RESEARCH: 4/5
WRITING STYLE: 4/5
RELEVANCE: 4.5/5
ENTERTAINMENT QUOTIENT: 4.5/5
“If you are the kind of person who is waiting for the ‘right’ thing to happen, you might wait for a long time. It’s like waiting for all the traffic lights to be green for five miles before starting the trip.”
– Robert Kiyosaki
Some Musings
In the words of the famous Bill Gates “If you are born poor, it’s not your mistake. But if you die poor, it’s your mistake.”
I believe this simple sentence to be very true. We cannot choose our birth, but we can definitely choose our education, career, business etc.
What we make of our lives is totally our responsibility and hence it is our obligation that we make informed decisions.
What is this book about? And Why Financial Planning?
“Dream Big” is a book which mostly seeks to help a layman understand the significance of financial planning.
Everyone works for money – most of us are either salaried, own businesses or are earning professionals. The work that we do gets rewarded in the form of money. In short, we work for money.
But what if there is a simple and effective way to make money work for us? Well, the answer to this question lies in two modest words – financial planning.
This book tells us everything there is to know about financial planning and why it is a must.
Dream Big lets you both dream and achieve
“Dream Big” helps us appreciate the subtle intricacies of a good financial plan while offering an abundance of related information at the same time.
The book catalogues the most common of all investment options and talks about each of them in great detail. As each person’s financial goals are different, their investment requirements are different too.
“Dream Big” helps the reader chose the best investment instrument based on various factors like financial goals, investment horizon, risk profile etc.
The writing style
Learning about finance and the various investment options available can be a tiresome process for a beginner.
But the authors have taken great care to stick to easy language and easy to understand details.
The book starts with an example of how the author’s driver drawing just 6500/- a month was able to amass almost 50 lakhs in wealth within a span of 10 years.
Such everyday examples excite the reader and make them pay more attention to what is written in the book.
A comprehensive guide to financial planning
The best thing about “Dream Big” is that it has something for everybody; whether you are a student or a salaried individual or even a retired professional, there is some advice for you in this book.
The book covers almost all investment options – real estate, gold, bank fixed deposits, equities, mutual funds, insurance etc.
What I did not like
After the first couple of pages telling us about the story of the author’s driver, there weren’t any more examples.
There were a few numerical-only examples for explaining the differences in returns of the various instruments but they weren’t exciting.
A little more effort in keeping the reader’s interest, with the help of some trivia, examples, and fun facts, would have done wonders.
Final Verdict
I would recommend “Dream Big” to all readers who are above 21 years of age.
Financial literacy is a very important aspect of our education but unfortunately, our traditional education system doesn’t teach us much about it.
It is therefore crucial that we take the necessary steps ourselves and formulate sound financial plans.
Pick it up if
- If you are above 21 years of age.
- You enjoy reading non-fiction and self-help books.
- You want to learn about how to get rich through ethical, legal and simple means.
- You enjoy books on personal finance.
Skip it if
You would rather stay away from non-fiction books that teach a good way to be financially strong (read rich).
Can’t wait to read it? Buy your copy at the link below!
