One Year to an Organized Financial Life: From Your Bills to Your Bank Account, Your Home to Your Retirement, the Week-by-Week Guide to Achieving Financial Peace of Mind [Paperback]

Regina Leeds (Author), Russell Wild (Contributor)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 10, 2009

Do you constantly feel anxious about money? Have unopened credit card statements piled up on your countertop? Are you forever losing receipts for items you meant to return? In an economic downturn taking charge of your financial well-being is more crucial than ever. One Year to an Organized Financial Life is a unique week-by-week plan to make saving money simple, automatic, and stress-free.

For decades, professional organizer Regina Leeds and financial advisor Russell Wild have helped thousands of clients get their lives in order. Using Leeds’s “Zen organizing” approach, which addresses the underlying causes of chaos and replaces them with routines, they now show readers the steps to improving finances within a manageable timeframe. From sticking to a budget to getting out of debt, curbing spending to maximizing retirement savings, One Year to an Organized Financial Life makes it possible for anyone to live more richly on less.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Leeds (One Year to an Organized Life), a professional organizer, and Wild, a financial adviser, apply Leeds's Zen Organizing philosophy to replace financial mayhem with method through digestible weekly steps over the course of one year. The authors begin by guiding readers through an emotional audit of their history with money, ridding their work spaces of clutter, and organizing key financial documents. January is time to take control, and the authors provide step-by-step instructions on preparing for tax season and retooling spending habits while laying the groundwork for protecting long-term assets. Savings and retirement vehicles are discussed at an extremely macro level—but the extensive resource section compensates for the oversight. By devoting the entire month of November to getting ready for end-of-year holidays, the authors drive home how planning ahead can alleviate the pain of unforeseen expenses. This is an excellent start to creating a solid financial foundation and future. (Jan.)
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Review

Publishers Weekly, 11/23/09
“This is an excellent start to creating a solid financial foundation and future.”

Tucson Citizen, 1/8/2010
“From sticking to a budget to getting our of debt, One Year to an Organized Financial Life is essential and accessible.”

Atlantic City Weekly, 2/9/10
“One Year to an Organized Financial Life is the portal to a lifelong practice of money clarity and order.”

Boston Globe, 2/21/10
“A nuts-and-bolts guide to organizing your files, paying your bills, and cutting costs and clutter…[Leeds’] advice is simple, practical, and essential…Calm and empowering, this handy guide is so well thought-out that just leafing through the pages might make you feel more in control.”

Curled Up With a Good Book, 4/19/10
“[An] absolutely marvelous book…[Leeds and Wild have] developed a deceptively simple (and extremely easy) method for whipping your whole life into shape…Invest in this guide, follow the advice of Leeds and Wild, and put your money to work for you.”

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Da Capo Lifelong Books; 1st Da Capo Press Ed 2010 edition (December 10, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0738213675
• ISBN-13: 978-0738213675
• Product Dimensions: 7.1 x 0.8 x 9.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #38,772 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #19 in Books > Business & Investing > Personal Finance > Credit Ratings & Repair
  • #100 in Books > Business & Investing > Personal Finance > Budgeting & Money Management

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

39 of 40 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Good concept, but not a thorough guide January 4, 2011

By Casey

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

I am a few months into this book and I have to say that I am slightly disappointed. I started off with high hopes. The book had some good tips in the introduction and the author sounded powered up about getting my financial life in shape and organized. I had a few gripes early on, but kept pushing through thinking that it would get better as it went, but it hasn't. I have found the book to be a mixture of irrelevance and surface-level information. For example, the budgeting week tells the reader to set up a budget. It explains a little bit of why a budget is important and sort of gives one example, but if the reader has never created a budget before they may not even know what categories are appropriate to budget for or how much they should be contributing to each area. Another example, one week she says to organize your office area, but she doesn't cover what is important to include in your desk or office area.

