Foreword
Trying to figure out the money game can be challenging for anyone, let alone a teenager or young adult. There are so many concepts to learn, and most often, those concepts are interpreted by teens as boring or complicated. Many parents do not feel competent to teach personal finance, and it is not a subject taught in school. Couple that with the fact that 60 percent of bachelor’s degree recipients borrow to fund their education and 84 percent of undergraduate students have at least one credit card, and you have a disaster waiting to happen.
This book is trying to change that trend. Tamsen Butler, in The Complete Guide to Personal Finance: For Teenagers and College Students, seems to do the impossible. This book provides a proper education in personal finance in an entertaining and understandable manner.
The purpose of this book is not to tell the readers what to do, but to educate them on the various options and the possible results of one’s choices. Even if all of the information is not relevant to your current situation, this book can be used as a reference for each financial stage of the early adult years. It is comprehensive and user-friendly, and it is sprinkled with real-life anecdotes that illustrate each financial concept. Anyone can benefit from this approach to teaching personal financial planning.
As a veteran financial adviser and author of Lessons from the Depression: Eliminating Debt the Old-Fashioned Way, I found the information in this book extremely helpful in conveying the concepts a teenager or college student needs for a financially successful life. For those students who are looking for information on their own, or parents who want to find a guide that will teach fundamental financial concepts, this book will teach you everything you need to know. Butler has done a great job of writing an easy-to-read and informative book on a subject that all can benefit from.
Darlene Gudrie Butts
Veteran Financial Adviser
Author of Lessons from the Depression: Eliminating
Debt the Old-Fashioned Way
www.lessonsfromthedepression.net
Darlene Gudrie Butts has been a financial adviser for over 23 years and has authored Lessons from the Depression: Eliminating Debt the Old-Fashioned Way. Her goal is to educate the world on personal financial concepts one reader at a time. Her second book, The Ripple Effect: A Guide for Parents, Teachers and Coaches, will be coming out in the spring of 2010.