The 7 Best Personal Finance Books of 2019

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Best Personal Finance Books

Studies have shown that saving money and budgeting are two of the most popular New Year’s resolutions.

Whaaaaaaaaaaaat?!

I know! Besides losing weight, working out and trying for that elusive six-pack. People genuinely care about their personal finances.

While I can’t flex your personal finances into a six-pack. I can provide you a list of The 7 Best Personal Finance Books of 2019. Instead of signing up for another gym membership that you won’t use after February. Spend that money buying books to educate yourself about money.

Why books?

Personal finance books will empower you to budget, save for retirement, get out of debt and tackle many other money-related decisions with confidence.

Remember, Personal Finance needs to be personal. There is not “a one size fits all solution.†Your financial goals should align with your life goals and aspirations. Not your friend Bobby’s or Jenny’s financial goals. Or, your neighbor down the street with that new luxury car. Yours.

Exactly like my article listing The 11 Best Books on Investing of 2019. These personal finance books are in no particular order but are regarded as the best. I would recommend Personal Finance for Dummies for beginners because it will give you a fantastic foundation and make the other books more enjoyable to read.

All these books are available on Amazon Kindle. Prefer listening to books? Try Amazon Audible and get 2 Free Audiobooks. Are you ready to start reading the 7 Best Personal Finance Books of 2019?

Personal Finance for Dummies

As you might have figured out, I always recommend the “Dummies†series. Why? Because it is the go-to reference books for learning about unfamiliar topics. The bestselling Personal Finance For Dummies has helped countless readers build a financial foundation. Eric Tyson provides a guide to taking an honest look at your current financial health and setting realistic goals for the future.

Throughout the book, you’ll find techniques for tracking expenditures and reducing spending. Also, getting out from under the burden of high-interest debt. Tyson explains the basics of investing in plain English and options for popular investment strategies. He also covers ways to save for college and special events, tame your taxes, and financially survive the twists and turns that life delivers.

  • The bestselling, tried-and-true guide to taking control of finances, now updated to cover current economic conditions
  • Provides concrete, actionable advice for anyone facing great financial hardship
  • Helps you avoid or get out of debt and budget funds more successfully
  • Eric Tyson, MBA, is a nationally recognized personal finance counselor and the author of numerous For Dummies titles, including Home Buying For Dummies, Investing For Dummies, and Mutual Funds For Dummies, among others.

Broke Millennial

Broke Millennial: Stop Scraping By and Get Your Financial Life Together, by Erin Lowry is a fantastic book for people clueless about budgeting or overwhelmed by student loans. If you’re a cash-strapped 20- or 30-something, it’s easy to get freaked out by finances. But you’re not doomed to spend your life drowning in debt or mystified by money. It’s time to stop scraping by and take control of your money and your life with this savvy and smart guide.

Broke Millennial shows step-by-step how to go from flat-broke to financial badass. Unlike most personal finance books out there, it doesn’t just cover boring stuff like credit card debt, investing, and dealing with the dreaded “B†word (budgeting). Financial expert Erin Lowry goes beyond the basics to tackle tricky money matters and situations most of us face, including:

  • Understanding your relationship with money. Do you treat it like a Tinder date or marriage material?
  • Managing student loans without having a full-on panic attack
  • What to do when you’re out with your crew and can’t afford to split the bill evenly?
  • How to get “financially naked†with your partner and find out his or her “number†(debt number, of course)  . . . and much more.

This book is packed with simple advice and hilarious true stories. Broke Millennial is the roadmap every financially clueless millennial needs to become a money master. It is one of the best personal finance books, so what are you waiting for?

Dave Ramsey’s Complete Guide to Money

Dave Ramsey is a living legend among personal financial circles. Yet, this amazing book takes a back seat to Ramsey’s more famous book “The Total Money Makeover.†And it shouldn’t!

While the latter book does a great job of breaking down the consumer debt problem. “Dave Ramsey’s Complete Guide to Money†is a more comprehensive ‘A-to-Z’ look at household money management. If you’re looking for practical information to answer all your How? What? and Why? questions about money, this is the book for you.

It does include a large dose of debt management and it should. But Ramsey spreads the wealth and gets into those real-world money scenarios that Americans encounter. Things like insurance policy management, charitable giving, and trading.

If you need one single money management book, this is a fantastic choice.

