Die With Zero: Getting All You Can from Your Money and Your Life―A Revolutionary Approach to Maximizing Life Experiences Over Accumulating Wealth

This book is a very easy read and packed with vital ideas to think about in order to maximize living your best life and dying without regret. For me, it validated all the choices regarding my family and lifestyle I've made up to my retirement. And now that I'm retired, it excites me to make more adjustments in order to live my best life. Don't be fooled by the title. It's not all about $$. It's about life. The author shares personal stories about his wealth, but he manages to make points applicable to anyone in any financial situation. I'm giving a copy to many of my friends this year. It's not a financial planning tool, it's just wonderfully thought provoking.

The overall message is good, but this could be a 25 page book. The stories seem to repeat, so the lessons learned are redundant.

I wish I had known about this 30 years ago. Having been retired now for 5+ years, it’s still hard to get out of the “autopilot “ mode of saving for the future. The author gives great advice on changing that mindset and living your best life through experiences.

Great read, all the tight wad people in the world should read this one.

Die With Zero contains a controversial and thought-provoking concept, which is to plan your life so that you purposely spend all of your wealth by the time you die. To maximize a person’s life, the author (Bill Perkins - NOT a financial advisor) recommends that most people should begin spending down on their retirement savings between 45 and 60 years of age (depending on one’s estimated life expectancy) so that they will reach zero net worth by the time they pass away. In theory, this plan is a great idea. In reality, this idea is impractical and down-right dangerous given that it’s impossible to predict the timing of one’s demise. I strongly disagree with many of the points in this book, starting with the notion that any money earned during a person’s career is “wasted” to the extent that the person dies before spending it. In other words, the author is saying that money has no value unless it is spent during one’s lifetime. In my opinion, this is wrong for several reasons. As just one example, having savings in the bank gives many folks the feeling of financial peace and security. If you don’t believe such a feeling is valuable, just ask anyone who has ever lost sleep worrying over unpaid bills or a lack of retirement savings. With that said, I found other points in the book that are worthwhile, including: 1) everyone should be mindful of how they spend their time and money (i.e., consider whether the daily Starbucks routine is a better choice than saving for front row concert tickets or a summer vacation and regardless how you answer that question, it’s empowering to know you have a choice), 2) a fulfilling life has more to do with amassing memorable experiences than increasing the size of one’s bank account, 3) plan to spend some money on experiences while you can still physically participate (don’t wait til retirement to buy a ski boat b/c most 70 year olds can't water ski), 4) retirement planning should include the concept that spending varies during your golden years (most retirees are more active/spend more $$$ in early retirement and less as their health declines), and 5) deferred gratification (i.e., saving for an emergency or retirement) is wise, but denied gratification is not smart (i.e., work until you die without stopping to smell the flowers along the way). Overall, I completely disagree agree with the main message in this book. Personally, I’d rather die with a pile of unspent money than take a chance of outliving my savings and end up eating dog food for my remaining days on earth. For financial planning advice, I definitely don’t recommend this book. However, it is valuable in the sense that it provides a different perspective on retirement savings and made me think more about my future.

great advice for living and money management! Even if you don't agree with all the strategies there is still a lot of great ideas to take away and apply to living a fulfilling life

Great book! It causes you to think about what you’re wanting your legacy to look like as well as your presence in your life. I don’t agree with all of the guidance but it was a great book to make your critically think.

This book was so helpful and helping me to make decisions about how I spend my money. It was particularly timely as I am nearing retirement and am understandably anxious about drawing out of my retirement funds. At the same time, I know that people in my age group ( I am in my 60s ) should travel and do those types of activities since the older you get the less likely you are to be able to do so. The author provides a good philosophy of the point of acquiring money, and also how to spend it based on your values and living a fulfilling life.

Muy buen libro! Muy revelador. En verdad una lectura para abrir los ojos y el entendimiento sobre que hacer con los recursos que una persona ha acumulado en su vida. Rompe paradigmas y hace pensar en el futuro y en los seres queridos. Lo recomiendo ampliamente.

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Bill Perkins has changed my life plans! Highly recommend this book to anyone wanting to have the best life! It is a fabulous strategy!

The sort of book one should read in one's twenties and thirties but still thought provoking. Highly recommend it for content despite being very American in style and somewhat self congratulatory.

Libro molto figo, che mette te stesso al centro, soprattutto da un punto finanziario, ma non solo.