As I get further into the book I am continually frustrated by the fact that the author just tells the reader to do something instead of explaining how to do something or what the best way to do it might be. After reading I usually can't even recall what I am supposed to be doing, or I have to look-up information to fill in the blanks, which is frustrating--I feel like the book should be a comprehensive guide (or at least that's what I expected it to be).

Additionally, you may want to consider that you will have to make further investments to go along with the changes that the author suggests. I had to buy pouches to organize my purse, files to create a filing system, drawer organizers to organize my desk, and so on (and I didn't buy many of the items that she suggested). She even suggests buying new furniture for your office if it is not suitable. Mine is not suitable, but I am on a tight budget (the reason why I am reading books about finances) and I cannot afford to replace furniture.

On the bright side, I did find the chapter about creating a filing system helpful. The author explained exactly what the reader needed and what exactly to make files for. If only all of the weeks were as detailed.

The book may be helpful for someone who needs a sort of coach to tell them to do something and when. I find myself skipping through it, because when I get interested in something I want to learn everything about it, fast. (Maybe that's why I've been frustrated with the fact that it seems incomplete).

30 of 30 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Calming and incredibly helpful- a must have February 22, 2010

By JT

Format:Paperback

What can I say about a book that in ten minutes had me doing something I had been putting off for thirteen years--i.e. making a living will and getting my mother and my mother-in-law to do the same? (The book even includes the living will for you to fill out.) This book is so well thought-out, so calming and supportive, it truly makes you feel that you can do every one of the author's essential tips. Plus, unlike most financial books, it is packed with tips for the self-employed and it's rational, Zen tone makes dealing with finances...well, a new pleasure. Highly recommended.

32 of 34 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Another great offering from the Zen Organizer January 3, 2010

By Keith Campbell

Format:Paperback

Just released in 2010, One Year to an Organized Financial Life is the latest installment from Regina Leeds, the "Zen Organizer". I've previously read her book "One Year to an Organized Life" and found it a refreshing change in the field of organization. This book continues a winning pattern and expands it to an area where I (and many others) especially need some serious help - our finances.

Overhauling any aspect of our lives can be an intimidating. There are so many things we could do differently. So many small and large habits that need changing. Regina approaches this problem by having us concentrate on only one issue at a time, one per week, over the period of a year. Every month she introduces one key habit for the month, one helpful tool for the month, and then introduces one change or habit each week, in nice bite-sized pieces. Follow through on these easily manageable assignments, and in one year, ta-dah! you're financially organized. Or at least in a lot better shape than when you started.

One of the beauties of this approach is that you can pick up the book any time during the year and start the program. You don't need to start in January (although January would make a great time to start). Some of the months deal with items specific to that time of the year. for example, in November Regina deals with gift-giving, holiday spending and organizing holiday parties and get-togethers economically. The fact that I tend to start thinking about these things in December instead of November is an indication of just how much help I need.

The chapters and assignments give some really exceptional ideas for spending less money, making more money, saving for the future and protecting yourself from life's uncertainties. Regina covers insurance (of all kinds), investments, retirement, college planning, budgeting, entertainment, and the aforementioned holiday spending. In this book, she has a certified financial adviser (Russell Wild) along to supplement her organizational knowledge with expert financial knowledge about such things as various kinds of tax-deferred savings accounts and tax-loss harvesting (if you don't know what that is... you need this book).

When I open up a book on financial organization, I generally expect to hear that I should spend less, save more and make spartan cuts in my lifestyle. Perhaps that's why I don't generally like such books. The ideas in this book, however, are surprisingly fresh. I am getting a lot more new information out of it than I expected. And, like her previous book, Regina doesn't focus exclusively on the mechanics of organization, but also explores and rehabilitates your feelings about financial issues, through such tools as journaling tasks. The goal, after all, of "Zen Organizing" is a feeling of peace and security - not organization for its own sake.

So, if you feel your financial life needs some serious help (we know who we are), this is a gentle program that takes you by the hand and leads you through a year of easy steps to feeling much much better about your economic situation. There are no theories without simple, practical steps. Take the first step and give the book a try.