With hundreds of thousands copies in print around the world, Smart Women Finish Rich, by renowned financial advisor David Bach, has shown women of all ages and backgrounds how to take control of their financial future and finish rich. Whether you’re working with a few dollars a week or a significant inheritance, Bach’s nine-step program gives you tools for spending wisely, establishing security, and aligning money with your values. Plus, in this completely revised and updated edition, David Bach includes critical new long-term investment advice, information on teaching your kids about money, Internet resources, and new ways to attract greater wealth–personal and financial–into your life. Completely Revised with Updated Tax Law Information, Income-Building Strategies, Online Resources, Success Stories, and More With hundreds of thousands copies in print around the world, Smart Women Finish Rich, by renowned financial advisor David Bach, has shown women of all ages and backgrounds how to take control of their financial future and finish rich. Whether you?re working with a few dollars a week or a significant inheritance, Bach?s nine-step program gives you tools for spending wisely, establishing security, and aligning money with your values. Plus, in this completely revised and updated edition, David Bach includes critical new long-term investment advice, information on teaching your kids about money, Internet resources, and new ways to attract greater wealth?personal and financial?into your life. A senior vice president of a major New York brokerage firm, David Bach is a partner of The Bach Group, which manages over a half-billion dollars of individual investors’ money. The national bestselling author of Smart Couples Finish Rich, Bach is the host of his own PBS television special, “Smart Women Finish Rich.” His investment principles are taught nationally through his Smart Women Finish Rich and Smart Couples Finish Rich seminars, which are hosted by 5,000 financial advisors in 1,500 cities with more than 100,000 attendees annually. He lives in San Francisco, California, with his wife, Michelle. Visit his website at www.finishrich.com. STEP ONE LEARN THE FACTS--AND MYTHS--ABOUT YOUR MONEY Wendy sat in my office, perched on the edge of her chair, alert, inquisitive, and a little bit embarrassed. An experienced and highly successful real estate agent, she had come to me for a financial consultation--and the facts of her situation were hardly reassuring. Although she earned well over $250,000 a year and was able to put two kids through private school at an annual cost of $15,000 each, her personal finances were a mess. A self-employed single parent, she had less than $25,000 saved for retirement, no life or disability insurance, and never bothered to write a will. In short, this intelligent, ambitious businesswoman was completely unprotected from the unexpected and utterly unprepared for the future. When I asked Wendy why she had never done any financial planning, she shrugged and offered a response I'd heard countless times before: "I've always been too busy working to focus on what to do with the money I make." Looking across the restaurant table, I could see the sadness in my mother's eyes. A good friend of hers had just gone through a bitter divorce. Suddenly, after more than three decades of marriage to a wealthy surgeon, the friend now found herself living in a tiny apartment, struggling to make ends meet as a $25,000-a-year secretary. Like many formerly well-off women, she had never paid much attention to her family's finances, and as a result her estranged husband was able to run rings around her in the settlement talks. It was a terrible thing--all the more so because it could have been prevented so easily--and it made me wonder if my mother was similarly in the dark. So I asked her. "Mom," I said, "do you know where the family money is?" I thought it would be an easy question. After all, my father was a successful financial consultant and stockbroker who taught investment classes three nights a week. My mother had to be up to speed on the family finances. At first, however, she didn't reply. Then she squirmed slightly in her chair. "Of course I know where our money is," she finally said. "Your father manages it." "But where is it? Do you know where he's got it invested?" "Well, no, I don't. Your father handles all that." "But don't you have your own accounts, your own line of credit?" My mother laughed. "David," she said, "what do I need a line of credit for? I have the best bank in the world--your father." The reason I've started our journey with these two stories is that I know you are a very special woman--the kind of woman who believes in herself. Specifically, you believe that you possess the abilities and the intelligence to have the kind of life you feel you deserve. (If you didn't, you would have never picked up this book in the first place.) You also believe--correctl