Customer Reviews

The Kitchen Table Investor: Low Risk, Low-Maintenance Wealth-Building Strategies For Working Families

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This is a down-to-earth book in which everyone can find valuable suggestions - some simple, others that take a little work. The sections on investing in stocks and how to make your stock selections is excellent. Although I am already a member of NAIC, I found much simplified information to be helpful. I also like the way the author emphasizes that planning for your future applies to all facets of one's life.

On the cover of this book, the investment strategies are described as "low-maintenance." However, the author goes into great detail into buying your own stocks and also investment clubs, both of which take a considerable amount of time to research and participate in. I honestly don't feel that they belong in this book. Since the author previously wrote a book on investment planning, I feel the content was repurposed for this book despite its inappropriateness. This inappropriate content takes up a very large part of the book, so it's a big problem.

The book is poorly organized. It starts with ideas of how to find money for investments, yet inexplicably the last chapter also covers this same topic. It also does not seem to follow any sort of logical pattern, such as prioritzing what investments a middle class family should pursue first before taking on higher-risk, more complicated or more time-intensive investments. Another thing missing is what to teach the children about investing--should you open a money market in their name and have them put half their birthday money in there or something? If this book is for "working families," shouldn't there be some info about talking with your children about money?

One aspect of this book I enjoyed, however, was about saving money by not buying things that won't really bring you joy. It is a great contrast to the idea of "tightening your belt" and grimly depriving yourself of pleasures to accumulate money.