The Automatic Millionaire: A Powerful One-Step Plan to Live and Finish Rich (Canadian Edition) - Hardcover

Bach, David

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0385660243 ISBN 13: 9780385660242

Publisher: Doubleday Canada, 2003

Synopsis

Bestselling financial advisor David Bach brings us his proven, revolutionary system that in one hour will make readers -- even those not smart about money, not disciplined or budget-minded -- rich.

The Automatic Millionaire shows readers how to change financial practices and financial lives, beginning with a powerful story of an average Canadian couple -- he’s a low-level manager, she’s a teacher -- whose joint income never exceeds $55,000 a year, yet who somehow manage to own two homes debt-free, put two kids through college, and retire at 55 with more than $1 million in savings. The incredible message Bach delivers is that the key to getting rich is by “automating” the way to wealth “by paying yourself first,” using automatic funded retirement accounts and money market accounts to secure the future and pay for the present.

In a short book destined for bestseller lists, The Automatic Millionaire introduces readers to a system that is powerfully simple, and automatically effective, a life-changing system that delivers. Do it once, the rest is automatic.

About this title

Review:

Despite its sensational title, David Bach's The Automatic Millionaire: A Powerful One-Step Plan to Live and Finish Rich is not a get-rich-quick guide. Rather, the book is a straightforward march through common-sense personal financial planning that suggests readers "automate" their contributions to retirement and investment vehicles. Bach, in fact, calls his model the "tortoise approach" to becoming wealthy by retirement age.

In the early part of the book Bach builds on ideas he established in Smart Women Finish Rich and other bestselling titles. His core principle is that, to succeed, you must "Pay Yourself First." In other words, he suggests using pre-tax retirement accounts (e.g. 401(k)s or IRAs) to set aside a fixed, monthly sum of money before considering what is left for living expenses. The "automatic" part of the title comes from Bach's emphasis on using automated payroll deductions to avoid the temptation of using the money to pay today's bills.

Bach insists that "regardless of the size of your paycheck, you probably already make enough money to become rich." But his claims that his plan requires "no budget, no discipline," is a bit disingenuous. His discussion of the "The Latte Factor" shows that, to find money to start a retirement plan, a person with a modest income needs to make an up-front commitment to stop accruing debt and to reduce spending on such "wasteful" items as lattes and cigarettes.

In the end The Automatic Millionaire does not offer much that is new for readers already familiar with personal finance basics like accelerated mortgage payments, "the miracle of compound interest," and the setting up of emergency funds. But, for those just starting with financial planning, Bach provides a host of resources to put recommendations into action. He walks his readers through such fundamentals as shopping for interest rates, creating a balanced retirement portfolio, and consolidating debt. And Bach's conversational style will make this quick read highly palatable for those daunted by more detailed investment and personal finance titles. --Patrick O'Kelley

About the Author:

David Bach is the author of the national bestsellers Smart Women Finish Rich and Smart Couples Finish Rich and The Finish Rich Workbook, and the host of his own PBS special, Smart Women Finish Rich. Bach’s Finish Rich Seminars are now the leading financial seminars in North America, having been taught in over 1700 cities by thousands of financial advisors. He is a Money Coach on America Online (AOL Keyword: David Bach) and the host of his own nationally syndicated radio show Live Rich with David Bach.

About this edition

• Publisher: Doubleday Canada
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 0385660243
• ISBN 13: 9780385660242
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 4
• Number of pages: 240