Review: The Investment Answer

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What if there were a way to cut through all the financial mumbo-jumbo? Wouldnt it be great if someone could really explain to usin plain and simple Englishthe basics we must know about investing in order to insure our financial freedom?

At last, heres good news.

Jargon-free and written for all investorsexperienced, beginner, and everyone in betweenTHE INVESTMENT ANSWER distills the process into just five decisionsfive straightforward choices that can lead to safe and sound ways to manage your money.

When Wall Street veteran Gordon Murray told his good friend and financial advisor, Dan Goldie, that he had only six months to live, Dan responded, Do you want to write that book youve always wanted to do? The result is this eminently valuable primer which can be read and understood in one sitting, and has advice that benefits you, not Wall Street and the rest of the traditional financial services industry.

THE INVESTMENT ANSWER asks readers to make five basic but key decisions to stack the investment odds in their favor. The advice is simple, easy-to-follow, and effective, and can lead to a more profitable portfolio for every investor. Specifically:

• Should I invest on my own or seek help from an investment professional?
• How should I allocate my investments among stocks, bonds, and cash?
• Which specific asset classes within these broad categories should I include in my portfolio?
• Should I take an actively managed approach to investing, or follow a passive alternative?
• When should I sell assets and when should I buy more?

In a world of fast-talking traders who believe that they can game the system and a market characterized by instability, this extraordinary and timely book offers guidance every investor should have.

Review:

Ok financial planners, and the authors of this book, prepare for the curtain to be pulled back.

Let me start by saying I was a stockbroker/financial planner (series 7, 63, 24, and insurance and variable products liscensed) for seven years. The level of sales training you receive as a broker is unbelievable. The most highly skilled securities sales person wants to connect with you, on a personal level. They are TRAINED to first, tap into your emotions. This seems cheesy right? Well, it is unless you are very subtle about it.

The fact that this author teamed up with an experienced financial advisor to “write the book he has always wanted to write” on his deathbed, is an example of that subtle manipulative connection they seek. The intent of the book is to elicit an emotional response like, “This must be genuine because the author wanted to leave this world finally writing the book he couldn’t write while he was alive. He is going to finally tell us THE INVESTMENT ANSWER!” After they achieve the response they desire, they start the second phase. They now have stories, charts, and allocation models that illustrate they do things differently and that they therefore, have the answer you are seeking. It is very subtle, but VERY powerful. I have been through several of these needs/emotion based selling seminars. I always felt a little dirty after attending them. Your advisor, is a salesman first and foremost.

By the way, the allocation models they show you, are never based upon what they predicted five, ten, or fifteen years ago, because they don’t want to show you that. They always show you what worked in the past, based upon past performance of the funds they are NOW showing you. The dirty secret is that they were not using those funds then! Ask any advisor to show you what they were recomending years ago, and how it performed. They will wiggle like a worm on a hook, because they will not want to talk about that. That’s the ugly truth folks.

The problem is that the technique works! We humans are for the most part, sheep lead by our emotions. I am a sheep like the rest of you, it’s just that I woke up (at least to the financial industry). This is one of the many books that financial planners will either give out to clients, or suggest that the clients read themselves. I almost bought this book, but then I read the excerpt from the “Do it yourself” chapter. It says don’t do it yourself, you need a fee based advisor!!! Bovine scatology. Let me take a wild assed guess that the author of this book is either a fee based advisor, or receives material benefit from one, right? If so, he is about to rake in the commissions.

I am no longer in the industry, and have absolutely NO regrets. I am now an elementary school teacher, who knows a crapload about the financial markets. I own very low fee mutual funds, in a wide spectrum of asset classes. Go subscribe to one of the Fidelity or Vanguard newsletters out there, and split the cost with your family. They cost about $140.00 a year, but give very solid advice about asset allocation models and risk profiles. Go read a Dave Ramsey book to learn about general financial mangement, as he actually does give some good solid advice. Ramsey is a master at selling all the old rules, in a new way.

Sometimes the best advice is free.

Tags: personal finance books

Category: personal finance books