Money Talk Is More Excruciating Than Going to the Dentist
Money Talk Is More Excruciating Than Going to the Dentist |  |
| Money Talk Is More Excruciating Than Going to the Dentist Posted: 08 Dec 2010 04:00 AM PST
A recent survey shows that for 41 percent of the Canadians, it is more excruciating to talk to their partners about money than to go to the dentist. This may come as a surprise considering that Canadians enjoy a high standard of living compared to other Western nations. Given that a quarter of a million people have lost their jobs in the past three months and the economy still seems unstable, discussing fiances with your partner is crucial. In order to get through these rough times it is important that both partners have a clear understanding of their financial priorities.
 Photo: Illuminaut So, how to go about it? Experts insist that you consider your partner's weaknesses in this context. If your spouse had a tough childhood, with money being scarce, the topic would naturally be a sensitive one. Keep past experiences in mind and use kid gloves. You will have to talk about your spending, investing, and saving habits at one point, but before you do that, take the time to make plans for the future. Think about things you want to do together – traveling, retiring, decorating your home – in short, think about how you want to live your life together. Leave reality behind for a moment and picture the ideal situation. Next, decide on what steps to take to make your dream reality. These steps should include devising a spending plan. You must be honest about how much each of you spends. Either one of you or both may have some impractical spending habits that should be discussed. After this, you should figure out your total income as well as the total expenses. If the expenses are half the total income, you could each invest half of the income in a joint account. It would be a good idea to divide household tasks. One of you – the more organized one – could be responsible for the day-to-day household expenses and for all bill payments. At the end, you should agree on leisure spending – how much each of you spends on entertainment and whether the other approves. When it comes to major purchases, you need to have a spending amount determined in advance. If you want to spend more, check with your partner first. Never go behind their back as the breach of trust is a big mistake to make. Monthly expenses depend on the city you live in, your lifestyle, where you shop, and they type of housing you have. The average family spends between $55,000 and $65,000 CAD per year. You could go through all the steps above and still fail to reach an agreement. The lack of money is often the primary reason for disagreement between partners. Although the ideal solution would be to increase income, it may not always be possible. The next best alternative is to cut costs. Ask friends or relatives where they shop for bargains – different stores charge differently for clothing, food, and other bare necessities. Be sure to create a budget – one cannot stress this enough. The biggest expense in Canada is housing, accounting for up to half of your total income. The average rent for a two-bedroom apartment five years ago was $731 per month, the minimum being $472 (Saguenay) and the maximum $1,052 (Toronto). It is cheaper to both rent and buy a house outside of the big cities. Although we can not control the economy, following the above steps can help reduce the pain of a recession. Melissa Dean writes for http://www.creditcardreview.ca/blog, a Canadian blog offering reviews of popular Canadian credit cards. |
| Book Review: Changing The Conversation Posted: 07 Dec 2010 10:30 AM PST
The first thing that struck me with this book was its readability; the author has included a lot of 'breaks' in the reading, many organized, flowing chapters, as well as constantly finding ways of adding depth to the subject matter with creative analogies, personal stories, as well as riveting facts and figures. Gary refers to each one of the chapters as "conversations" and he does a great job of making each chapter unique in its content. One of the concepts introduced early-on in the book is summed-up as "KASH", which is an acronym that the author defines as: Knowledge, Attitude, Skills, and Habits. He artfully uses this concept to explain the necessity of perpetual self-renewal in today's "conceptual age" society, a term that is given to describe what the "information age" has evolved into – a society fundamentally based in knowledge work as opposed to hum-drum, factory-based employment that we've gotten oh-so-used-to in North America. A common theme that the reader will notice again and again is that there is a big focus on zooming-out – so to speak – of the focused view of earning as much as you can, safeguarding your assets for retirement, and retiring to a life of leisure and little to no work. Instead, you are shown a view that takes a look at the matter of retirement in an entirely new light, planting firmly in your mind that the idea of retirement is not The End, but an entirely New Beginning; as the chapters progressively lead-in to one another, this concept begins to make perfect sense. As I continued through the book, I was constantly surprised at how well the author stayed on-track with actually changing the conversation; there are so many times that we're told something is "new" or "never-before-seen" when it's actually a white-washed version of a product that left the shelves 6 months ago – It really does stand alone as a book on personal finance, and anyone looking for advice on investment products, retirement calculation examples, and the like are going to be disappointed. This book almost reminds me of a "personal development…for your finances"…book! It really is that "core-oriented" and it looks more at you and how you view your finances as opposed to numbers, charts, etc. The "conversations" in the book range from "Are you a chief or an Indian?" which outlines the authors concept of two distinct types of people, to "Age of Art and Heart" where the author describes a new age as distinct from anything we've ever seen – an age that is focused on the needs of the individual rather than the herd, and where corporations and businesses alike are realizing that their biggest asset is human capital… In essence that may be what Mr. Klaben attempts to do with this book: introduce the concept of human capital into the financial picture and help people realize that there's much, much more to money, success, and wealth than digits on a screen and dollars in a bank account; he animates for the reader in a most vivid fashion a new lens for the reader to hone and view their personal finances with. What it will tell is inherently personal, and what it will yield depends solely on the individual… |
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