Personal Finance 1050 ePortfolio

Personal Finance 1050 ePortfolio Assignment

For our Personal Finance 1050 ePortfolio assignment, we were assigned to read the book called The Four Laws of Debt Free Prosperity: The Chequemate Story. Then we were assigned to write a book report on it. In the book report we had to discuss/answer the following questions explain the four laws, discuss the laws and how they have applied in our lives, what forms of tracking we will use, discuss how the laws will be used in our lives in our futures, decide if we had changed our thoughts on money after reading the book, how our education is going to help us with our future finances, what we have learned in class and shared with our parents, and what we are going to teach our children about finances.

THE FOUR LAWS OF DEBT FREE PROSPERITY: THE CHEQUEMATE STORY

Many Americans struggle financially. Being financially independent is difficult to most people. However, if you apply the 4 simple principles taught in this book then finances can be EASY (maybe even fun). The book’s 4 principles or Laws are: Track, Target, Trim, and Train. The first law, Track, means to track every single daily expense and write it down. The second law, Target, means to set realistic financial goals, to write them down, and imprint them into your brain. Part of this law is to also make the goals a top priority in your life. The third law, Trim, means to set your standard of living lower than your level of income, in other words live on less than you earn and then spend the rest to get out of debt or invest. Also known as, pay yourself first. The fourth and final law, Train, means to educate yourself and learn about compound interest and investment strategies; then apply what you have learned.

I haven’t mastered any of the laws completely; in fact I haven’t even tried some of them before. However, I have tried tracking for a period of time. It got easier as I went and it became more important throughout the time period. I may not have mastered it, but I did implement it pretty well. Even though I stopped because it was just for an assignment, I plan on continuing tracking again when I become financially responsible. When I track in the future I will either write every transaction down in a little booklet like Paul Smith did or I will keep track of it on my electronic device.

Currently I do not have any trouble with any of the laws because I am not financially responsible yet. However, when I do become financially responsible I anticipate difficulties because life isn’t easy. The two laws I anticipate having the most difficulties with are the second law and the fourth law. I anticipate having difficulties with these two laws because they aren’t as much as a doing task but more of a planning task and deciding my future. I’m not as good at those kinds of things because I can be really indecisive sometimes. In order to do better in these laws I plan to not be as indecisive and just get things done. Not to mention, I won’t be doing any of this alone; I’ll have my current family and future family there to help me out and to counsel me.

This book has drastically changed my thoughts and opinions on money. I used to think that people just had to go into debt to survive (in order to buy things like a house and cars) in today’s world and pretty much just stayed in debt the rest of their lives. However, this book taught me that my ways of thinking were completely false and far from the truth. It isn’t easy to prove that way of thinking wrong, to be debt free, and be financially independent, but it is possible as was demonstrated in the book. I also learned a lot about how powerful compound interest can be, which was perfectly described by Albert Einstein who said, “The most powerful principle I ever discovered was compound interest.” This was even after inventing the Atomic Bomb, which really puts some emphasis into his statement. I also learned about Benjamin Franklin and his two rules to create wealth. First, learn how to manage the money you already have and second, create more money to manage.

My education will help me a lot with my finances. For one, I will be able to make more money (which I know the book says isn’t the answer, but it helps) and two, generally speaking, educated people know and understand finances better and therefore take better care of them.

I haven’t shared a lot of my learning’s in Personal Finance with my parents, but I plan on discussing it more. I also plan on encouraging them to read this book. I will also encourage my children to read this book and I will teach them everything I can about being financially responsible and being prosperous so they too can be just like Paul Smith and Mary Sessions.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Harris, B., Coonradt, C., & Nelson, L. (1996). The Four Laws of Debt Free Prosperity: The Chequemate Story. Salt Lake City: Chequemate International.

Miles, M. (2012, April). Sample - Reports. Retrieved April 22, 2012, from Riverton High School: http://rivertonhigh.com/studentlife/Business%20Forms/RHS%20Sample%20Report.pdf