Customer Reviews

Let's Get Financial Savvy! From Debt-Free to Investing With Ease

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Dr. Center-Shabazz explains the notion of financial savviness in her book, Let's Get Financial Savvy!, using this adage, "You can take a million dollars from a rich man and chances are he will regain it within a year. You can give a million dollars to a poor man and chances are he will lose it within a year." The difference between the two is financial savvy. Concisely, financial savvy comes from knowledge and knowledge is power. The purpose of the book is to empower others to claim and retain their "savviness".

I think this book is an excellent resource for beginners who desire an understanding of financial concepts because it is not a comprehensive "how-to" guide. The author provides some budgeting formulas and worksheets that are largely self-explanatory and rudimentary. She does a great job dissecting complex topics and restating them in layman's terms to ensure thorough comprehension. She also covers the basics by featuring numerous financial topics ranging from budgeting (cash flow and debt management) to retirement and investment planning. Simply stated, she tells the reader what should be done without all the details on how to make it happen. This approach may be too elementary for the experienced investor who may be looking for advanced strategies and tactics. For example, on the subject of mutual funds, she discusses the benefits, types, and other fund aspects and then instructs the reader to "read a lot of mutual fund reports" without providing an example of how to analyze such a report to understand the terminology, indicators, or components of such reports. This reviewer is of the opinion that advice like this is akin to a parent briefing their teenager on the benefits of car ownership and then handing them the manuals to the GM models to read on their own.

Nonetheless, the author's enthusiasm and dedication toward personal enrichment shines through in the book. Her "can do" attitude, illustrated in her "How I Came To Be MSFINANCIALSAVVY" chapter at the beginning of the book, resonates throughout to demonstrate that personal change is possible one step at a time.

Phyllis
APOOO BookClub

I have ordered and have read quite a wide variety of personal finance books and investment books over the last 6-8 months. I am pleased to say that Let's get Financial Savvy is not just a neat title. The book blends the topics of personal finance and investment in an easy to read personal style. Your real life experience makes for inspirational reading too. It covers the fundamentals of both topics very well and is not overly lengthy. Since it was written relatively recently is also very up to date. Well written.

After reading Let's Get Financial Savvy! I now have started to fund my work retirement account, started a balanced budget, written and working a plan for getting out of debt. This book gives you such clear step-by-step instructions for getting your financial life in order. After reading Lois' book no one should be in the dark about money and it's potential.

Let's Get Financial Savvy! Is a wondrously useful guide to creating and sustaining a functional financial life. It is a fast and easy read bursting with insights and resources, tons of them, for getting out of debt, writing a creative budget, buying a home, protecting your retirement income, college scholarships, investing and more.

The author, Lois Center-Shabazz, has positioned this book for those who want to become financial savvy in all aspects of their life. Personally, as the long-time operator of an investment club and divorce counselor, I see this as a book from which anyone desiring to began or improve a program on finances can harvest enormous wisdom. More than that, readers will save so much time and avoid so many mistakes.

This is a five star review for a five star book!

Let's Get Financial SavvyDr. Lois Center-Shabazz, founder of MsFinancialSavvy.com, was born and raised in San Diego, Ca. After graduating from The University of California at San Diego, then dental school at Loma Linda University, she began her successful career as a dentist while pursuing her interest in investment and financial research. Such a life would seem comfortable and rewarding; for Dr. Center-Shabazz this was merely a prologue.


After 18 years as a dentist she made the decision to sell her practice and move to Virginia with her husband. This new freedom gave her the opportunity to fully develop her investment education program she started in her early years as a practicing dentist; she now devotes her full time to studying and teaching investments and personal finances. In her first phase of her financial education, Dr. Center-Shabazz was angered to find that the "professionals" who had been handling her money were misleading and uninformed. This revelation was the driving force for her to learn all she could and become "financial savvy." This culminated in the founding of www.MsFinancialSavvy.com, the most comprehensive and user-friendly personal finance website in use today. Dr. Center-Shabazz did not leave her quest there. With the release of her new book, Let''s Get Financial Savvy, Dr. Center-Shabazz offers a groundbreaking new way for everyone to take control of their money, and understand the complex world of finance. Drawing from her experience with debt, and the uphill battle to expunge that debt Dr. Center-Shabazz has quickly become the valedictorian in the new school of the financially independent.Since founding MsFinancialSavvy.com, Dr. Center-Shabazz has been featured on numerous talk shows and spotlighted in newspapers and magazines across the country. The content of her book is so fascinating, it has garnered her the 2002 Pinnacle Book Achievement Award for Self-Help, given by The North American Book Dealers Exchange. Today, she continues to spread her message speaking to the "financial enlightened" and to help people from all walks of life to become financially savvy.

Dr. Shabazz, has mastered the art of "money!" She has focused on very important money issues but has explained retirement, ira's, cd and mutual funds in a way that a beginning investor can begin to invest and an experienced investor can take tips from her to make their portfolio larger. This was an excellent and informative book.

LET'S GET FINANCIAL SAVVY will be a great addition to anyone's library! It takes the reader on an educational journey from the ashes of debt to the glowing promise of a stable retirement. Ms. Center-Shabazz helps to relay concepts that the reader may have already known and forgotten and she also conveys information that may not be readily available to most. LET'S GET FINANCIAL SAVVY conceptualizes often intimidating information regarding financial planning, debt management and investingin `keeping it real terminology' that is easy to understand. One of the keys to financial success pointed out by the author was to develop a "fierce" budget and stick to it! Also, the author pointed out that a huge sum of money is not needed to start investing. LET'S GET FINANCIAL SAVVY helps to define relevant terminology and illustrate differences in various investment vehicles.

LET'S GET FINANCIAL SAVVY is more than a periodical document passing through time. With the author's use of her personal website the book is a current relevant guide that helps provide information to the financial novice. This book is a great source of information at every level of the financial realm.

Reviewed by Nedine Hunter
of The RAWSISTAZ Reviewers

Those new to personal finance concepts, such as young adults newly out of college, (as will many an adult in need of a financial mangement refresher) will find Let's Get Financial Savvy! by Lois Center-Shabazz to be an important and effective guide. The author persevered through a financial crisis and here imparts personal experienced based tips on how to invest, handle money, and protect against risky ventures. From online investments to mortgages, as will many an adult comes packed with charts and calculations.

Let's Get Financial Savvy!: From Debt-free To Investing With Ease by Lois Center-Shabazz (founder and editor-in-chief of the personal finance website MsFinancialSavvy.com) is a superbly organized and presented "how to" guide to managing personal finances. Ranging from simple matters like balancing a personal checkbook, to evaluating good debt versus bad debt, types of health insurance coverage and retirement planning, familiarity with the stock and bond markets (as well as mutual funds), tax-free accounts, home buying, and a great deal more, Let's Get Financial Savvy! is an easy-to-read primer that explains money management matters in plain and direct terms. Let's Get Financial Savvy! is an absolute "must-have" instructional reference, especially for young people just starting out on their own.

this books has the typical info you would expect to find in any self-help financial book, no secrets revealed hear. Any person who sits down and REALLY thinks about there finances would come up with the same solutions this book would give you.