shopaholic Ties the Knot Review
  3. Da Vinci Code Review
  4. Confessions of a Shopaholic Review
  5. Angels and Demons Review