The Road to Wealth

A lot of good information would recommend this to anyone who needs to be informed.

I've just begun wanting to learn about investing, which is only a fraction of the content contained within these pages, and a friend lent me this book to help me with a little direction. As a neophyte investor (ok...I haven't actually started yet, but my heart's in the right place), I have found this book to be somewhat of a gem. My only exposure to investors' education has been Yahoo! Finance and its various investing links, whose material is mostly disjointed and not too useful. This book, on the other hand, is rather well-organized, flows nicely from subject to subject, is comprehensive, and reads easily without being too heavily laden with detail. As such, Orman's book is intended for beginners, such as myself (what would you expect with a title "The Road to Wealth"? - it's not exactly a textbook for graduate level study in finance, nor would I want it to be).I find Orman's simple Socratic question-answer style to be a surprisingly useful tool for learning this otherwise overwhelming subject matter, and it lends to either casual bathroom browsing or more serious notetaking, and I've done both. After having read most of it, I feel less out of my element when hearing about P/E ratios or index funds, and some people think my throwing around such terms in everyday conversation makes me sound quite smart. There is a footnote, however, which took with it to the bottom of the page the fifth star, leaving just four: if this book ends up being my road to wealth, I suspect I'll barely make it out of the driveway. I will not likely build a stellar portfolio tomorrow, but I honestly didn't think I would. Orman intended this to be a primer, something with which to get your feet wet. You'll never find a book that has all the answers, and this one surely attests to that. But it's great nonetheless and I recommend it highly to the would-be wealthy who so far don't know an annuity from an alligator. Happy trails!

This book is about all the things your parents never told you about money, written in easy to understand language. You need to get your financial house in order and this is your guide!

This is a book of strictly FAQ's; the entire format is reader questions and short answers by Suze. Questions such as "Will i be charged a fee for using my debit card?" and "What exactly is a credit score?" are among the very basic while "Does the money I get from a reverse mortgage affect my Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, or SSi benefits?" are a little less known.That being said, I skipped over a lot of the book because it wasn't relevant to my current situation. The insurance section cover's a lot of medicare and medicaid information that doesn't apply to me (26 yrs old, married, no kids), the financial intimacy section deals a lot with divorce, and I don't have any debt issues (for which 83 pages are devoted to). The homeowners sections was great, with lots of information about points and APR's that aren't talked about at banks. Paying for college had a lot of basic information and could have been summarized in about 3-4 pages instead of the 20 it is.Tons of information, not much of it relevant and most of it fairly basic.I don't rate many books, generally because I like them but this one is worth warning the reader: if you have basic knowledge of financial systems, this probably isn't for you. A book I really like, especially for younger adults is Suze's "The Money Book for the Young, Fabulous and Broke." Robert Kiyosaki "Rich Dad Poor Dad" books are always worth reading as well.

I am in my early twenties and there were too many technical words in the financial world that I did not understand. I was tired of NOT UNDERSTANDING financial conversations. Then, I realized that ignorance in this world's economy can be detrimental in my personal life. Thank goodness that I decided to get informed early in my life. I will be applying for loans and financial aid, so I need to know the concepts well in order to make informed decisions. I read that I need to establish good credit in order to receive loans, so I searched for good deals in credit cards that offered the lowest interest.It is very fulfilling to actually understand my personal finances in a fun and entertaining way, since I have always disliked economics. If you are a person that wants to LEARN AND APPLY all the steps there are to become debt free, then this book is for you. This is a very good reference book to have in your library. Suze Orman answers all the questions there are about personal finances. I still haven't finished reading it (it has 11 chapters and almost 600 pages!), but it has been worth my time.

I was disappointed to find that Orman seems to think of her readers as women only. The text is in question/answer format, and whenever the gender of the questioner is made evident, it's always a woman. "I plan to marry my boyfriend...", "I don't like my boyfriend's credit card habits...", "My husband died and...", "My husband is dying and...", "My husband died a year ago and...", "My boyfriend got a new credit card and...". Doesn't Orman know that books like this should be written in a gender-neutral fashion? Worse, her preference for females shows up in her example selections--it's virtually all sisters and daughters. "I'd like to reward my daughter's trustworthiness by...", "My daughter is going off to college, and...", "My daughter would like to buy...", "My sister says her husband...", "My sister loaned me $15,000...". The (very) few instances of a son shows them in a bad financial light: "My son has been irresponsible with his credit...". I read the first couple of hundred pages, but this persistant sexism began to grate on me. For that matter, probably 80% of the personal pronouns are "she" and "her". By half-way through the book, it was clear she had some kind of agenda going on. Big turn-off. I'm really surprised that the publisher let her get away with this and didn't alternate the gender when the book was edited.

I enjoyed this book. It is more grounded and internationally user friendly than her others (which were based on US financial systems and so not applicable to those living outside of US). However lots of examples here to show you how to research and find best options for you whether savings, mortgage etc.