A Book in Review: America's Cheapest Family

America's Cheapest Family Gets You Right on the Money By: Steve and Annette Economides
Non-fiction, Economics 276 pages
Book Count: 65

First, this really is their last name. Second this book was overall a good book for people interested in learning how to get the most out of their money. It includes at the end of most chapters 3 levels of things that you can do to help save/better use your money depending on where you are at now in the process. It has only a couple of things that I disagree with. One, I know from others experience that not having any credit cards does have a negative effect on your credit score. (Even if you have paid off your mortgage, car(s) and have worked for years.)Of course, if you are planning to pay for everything with cash and have money saved for emerengices then all you would need is a debt card that can be used as a credit card, like they have. Two, I have found that shopping once a week lets you take advantage of all the best deals in a stores sales cycle. Shopping once a month causes you to miss too many deals and spend more. And three I have no idea what making your kids dress up has to do with saving money. The part about not buying the trendiest clothes makes cents (ha ha puns!) but how dress pants and button downs save you money is beyond me. Expecaily, when they talk against letting their kids dress in grunge style (why do they think kids wear grunge as a major trend in 2007???) It is a style that is perfect for resale/consignment store shopping. Besides that I can't think of anything in the book that jumped out at me as not a good idea. Many of the things are found in lots of other books on the subject. It does have a lot of tips on all different types of money saving. And it has info on how to teach your kids how to handle money, which most books don't have.