The Automatic Millionaire

The Automatic Millionaire: A Powerful One-Step Plan to Live and Finish Rich by David Bach is a #1 New York Times Bestseller. It describes how to take the hard work and willpower out of the saving equation by automating your saving and investing.

The Automatic Millionaire starts with the powerful story of an average American couple. He’s a low-level manager, and she’s a beautician whose joint income never exceeds $55,000 a year. Yet, somehow manage to own two homes debt-free, put two kids through college, and retire at 55 with more than $1 million in savings. Through their story, you’ll learn the surprising fact that you cannot get rich with a budget! You have to have a plan to pay yourself first that is totally automatic. A plan that will automatically secure your future and pay for your present.

Jean Chatzky, a financial journalist and the author of Women With Money, agrees that it’s “terrific,†and says Bach “has keyed into the fact that changing your habits in a way that you can stick to them, and knowing what’s meaningful to you in your own life and prioritizing that, is what’s going to help you succeed.â€

The Behavior Gap

The Behavior Gap: Simple Ways to Stop Doing Dumb Things with Money by Carl Richards is one of my favorite best personal finance books.

Why do we lose money? It’s easy to blame the economy or the financial markets-but the real trouble lies in the decisions we make.

As a financial planner, Carl Richards grew frustrated watching people he cared about make the same mistakes over and over. They were letting emotion get in the way of smart financial decisions. He named this phenomenon – “the behavior gap. Which is the distance between what we should do and what we actually do. Using simple drawings to explain the gap, he found that once people understood it, they started doing much better.

Richards’s way with words and images has attracted a loyal following to his blog posts. His book will teach you how to rethink all kinds of situations where your natural instincts (for safety or success) can cost you money and peace of mind.

“It’s not that we’re dumb. We’re wired to avoid pain and pursue pleasure and security. It feels right to sell when everyone around us is scared and buy when everyone feels great. It may feel right-but it’s not rational.â€Â  -From The Behavior Gap

This is another must-read of the best personal finance books.

Your Money or Your Life

The authors of Your Money or Your Life: 9 Steps to Transforming Your Relationship with Money and Achieving Financial Independence expresses the idea that cheap is better and living frugally will make you happier.

Think about it. You have a choice between two jobs. One pays really well and the other doesn’t. But the well-paying job makes you dread the sound of your alarm clock in the morning. Which job do you accept? Robin, Dominguez, and Tilford think it’s a no-brainer. Earning money should not mean misery. Go with the one that makes you happiest and trim your budget accordingly.

“This is a wonderful book. It can really change your life.†-Oprah

For more than twenty-five years, Your Money or Your Life has been considered the go-to book for taking back your life by changing your relationship with money. Hundreds of thousands of people have followed this nine-step program, learning to live more deliberately and meaningfully with Vicki Robin’s guidance.

“The best book on money. Period.†–Grant Sabatier, founder of “Millennial Money,†on CNBC Make It

The Millionaire Next Door

The Millionaire Next Door: The Surprising Secrets of America’s Wealthy, by Thomas J. Stanley & William D. Danko reveal the seven common traits they’ve found among millionaires in their years of researching the behaviors of the wealthy.

Most of the truly wealthy in the United States don’t live in Beverly Hills or on Park Avenue. They live next door.

America’s wealthy seldom gets that way through an inheritance or an advanced degree. They bargain-shop for used cars, raise children who don’t realize how rich their families are, and reject a lifestyle of flashy exhibitionism and competitive spending. In fact, the glamorous people many of us think of as “rich†are actually a tiny minority of America’s truly wealthy citizens—and behave quite differently than the majority.

At the time of its first publication in 1996, The Millionaire Next Door was a groundbreaking examination of America’s rich. Exposing for the first time the seven common qualities that appear over and over among this exclusive demographic. This new edition, the first since 1998, includes a new foreword by Dr. Thomas J. Stanley—updating the original content in the context of the 21st century.

The Best Personal Finance Books Conclusion

I only listed seven personal finance books, but many experts will agree, these are the best. There are plenty more “best personal finance books†lists online. I recommend searching for books that speak to your current financial situation. Or, books that can help you achieve your financial goals.

When we talk about understanding how to manage money, personal finance is one of the most essential skills you can learn. But without any guidance, it is difficult for us to understand the value of handling our money to achieve our life goals.

That’s why you need easy-to-read books that will explain to you the basics of financing, the best way to save money, and how to pay off your loans.

I hope my list of the best personal finance books will help you achieve your financial and life goals!

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