It's worth a try. When I give a book like this to someone, I'll say "Because I read a book like this when I was your age, my time is now my own."
One of the traits my daughter inherits from me is that she is a voracious reader. I found an investing book written for women (no - not Suze, though I don't know how people pick on her so much - some people deserve to be yelled at), and just put on her desk. I didn't even say anything. She found it, and read it in 1 or 2 nights. She later asked me to look over her 401k contributions
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I am now trying to get her to reduce eating out, not going to the theaters 3 times a week, and not shopping for clothes twice a week.
Glad you're enjoying my book. You're right, much of the advice is targeted toward younger folks who are just starting out ... I'm heartened by the fact that the book is getting a bit of a cult following among college students and other young adults. I don't know if it will capture your daughter's fancy, but it's definitely most popular among those in that age bracket.
That's encouraging.
Let me explain the approach I'm taking with our 'just starting out in real life' son. I'm trying very hard to do no 'preaching' whatsoever. I expect that to be counter-productive. What I have been doing, in small doses, is explain the consequences of decisions.
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So maybe some people are just born with the 'frugal gene', but I think others can understand the cause-effect, and decide from there. Others never get the cause-effect thing, choose not to look, or just want to live in ignorance of it.
-ERD50
That's the approach we have taken. With my son, I've got no problem. In fact, we don't want him to become "too cheap". Let me explain that a bit further.
When I was in my late 20s, having a bit of cash piled up but not knowing how to invest, I read Andrew Tobias. By the way, he described more ways an investor could lose money than one could make money. That was useful, I guess, to keep a novice from diving in head first. But I remembered and appreciated some of his philosophical points the most. Now, we all know Jeff Yeager uses the term "cheapskate" in the self-mocking sense. Tobias showed the differentiation between true "cheap" and "frugal".
To Tobias, not using the minibar in your hotel room and running down to get a Coke at the nearby convenience store is frugal, not cheap. Not leaving the correct tip to your waitress, or not contributing to the office envelope circulating for collection for a gift for the department secretary is cheap, not frugal. Tobias said frugality generally applied to the act of denying oneself, while cheap applied to actions towards others.
Growing up, I saw that my father rarely went out to drink and eat with friends. He mostly tried to include his family in recreation activities. He would scrimp on himself, but not on his kids. He was frugal, not cheap.
On the other hand, I have seen people who would not hesitate to squander on themselves, but were extremely miserly when it came to treating others. Those are CHEAP, no matter what fancy cars they drive or what clothes they wear. Those, you may not know they are cheapskates until you get a chance to observe how they treat their family members and friends.
