This page sets forth links to articles referring to Rob Bennett’s book Passion Saving: The Path to Plentiful Free Time and Soul-Satisfying Work, to his daily Financial Freedom Blog, to the rise of The New School of Safe Withdrawal Rate Analysis (founded and led by Rob), and to Rob’s other writings on the Passion Saving approach to money management.
Softpanorama.org, Saving Your 401(k) Nest Egg From Yourself
Juicy Excerpt: Avid Siegelists [Jeremy Siegel is the author of the book Stocks for the Long Run) might later become disillusioned with the returns offered by stock indexes purchased at high valuations and suddenly realize that there are times when buy-and-hold investing is not nearly so exciting an approach as it has been advertised to be by gurus.
Internet Marketing Journal, Saving for the Future
Juicy Excerpt: I think you’ll find (like I did) that he offers a fresh new perspective that will motivate you to get on track with a solid savings plan.
Woman’s World, Save $500,000 by Retirement with this “Surprise” Advice (October 10, 2006)
Juicy Quote: “Whenever you’re ready to make a purchase, consider how many hours you have to work to buy it,” says Bennett. Those new shoes may not be worth five hours on the job.
The Juneau Empire, Get Over It: Don’t Let Job Rejection Set Back Your Search
Juicy Excerpt: Bennett says another thing you can do is to make a list of the things you’ve learned about yourself and about the job market. “You met people doing the work you want to do,” he says. “What is it about them that appealed to you? Focusing on that may help open your eyes to appealing options that you hadn’t given much consideration to before.”
The Cleveland Plain Dealer, Motivation
Juicy Excerpt: Bennett’s book, Passion Saving: The Path to Plentiful Free Time and Soul-Satisfying Work, is not about conventional advice on how to save money. He says that when saving is something you do out of desire rather than obligation, you will have more success. The key to effective saving is identifying a short-term saving goal that creates within you a strong urge to save. Do that and the rest falls easily into place. The first step to identifying that sort of saving goal is coming to understand what saving really is all about.
The Joy of Life Column, Improve Your Life With a Job That Fits (link no longer available)
Juicy Excerpt: Bennett calls this kind of analysis, which is usually based on salary, a mistake. “Your financial compensation is only part of the total pay package you obtain from the work you do. More important in a long-term sense is what you learn from doing the job,” he writes.
The Houston Chronicle, Gaming Doesn’t Have to Break Your Family’s Bank
Juicy Excerpt: Bennett, a lawyer and tax specialist who blogs on financial affairs at PassionSaving.com, says he can’t think of any spending category with as many bad traits as video games.
Online-College-Education.com, Want a Family-Friendly Career? Parental Advice on How to Break Into One (Link No Longer Available)
Juicy Excerpt: The strain on your bank account isn’t worth one cent of a frivolous purchase, he says. Because of his “Passion Saving” plan, Bennett eats all his meals with his family, takes his boys to the park or the pool every day, and spends more time with his wife, who’s also a stay-at-home parent. And that’s worth more than anything else, he says.
WritersHelper.com, Book Marketing and the Proposal Doctor
Juicy Excerpt: Her comments led me to believe that the best way to market my book was to sell it from my Web site, demonstrate that there is a market for it, and only then to contact publishers for the purpose of distributing it to larger markets.
PRWeb.com. Calculator Predicts Poor Long-Term Stock Returns Due to Valuation Effect
Juicy Excerpt: Investors have been misled by reports on what the historical data says that ignore the effect of changes in stock valuation, said Rob Bennett, co-author of the new calculator.
MSNBC.com, What Motivates Us to Overspend?
Juicy Excerpt: As Rob Bennett, author of The Financial Freedom Blog, so aptly puts it, “Few people see what books you buy; everybody sees what car you drive.
Medill News Service, Have Fun and Hold Down Spending
Juicy Excerpt: Bennett says that it’s a good idea to enjoy eating out at a restaurant, but to move the drinking to someone’s apartment. A bottle of wine when out can cost as much as $25. Buying a bottle of the same wine can cost half as much at a local store.
Forbes, Anonymity and the Net
Juicy Excerpt: Question the right of Net anonymity and you risk an unmitigated thrashing (anonymously, of course). So maybe we are asking for trouble when we dare to say that Internet anonymity is out of control…. It emboldens the mean-spirited and offers them a huge audience for spewing hatred and libel. Caustic cowards are free to one-up one another in invective and vitriol — haters who would tone it down if they had to identify themselves.
Note: Rob’s voice is the strongest voice in our community speaking out against the abusive posting that has caused great damage to six Retire Early boards, including the Motley Fool board, the Early Retirement Forum and the Vanguard Diehards board. He stated in a Letter to the Editor that: “Abusive posters seek power, not free speech. I’ve seen thousands of fine people intimidated into silence in the name of free speech.”
GetYourAssetsInGear.com, Time Is Not a Four-Letter Word (Link No Longer Available)
Juicy Excerpt: The problem is that valuations went so high in the late 1990s that it is taking a long time for stocks to get back to the price levels where they again provide the usual annual real return of about 6.5 percent. We’ll get there, however, and, when we do, stock investing for the long term will be fun again.
MSNBC “Your Career” Column, On Labor Day, Readers Seek Some Work Advice
Juicy Excerpt: This type of relationship building can take time to pay off, Bennett stresses, but when a new position comes up at least you’ll be on the radar screen of more than just your boss.
The owners of the Financial WebRing Forum state:
“We have taken the unusual step of banning a member based on expected behavior rather than actual behavior. Based on what we have seen elsewhere and at his own blog, we have permanently banned Hocus from FWF. What we have seen unfolding in Technical Analysis Anyone? is consistent with what we have seen unfold at other forums. Rather than wait and incur similar chaos, we have acted now.” A forum member named “Squash500 observes: “What I don’t understand is how Hocus can correspond in such a sweet and polite way—-yet he irritates me to no end. ”
The NormxxxRuminates blog sets forth a long excerpt from the article “The Famous Robert Shiller Stock Market Prediction” from the “The Stock-Return Predictor” section of the site.
The Canadian Financial DIY blog lists PassionSaving.com in its Resources section as a site that helps with “fitting investing into life.”
Sweetlip starts a thread at the Early Retirement Forum asking about the people who built the Motley Fool board, including “Rob Bennett, who must have fallen really out of favor with [John Greaney], judging by John’s comments on RetireEarlyHomePage.com.” Sweetlip observes that: “That must have been one helluva catfight to get Hocus so ostracized.” Cute Fuzzy Bunny offers that: “Sometimes people retire early and lose their minds.”
I post a Letter to the Editor at the www.Early-Retirement-Planning-Insights.com site entitled Dollar Cost Averaging at Year 15. I say: “In real life, most 100 percent stock investors would lower their stock allocations dramatically after suffering a big hit. That would bring the 15-year results for 100 percent stocks down dramatically.”