Get a Life: You Don't Need a Million to Retire Well

by Ralph E. Warner

Book Overview

Retire happy and healthy without keeping a million bucks in the bank The financial-service industry wants you to believe that in order to avoid financial destitution, you need to put aside huge... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1413300847
• ISBN13: 9781413300840
• Release Date: January 2005
• Publisher: NOLO
• Length: 416 Pages
• Weight: 1.35 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 7.1" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Another valuable book from Nolo Press

Get a Life Stresses the importance of planning ahead. It notes that older people who have happy marriages, plenty of friends and warm relationships with other members of their famlies live longer than older people who don't. So it tells how to improve family ties, make new friends to replace the ones who die and work at having a happy marriage.It has a useful chapter about health and fitness which you should supplement with three other books: Fats that Heal, Fats that Kill, by Udo Erasmus; The Healing Nutrients Within, by Eric Braverman and any book by Barry Sears about his Zone Diet. It tells how to avoid nursing homes or pay for them if you can't avoid them. It has tips about buying used cars and pre-paying mortgages.Chapter 8 surveys where your retirement money will come from. It tells how to save enough for retirement, even if you think it's impossible. And it presents what it calls the savvy peasant's investment guide. Here it covers bank savings accounts, bank certificates of deposit, money market accounts, U.S. Treasury bills, U.S. Government bonds and notes, municipal bonds, corporate bonds, stock, stock mutual funds, variable annuities, immediate or fixed annuities, real estate and precious metals and exotic investments.

Change your thinking about retirement!

As someone who will probably retire within the next dozen years, I was beginning to wonder whether the doom-sayers were right: I don't have a million bucks in savings or a fat stock portfolio, so was I being foolhardy in assuming that I'd have enough to live on comfortably in my old age? This book was tremendously reassuring. Some of the author's main points are: (1) The difference between a happy, fulfilling retirement and "waiting for the undertaker" is not money but quality of life -- family, friends, good health, and meaningful activities that give you a reason to get up in the morning. (2) It's possible to estimate fairly accurately how much money you'll need to live on after you retire, and in most cases it's nowhere near the "70% of your present income" that the doom-sayers insist that you need to maintain your present lifestyle. (3) The loudest doom-sayers are the ones who are trying to sell you retirement plans! The author tells readers how to access a free set of "retirement calculators" on the Nolo Press web site to assist them in financial planning, and that alone is worth the price of the book. But what really "made" the book for me was his many interviews with happily retired people from all sorts of backgrounds and economic levels -- just reading about them was a real upper. There are plenty of books on how to provide for your retirement financially, but this is the only one I know of that adequately addresses the REST of your life. Read it!!

This is the best retirement planning book I've ever read!

This is the first retirement planning book I've ever read that realistically addresses how much money you really need to save for the lifestyle you want. I now realize that I don't need to save millions, that my current saving plan is perfectly adequate for the lifestyle I want. I can relax, enjoy my life and family, and work on retaining my health.

Excellent Contrarian Viewpoint

This book should be required reading for anyone who thinks about retirement, from those just starting out in their 20's and 30's to those nearing retirement. The book is a refreshing, contrarian view to the conventional wisdom of "save tons of money for retirement", "you'll need 70-100% of your current income in retirement", etc., etc., etc. The traditional retirement literature is focused almost exclusively on money, with which Warner takes exception.Warner's focus is on the whole person - he makes a very compelling argument that money is a FACTOR in a good retirement, but that it is also important to cultivate health, outside interests, friendships and family. He believes these latter factors have a FAR greater influence on a successful retirement than money. He bases this viewpoint on research among those enjoying active, successful retirements.Warner is not a Pollyanna, saying not to even think about retirement savings (as some critics seem to suggest). The book contains some common sense ideas on savings and admits that having SOME money may help. Warner's point, however, is that money alone isn't going to make you have a successful retirement if you neglected your family, friends, outside interests, spirituality and health in order to get the money.I highly recommend this book to anyone who ever thinks about retirement. You may not agree with the proposition, but the book will really help expand your view of the elements of a good retirement and may help you plan a more enjoyable life.