[Today’s post is by staff writer Melanie.]
The personal finance world is chock full of helpful advice, money tips and a ton of expert knowledge. Much of this knowledge comes from bloggers and what I call personal finance deities.
If you have any sort of penchant for personal finance, I am sure you have heard of Dave Ramsey and Suze Orman. Both of these personal finance experts have built an empire educating people on becoming debt free, saving money and taking financial control of one’s life.
On the other end of the spectrum, bloggers like me often write experientially about these things. Most of us don’t have any fancy certifications nor would we call ourselves experts. As someone who has followed personal finance blogs for several years, I love following the journey and hearing from real people. But as I said, we are not the experts, just people with a financial story to tell.
I condone seeking advice from people who know more than you. It’s always good to check out other opinions, learn more about complex financial concepts, and continually try to better yourself and your financial situation.
I remember in my early twenties, I would go to the bookstore (remember those?) and I’d hide out in the personal finance section. As a young woman just coming to terms with my financial situation, I was hungry for advice. I would be cooped up in the corner reading Suze’s The Money Book for the Young, Fabulous and Broke. I’d borrow audio version of The Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey from friends.
Every little bit of information I received made me feel like I was on a path to be financially well. It was as if by absorbing all this information, I would suddenly be enlightened and shift everything and change my bad financial habits.
As you know, change comes gradually. You can’t just read the equivalent of financial self-help and be a changed person. You have to actually DO something. Action wins, complacency keeps the status quo.
I found after a while that I would voraciously read book after book and while I was making small changes in my life, like paying more to debt and saving more money, I still wasn’t happy with my financial situation.
I felt guilty when I wanted my first credit card at 28, because Dave Ramsey told me they were evil. I started to feel really bad about myself when I watched Suze’s show, during her section Can I Afford It? where she notoriously denies people on air for their desired purchases. Most of these people made a lot more money than me and had a lot more in savings and they were getting denied for a $100 anniversary dinner! I realized that Suze would deny my whole life’s existence and I’d be excommunicated from the Church of Suze.
After analyzing my feelings, I realized the gap between financial deities and normal people is huge and that I couldn’t relate to them any longer. But some people worship them with such blind faith. Like any religion that you may worship, it should make you feel good and be in alignment with your values. You should not feel sorry for your existence or that you are constantly sinning.
This is not to say that a little tough love isn’t needed at times, but personally I think that it can go too far. I now find a lot of personal financial deities completely out of touch with “normal people problems.” They have built empires and made money that most of us will never see. Because of this, I tend to enjoy reading personal finance blogs more, over cut and dry, rote advice that seems the same for everyone, regardless of their personal financial situation.
If inspiring people to action is the road to actually making change in someone’s life, I don’t think making them feel bad first is going to get them there. So my advice is choose your financial deities wisely. Find people that inspire you and push you to greatness.
Who are your favorite financial deities, if any? What bloggers offer great personal finance advice? Let me know by leaving a comment below. Thanks!
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About The Author: Melanie blogs about breaking up with debt at DearDebt.com and invites others to write breakup letters to their debt as well. She’s accumulated a total of $81k in student loan debt between two degrees. Currently she puts more than 50% of her income towards debt, while living a frugal, fun life. Melanie enjoys travel, art, music, adventure, and of course, personal finance. If you’re interested in writing for Vosa contact us here.
Afterword From Brent
I wanted to chime in here to share some of my favorite personal finance blogs (in no particular order):
- Budgets are $exy (may I suggest you start with this post then this post)
- Dear Debt (obviously)
- FI Fighter (great advice from a fellow real estate investor)
- The Altucher Confidential (not your typical personal finance site but MANY great lessons to be learned and insight to be had)
- First Quarter Finance (the newest site to be added to my feedly account)
- Mr. Money Mustache (block off a good hour of time before you click this link)
- Club Thrifty (anyone who has 34 credit cards for travel hacking is a friend in my book)
- The Broke and Beautiful Life (a great site showing you that you can follow your dreams even if it doesn’t pay well)
Photo Credit: Duncan C
Agree that people should use gurus more wisely. It’s like some people trade one addiction (like shopping) for another (consuming all things Dave Ramsey). I recently read No Debt! No Sweat! By Steve Diggs and he is very much like Dave Ramsey, yet preaches a message of “find your own way”. Not every situation is the same and different people with different salaries and different lives will need different approaches. It was a breath if fresh air after “failing” several times on the Dave Ramsey path.
