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What our customer's say!

"A valuable addition to your retirement library", I read some of the other reviews but to me this is a 5 star read.

Covers in simple and understandable terms the common mistakes that most retirees make.

Asset allocation is the biggest mistake that retirees make!!! It doesn't take a rocket scientist to know that speculation in unsuitable to those retiring.

If you cannot afford to lose capital, then don't play the game.

Laddered municipal bonds, treasuries, cd's and money markets are my preferred investment model.

Laddering will provide you with steady monthly income and all of these will provide safety.

A book well worth having.

"Interesting Read and Predictions ", This book was written in 1999 and published in 2000. My hat is off to the author for retiring at age 29 back in 1981 and living off his investments.

The first thing that surprised me about this book was the author's acceptance and recommendations for using 8, 10, and even 12% SWR's (Safe Withdrawal Rates).

Bengen's and Bierwirth's studies back in 1994 were seminal events in financial planning in that they found 4% was the maximum SWR. If the stock market experiences a prolonged drop early in a retirement period, SWR's higher than 4% will cause the retiree to exhaust his portfolio before this death.

In 1998, the Trinity Study also found the same basic results as Bengen and Bierwirth.....and recommended a maximum SWR of 4%.

The author retired in 1981, so these studies were not yet done. Conventional wisdom back in 1981 was that if the stock market returned 10% per year on average, then you could withdraw up to 10% per year and not exhaust your portfolio.

It is puzzling to me why the author ignores the 1994 and 1998 studies since his book was written in 1999. Conventional financial planning practices today would frown upon a financial advisor recommending any SWR greater than about 4%.

I did enjoy the accuracy of most of the author's predictions back from 1999:

Foreign stocks will do well......U.S. stocks will not do well..................Correct

REIT's are a good investment.....................................................Correct

Housing prices will decline due to aging Baby Boomers.....................Incorrect

The author also suggests that U.S. bonds are too correlated to U.S. stocks and therefore bonds should not be in a portfolio. I checked the long term and short term correlations using Callan's Periodic Table of Returns:

1991 to 2006 correlation of U.S. Stocks to U.S. bonds......R squared = 3%, R=17%
2000 to 2006 correlation of U.S. Stocks to U.S. bonds......R squared = 66%, R=-81%

Defining correlation as R, the long term correlation of U.S. bonds to stocks was relatively low at 17%. From the time the author's book was published in 2000 thru 2006, there was a negative 81% correlation. This data disagrees with the author's comments that you should not use bonds because they are too well correlated to stocks.

The author recommends using 3 to 5 asset classes.....and advocates the use of index funds. I interpreted the author's writings to indicate he holds zero percent bonds.

I was a little surprised at the author suggesting for the first year or two, it will take you 100 man-hours per every 10% of asset allocation to get your finances in order. After the first year, he says 10 hrs/week is enough. I use mostly index funds, so it took no where near this many man-hours for me to set up my asset allocation and investments.

The author suggests that the dollar will continue to decline against both foreign and emerging markets. He advocates up to 33% of your portfolio be invested in foreign or emerging market stocks. He rationalizes that foreign investors are more likely to buy stocks in their own country. He predicts Baby Boomers will be able to find buyers for their foreign stocks much easier than for buyers of their U.S. stocks.

The epilogue section is a good example of Socrates' famous quote "Know Thy Self". It is extremely difficult for us humans to understand what drives us and how we can make more rational decisions.

The writing style in this book is of medium quality with some annoying grammatical errors, but it was not a major distraction.

I found the book an interesting read.....primarily because it was written from the viewpoint of someone who has "walked the talk" and lived off his investments since 1981.


Index Mutual Funds: How to Simplify Your Financial Life and Beat the Pro's
Are You Using the Right Rules to Plan Your Retirement?
The Richest Man in Babylon
Bogle on Mutual Funds: New Perspectives for the Intelligent Investor
The Millionaire Next Door
The Four Pillars of Investing: Lessons for Building a Winning Portfolio
A Random Walk Down Wall Street: The Time-Tested Strategy for Successful Investing, Ninth Edition
The Coffeehouse Investor: How to Build Wealth, Ignore Wall Street, and Get On With Your Life
The Bogleheads' Guide to Investing

"Disappointed", This book is clearly intended for East-Coasters or, more specifically, people who have lived their adult lives in New York City. Believe me, you cannot sell your home in rural Iowa and take the proceeds to buy another house in a cheaper, but fun, retirement area with the bonus of having money left over to invest and live on. I was disappointed that most of the suggestions in this book assume that the reader is currently spending like a madman and not too bright about ways to save. Also, for those of us living a conservative lifestyle, the savings he outlines are nonexistent.

