Financial Freedom Book Review: A Blueprint for Winning with Money
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I’ve been following along Grant Sabatier’s story for awhile. When I first started becoming passionate about personal finance during the summer of 2015, Grant’s blog, Millennial Money, was one of the blogs I started reading consistently. When I found out he was releasing a book, Financial Freedom: A Proven Path to All the Money You Will Ever Need, I was excited to read it!
The book officially releases tomorrow, and Grant was gracious enough to provide me with an advance Kindle copy. After reading the book, I am confident that thousands of people will be able to follow his blueprint to reach financial freedom in their own lives.
This is much more than your typical money book. Grant focuses on mindset, getting the most value for your time, career growth, investing early and often, side hustles, and many other key themes.
Grant’s Story – from Broke to Financially Free
The book opens in 2010, with Grant at his childhood home realizing he only has $2.26 left in his bank account. After doing everything he was “supposed to do,” he’s back where he started and has reached a dead end. He starts researching alternative career paths and lands on digital marketing, running Google Ad campaigns. Five years later he had grown his net worth to $1.25 million, and by the age of 30 he had reached financial independence, the point where his investments could cover his living expenses indefinitely.
While that financial turnaround is buzzy and captures headlines, Grant backs it up throughout the book with actionable steps that anyone can take to follow in his footsteps.
7 Steps to Financial Freedom
Grant breaks down his plan into 7 steps:
- Figure out your number
- Calculate where you are today
- Radically shift how you think about money
- Stop budgeting and focus on what has the biggest impact on your savings
- Hack your nine-to-five
- Start a profitable side hustle and diversify your income streams
- Invest as much money as early and often as you can
The first two steps involve figuring out what number you’re shooting for to reach financial freedom, which is commonly calculated as 25 times your annual expenses. (for example, if you spend $40,000 per year, you’ll likely need $1 million in retirement savings). Then you figure out where you’re currently at which your debt, savings, and investments.
Developing an Enterprise Mindset
One of the most valuable topics that Grant covers is step three, radically shifting how you think about money. He talks about developing an enterprise mindset, which he defines as making the most of your time. Time is your most important resource and it is non-renewable. When you’re working for a paycheck, you’re trading hours for dollars. Grant talks about how important it is to be making as much money per hour as possible so that you’re making the most of your time. That’s also why it’s important to reach financial freedom as quickly as possible, so that you free up more of your time to spend how you want.
The enterprise mindset aligns with having an abundance mindset, which is being positive about the opportunities available to you and having a deep sense of personal worth and security. Your money mindset is hugely important on your journey towards financial freedom.
Growing Your Income
Many personal finance books focus on cutting back on your expenses. While that side of the equation is important, Grant advises that growing your income should be your primary focus. This can be done be negotiating a raise, researching the average salaries for your field and switching jobs, and by starting a side hustle. The more extra money that you can bring in, the more money you’ll be able to invest.
Grant reinforces how important it is to invest as much as possible, early and often. Every time you invest, you’re buying back parts of your future.
My one caution for readers would be to balance the math with your emotions. The book discusses when to pay off debt and when to focus on investing. For debt below 5%, the math would say that you should use your extra money to invest for higher returns. However, carrying debt can often take an emotional toll. We opted to take a hybrid approach, both investing and paying down debt, on our road to debt freedom.
Final Thoughts
Overall, I thought this book was fantastic. It was comprehensive of the key pillars needed to succeed on this journey, but it was also easy to read and highly approachable. Personal finance can seem overwhelming sometimes, but Grant’s writing is so engaging that it tears down those walls. I think millennials will especially relate well to this book and the lessons found inside. Grant is passionate about this message and having a positive impact on other people’s lives, and I think Financial Freedom: A Proven Path to All the Money You Will Ever Need delivers on that mission in a big way!
For more details about the book, visit: https://financialfreedombook.com/