Yeah, anything that makes you feel like a failure or a loser is not OK in my book. Glad you found a book that resonates with you! I’ll have to check it out.
“It was as if by absorbing all this information, I would suddenly be enlightened and shift everything and change my bad financial habits.” lol I felt the same way. And I agree that Suze would probably deny that I’m allowed to eat this month. “No, you cannot afford food, period!” 🙂 I take bits and pieces of advice from everyone, and throw the rest away. I do think it can get over the top…although at times some people probably do need to be shaken up a bit.
Haha glad I’m not the only one that thought reading would fix everything. 🙂 I take what’s relevant to me and throw the rest away. I agree some people need to be shaken up, but I think you need to approach people differently. We all receive feedback and change differently. I’m likely to shut down or not care/give up if I feel highly judged.
Yup – a lot of what they say is dangerous, like condemning all credit cards as evil!
Michelle from shop my closet recently stopped listening to those shows because of how they made her feel, too. She’s much happier now!
I know, I loved that post from Michelle! If it’s not working for you anymore, time to move on! Break up with debt and your financial guru?!
Loved the post, Melanie!!! My story is like yours. Dave and Suzy shout a lot but don’t relate to others on the same level as bloggers.
And if we lived in the same town, we surely would have randomly met in the PF section of a bookstore. 🙂
And thanks for the link love, Brent!
Thanks, Will! We won’t meet at a bookstore, but will we meet at FinCon? Are you going? Your site is so inspirational and you are a financial leader in your age group!
Thanks for the love brotha! I’m impressed you still shot it my way after my idiocy this weekend… Yet again proves what a gentleman and scholar you are. *tips hat*
You’re welcome. Hopefully I can introduce the last few people on earth who haven’t already benefited from Budgets are $exy.
By the way, no need to worry about how things went down. Only one way to keep going… forward.
I’ve always liked and followed Gail Vaz-Oxlade, but I’m starting to question her advice about saving 10% of income. From hanging around the PF community including many FI bloggers, I’m thinking this should be a minimum 20% but more like 30% – 40%. And by saving you could also use to to mean – apply to debt and then save later, or save 20% and apply 20% to debt simultaneously.
I love Gail too Deb, but I agree that 10% is not enough for savings/investments. For people who are just starting out, or with very limited income, then 10% is certainly better than nothing. But many of us can save more if we put some effort into it.
When I was working to pay off my debt I read all the “majors” like Suze Orman, David Bach and Dave Ramsey. I adopted suggestions that I felt would work for me and dismissed the rest. I don’t like when people try to force that their way of dealing with money is the only way. I also feel that some folks get a little too attached to their favourite PF “Guru” and become more like a zealot. That’s a huge turn off for me.
I like to read all the PF gurus but in the end I choose which advise to use. My mom always told me that whatever I come across in life to take the good and walk away from the bad. I also agree with you in that I have struggled with some of the pf advise that these famed gurus give. I *strongly* disagree with Dave Ramsey about owning credit cards. I think you need at least one major credit card, 99% of the time I get by with mine, but some places are strictly credit card only.
These days these places are rare but they are still out there. I remember driving across the country for a trip and this hotel refused to take my debit card. So I gave them my credit card. A few years ago I knew this friend who had never gotten a credit card and thus didn’t have credit history, and this person had a hard time finding a place to rent. This person is a good saver so when he offered to give 6 months rent in advance at several apartment complexes he got turned down.
This person is a professional, clean cut, very responsible, and has references. Even though he wasn’t a Dave Ramsey fan, he was against getting a credit card. The only place that would take him in Omaha, Ne was an apartment that was next to a rowdy bar. He hated it! I explained that since he is so good with saving his money, he would probably be good with his credit card and he should at least get one.
He did get one, built up his credit over a few months and was able to move out of that crappy apartment and moved into a nicer apartment complex in a safe neighborhood. Just like I predicted, he didn’t go crazy with his credit card, he still pays it off on time and has excellent savings to this day. I still enjoy listening to Dave Ramsey but I don’t agree or follow everything he says.
In fact I respect how he has raised his children, his daughters aren’t stumbling out of nightclubs at 2 a.m. flashing their undies. His son isn’t out misbehaving either. All his children seem respectable, polite, happy people. He seems to have avoided raising trust fund brats which is refreshing. I also respect how he has admitted making mistakes in his marriage and how his wife was distrustful of him for a time, it takes a lot of guts to talk about mistakes in the public.