Oh well, no book is completely bad...

"Not the Only Investment Book You Need, But in the Top 3", I decided to give this book 5 stars because I decided it was worthwhile enough to buy, even after I'd already read a library copy. I usually don't re-read books. This one I have.

The main strength of this book is that it ties a lot of things together. It gives you a realistic way of developing a plan for the amount you need to retire. It then walks you through the amount of risk you need to take to achieve this amount, and realistic asset allocation to reduce the risk. He recommends keeping no more than 1/3 in US stocks, and having 1/3 in foreign stocks. As the world is becoming increasingly globalized, this is important advice. It was also pretty good advice since it was written right before the US market crash in 2000.

I agree with people who gave the book a lower rating. There are plenty of holes, and there are parts I don't agree with. This is not the only book you need to read. I recommend Bernstein's Intelligent Asset Allocator in addition to this book. Bernstein's book will help with the details. Edmund's book will give you practical advice to implement the details into a plan.

And if you don't have enough to meet your goals - Edmunds tells you to go back to work.

"Well worth it!", I have read a lot of books on retirement. This one is definitely one of the better ones. There are many new ideas in it and some "worth it" charts. We are already retired...going on four years...and already doing the things that the author suggests, but the hard data behind his ideas gave us more confidence in our approach.

Read this reviews before You buy...

"A good book that blends in with the others", I think this was a good book but I did not learn anything new compared to other books I've read on savings for retirement. It would be a good book for those who are still early in the learning process but could probably be skipped by those with a solid financial investment foundation.

"Misleading title, but informative", This book should have been titled _How to Invest in Three to Five Non-Correllated Asset classes_. There is very little information on how to actually retire early. The information on asset classes, however, is solid.

One area which I feel he could have done more with is options and derivatives. He completely avoids - or should I say, tries to scare people off of - them (he basically says, "Don't do it, you will lose...").

Also, several times in the book he kept dinging on his recent divorce. It rarely had anything to do with the current topic and I found it quite distracting.

The epilogue is strange. He tries to get very personal and share some of his feelings about loss, which is admirable, but I found it a little too sappy for my tastes.

"How to Retire Early and Live Well--Maybe Not Such a Sleeper", I thought this book was a "sleeper" but I have found that many other people have already found it and had the same favorable experience that I have had. This is a great book! It is simple and no-nonsense. It takes you through what you need to retire in simple terms. Then, it helps you figure out how to get there. It gives you lots of options along the way and demonstrates its points with practical examples. I have read a lot of these kinds of books. This is one of the best!

"How to Retire Early and Live Well withLess than a Million Do", A book that could potentially save you a ton of money--as it would have done for me had I implemented its strategy six months sooner than I did. As the title suggests, it's an excellen book for retirement planning, but it's also an invaluable overall investment management tool. Explains the importance of, and steps involved in, a form of asset allocation far superior to the stocks/bonds formulae we're used to. Pakced with useful information yet still a very enjoyable read. The Epilogue alone ("Living through a Crash without Putting a Bullett through Your Head") is worth way more than the price of the book.

"This book predicted the future!", This is a remarkable book. It came out in January 2000. We would have all been better off if we followed this advice back then. I only recently bought the book. More accurately than any other investment book of the year 2000, it predicted the future. On page 212 it says, "It is insane to put all your retirement money in U.S. stocks. Why risk the chance of never being able to retire if you are wrong?" In fact, it cautions to not put more than one third of your retirement in U.S. stocks. Chapter 7 suggests that real estate will be a better asset class than stocks for the next decade. Since the day this book was published, this certainly has been true. Babyboomers need to save for retirement, it says. But they are better off saving in undervalued real estate than overvalued stocks. The returns will be higher. In chapter 9, the author states that oil and gas will be excellent investments for the next decade. So far that too is right on the money. There are a lot more excellent suggestions in this book. It cost less than one trade at my discount broker. Damn I wish I bought this book in January 2000. I'm going to buy his REIT report as soon as it comes out....