When I walked out of the bookstore with Smart Couples Finish Rich, I was probably in the same financial condition as most of you are today. I had a job. I had a paycheck. I had vacations. I had toys. I was in debt. I was contributing to a retirement account.

But I didn't have a clear cut path to reach my financial goals. I wasn't even sure what my financial goals were. At the time I was naive enough to think that "I want to have enough money so that I don't have to work" was a financial goal.

Smart Couples Finish Rich starts out explaining how difficult it can be for 2 people to manage money as a couple when they probably grew up with different financial backgrounds.

The book explained that in most families, one spouse usually handles all financial matters, and the other is not involved. In some families, neither spouse wants to handle the money. This usually results in big problems. In smart families, both spouses get involved in money management. They communicate on financial matters and make sure they are in agreement on how their money is managed.

When it came to money, my father was my mentor. He had a solid financial background. He managed his budgets responsibly. He handled credit cards the right way. And he loved investing. I was lucky to have the background of knowledge I received from my father.

On the other hand, my wife is from a foreign country. She did not grow up in a capitalist economy. This turned out to be a huge advantage for us. She had not developed any destructive financial habits before we got married. She did not have credit cards or any kind of foolish spending habits. Where she grew up, money was scarce and you paid cash or you didn't buy. How many of us Americans would be better off financially if we had the same restrictions? I raised my hand.

My wife had no preconceived ideas about money management. What she learned, she learned from me. And she was eager to learn. We opened a second checking and savings account and made them her responsibility. She eagerly learned how to manage her accounts using computer software. And, as you will see later, that was just the beginning.

The next part of the book emphasized how important it is that a couple knows what their goals are in life. It's amazing how many people dream about what they want but they don't live their lives focused on reaching those goals. Ask yourself "What do I really, honestly want out of life?" Then ask yourself "Am I doing anything to make it happen?"

My wife and I went through the exercises provided by the book. It was no surprise that not only did we share many of the same goals, we had taken action to reach those goals.

I'm sure many of you have heard the expression Latte Factor. The author, David Bach, was the originator of that expression. For those who haven't heard of it before, Latte Factor describes all the little purchases we make everyday without thinking about it because "it's just a few bucks". But if you add it all up, you would only have to invest a small portion of it and you would become a millionaire.

In the beginning of the Latte Factor chapter, David Bach states that almost anyone in America makes enough money to become wealthy. The problem isn't how much money we earn. The problem is how much money we spend.

He suggests that you write down everything you spend for a week and you will be surprised to see how much money you are spending and what you are spending it on. I actually did a variation of this long before I read Smart Couples Finish Rich. I was in my early thirties, making a lot of money, and noticing there wasn't much left over at the end of the month. So I saved receipts for an entire month. It was surprising to see how much money I was wasting.

Cut back on unnecessary spending and you can be a millionaire. Notice, I said "cut back", not "eliminate" unnecessary spending. We all need to enjoy life. Don't give up your Latte's, just quit buying 10 every week. When you have 1 or 2 every day, it stops being special. You drink it out of habit and you probably don't even taste it anymore. Cut back to 1 or 2 a week. You will not only save a lot of money but they will become enjoyable once again.

Latte Factor doesn't just apply to those expensive coffees. It covers all the small spending we do on a daily basis without thinking about it. Fast food immediately comes to mind. Eating lunch out everyday instead of bringing it from home is very expensive. There are so many other things you will discover if you decide to "save those receipts" for a week.

After the book finishes with foolish spending, it moves on to smart saving. Almost everyone has heard the expression "Don't put all your eggs in one basket." David Bach suggests 3 baskets: a retirement basket, a security basket, and a dream basket.

Regardless of whether you know nothing about retirement accounts, a little about them, or a lot, the chapter about retirement in Smart Couples Finish Rich would greatly elevate your level of knowledge. I'm going to step out on a limb and claim that it might be the best explanation of saving for retirement that you will ever find. Now, granted, I have not read everybody's explanation so I may be wrong. But this one is really, really good.

The book explains what "Pay Yourself First" really means in terms of retirement savings. It shows you how you can save for retirement without taking the same huge hit in your net pay. It covers all the different kinds of retirement accounts and it explains their differences. And it answers a lot of the questions that come up in the course of making your retirement investing decisions.

My father suggested back in the early 1990's that I open a retirement account. I agreed with him. I should do that. And, of course, I kept putting it off. Eventually, though, I finally got started. I had my own consulting business so he suggested a SEP-IRA. That is an IRA for self-employed people. I got it started and even contributed some money here and there. That was the situation I was in when I read Smart Couples Finish Rich.

I learned in the book that besides my SEP-IRA, I could also open a Roth IRA. I did not know that. My wife did not have any retirement accounts. They offered a 401K at her place of employment so we immediately got her signed up. After that, we both opened Roth IRA accounts. So now, combined, we had a SEP-IRA, a 401K, and 2 Roth IRA accounts. It is looking pretty definite that we will be able to retire when we become eligible.

The nice thing about my wife's 401K and Roth IRA was the hands-on financial experience she gained. Her retirement money was invested in mutual funds so she immediately began learning about them. She saw her 401K investments on her paycheck stub every week along with the corresponding drop in taxes and net pay. She understood what was going on and why.

Let's move on to the security basket. As I started that chapter I thought "Here is where he tells us to save one year's expenses in a cash account in case we lose our jobs." I was kind of right. That was a tiny amount of the information in that chapter but there was so much more. There are certain protections that every family needs including life insurance, disability insurance, and having a will. These were some of the holes in my financial plan that were patched from the information I got out of that chapter.

The dream basket is exactly what it sounds like. Save up some money so you can enjoy your dreams. Of course, first you need to know what your dreams are. That part was easy because my wife and I share so much in common. David Bach suggests making an automatic investment out of your paycheck into your dream account. He also discusses options for what type of investments you should use depending on the amount of time before you are ready to pay for your dream.

By the end of the book, we found out that we were already doing a lot of things right but there were some things we still needed to do. Right away, we got started on those other things like increasing our life insurance and getting disability insurance. We needed to do these things, so we did. We didn't say "we need to" and then forget about it. We took action. Our financial future was looking pretty solid.

But we still had one problem the book didn't solve. We were still dependent on a paycheck to pay our bills. I asked myself "How can we fix this problem?" I didn't have the answer. That meant we needed more information, more knowledge, more hard work. In order to get on the road to Paycheck Independence Day, we needed to take the next step.

The next step was a book called Rich Dad Poor Dad.