Personal-finance

One of the keys to successful trading is recognizing that the market is not a combatant. It is not a bloodstained arena, a boxing ring, a firefight, or even a physical thing. This book also helped me confirm something I have always suspected: trading should be easy. This is to say, the journey is hard and grueling, but once you get there the sense of conflict and adversity should be gone. Before-During and After-Hours. Congratulations!

Conflicts, contradictions and paradoxes in thinking can spell disaster for even a highly motivated, astute and well grounded trader. Through simple exercises, traders will learn how to think in terms of probabilities, and adopt the specific beliefs necessary to developing a winner's mindset. After-Hours and More!

An excellent book on after-hour trading and technical analysis that cuts through all the hype surrounding this subject. Save yourself a lot of money and read this book BEFORE you make your mistakes!

Just back from a 16 day adventure around the big isle (April '04) and I can easily say that this '01 edition is already way out of date. In most cases you can multiply by 2 on the prices given, so be prepared. Realize that in the last year alone the prices for Hawaii real estate have gone bananas. For example in an article that recently appeared on the Honolulu Advertiser's front page entitled, "Kaua'i housing prices 'insane'" it was shown that the median price for a Kaua'i condo had gone from $227K to $420K in one year! On the big isle, which is the focus of this book, condo prices only went up 38%. Residential property went up 19% As a real estate agent here in Sedona who has already made contacts to be licensed in Hawaii, I was amazed. Using this book and the best guide book of the island, Hawaii, The Big Island Revealed by Doughty and Friedman, we put over 1300 miles on the rental car touring the island. After a week in the the beauty and traffic of Kona (high land prices!), we visited Hawi, Waimea (where I used to live in the 70's), and the Hamakua coast before settling into the constant rain of Hilo. We had 10 inches one day and after 4 straight days of being house-bound we visited Paradise Park and then headed back to south Kona through Volcano for at least the chance of Sunshine.
Affordable Paradise was useful to a point and the author's obvious slant is towards the cheaper housing alternatives found principally in Puna. Even those prices are no longer relevant again by a factor of 2 times for the most part. Just don't get this book and expect to find a paradise home for under $100K that is the value and beauty you may be looking for. That said, we are in escrow now for what we think is a marvelous area - an area this book hardly touches on. The 1/3 acre lots are going for $40-85K and have lots of advantages - 800' elevation, 20-30 inches of rain/year, slower pace. So you can find something and this book will help propel you forward. Also the moving-portion may prove valuable as we are now preparing to relocate. Perhaps the fact that on the next to last day we swam with a dozen delightful dolphins at Hoo'kena Beach makes it easy to see why Hawaii has us ready to return.
Good luck and Aloha!

BEING FROM THIS ISLAND, I WAS INTRIGUED. WELL WRITTEN AND WITH GOOD INSIGHT FOR THE VISITOR OR KAMAAINA...I ENJOY HIS TRUTHFUL YET POSITIVE PERSPECTIVE...BOUGHT SEVERAL COPIES TO PASS AROUND.

I had also bought "So You Want to Live in Hawaii", which i thought had a somewhat pessimistic tone for considering moving to Hawaii.
Affordable Paradise seems to have a very realistic and thorough understanding of whats involved both physically, financially, and mentally for considering making the move. It presents both positive and negative aspects for choosing Hawaii, and what to look for in purchasing a home, shopping, and understanding the locals. Very good book.

This book review consists of two parts. The first focuses on who could
benefit from studying and using the book. The second part reports on and
elaborates some relevant or interesting aspects of the book.

This book can be highly useful to financial advisers, and to entrepreneurs
who plan to start a new business or who are already running a business of
their own. The book can be used effectively in courses on entrepreneurship
taught in Schools of Business (Management), or sometimes in Law Schools.
Some of the book's chapters as 3, 4, 10, and 18 can be assigned in
introductory courses on management. If the instructor does not require
students to buy the book, then the college or university library should
acquire a few copies of the book so that the relevant chapters could be on
a reading list for introductory management courses.

The book has very good explanations of many topics related to
entrepreneurship.  We describe below, a few of such well treated topics.

Many of my MBA students would like to eventually, or right after
graduation, found their own business. They ask many questions about what
legal form should their entrepreneurial venture take. Lane's book provides
an exhaustive explanation of the benefits and costs of several legal
organizational forms:  proprietorship, partnership, corporation, S
corporation, and incorporation in Delaware or in another state. The book
also reports on a more recent legal form entitled: Limited Liability
Company (LLC).

Lane's book provides a well-written explanation of how to evaluate a new or
existing entrepreneurial venture. He describes the ins and outs of
breakeven analysis, simple forecasting financial models, and relevant
aspects of financial statements which the entrepreneur must be able to
understand for his/her own sake as well as for presentation to his/her
audience of potential investors. The book is a good source for providing
knowledge of other topics which the entrepreneur must understand to be able
to run his/her business efficiently. These include the ebbs and flows of
the processes of cash and receivables. Additionally, it provides a
discussion of other business processes. If the entrepreneur's business is
one of producing or reselling physical manufactured goods, then for such a
situation the book provides a good discussion of the inventory process.
Also provided in a comprehensive discussion are the ups and downs of the
liabilities process which has to be monitored closely by the entrepreneur.
The book performs well in providing the necessary understanding of business
processes. It presents its concepts and ideas in a lucid and clear fashion.

Among other analyses, the book offers in-depth analysis of risk management
for the entrepreneur. It discusses and explains the very important
insurance principle. It delves into the types of insurance that are
relevant for any business enterprise: property insurance, liability
insurance, self-insurance,
and specific insurance for directors and officers of the business entity.

Another important topic received a thorough going treatment: valuing the
business. This topic is especially of interest to entrepreneurs who own
their businesses and whose ventures achieved a measure of success. When
success and growth become permanent features of the business the notion of
selling the business to other entrepreneurs or to a large company may
become an option.  Some older owners would like to sell to attain a
comfortable retirement without the pressures of running a business. Young
owners may wish to sell, cash in, and move on to other experiences. Thus a
guide to valuation and selling is a useful part of the book.

This review focused on a few of the many interesting topics covered in
Lane's book. However, it should be borne in mind that the book covers many
more topics of interest. The book unravels its presentation over 310 pages
and 18 chapters.  It contains a wealth of information relevant to the
founding, running, financing and selling of business enterprises. It is and
will be useful for financial advisors and entrepreneurs...

Whether you are starting a business, buying or selling a business, or are just curious about the most important financial issues in doing so, this book is a comprehensive "must-have" guide. I found Chapter 12 (Buy-Sell Designs) to be particularly well written and informative, and believe that this single chapter is well worth the entire purchase price of the book.

I bought a few business planning books over the last months because I am starting my own hair salon. They all had these big lists of things to do, but never really explained why. I asked my brother-in-law, the accountant, for some help, but he gave me the same sort of stuff, which I still didn't get. This book I can take at my own speed while I am on the train. When I did meet with an attorney last week, I had a list of everything that I thought was important that I got from the book. He was impressed and my dream is closer than ever to coming true. Thanks, Marc!

The latest version of the utterly nonscientific and kind of silly AQ "theory"---and I use that term loosely. Razor thin on real science, but knee deep in sappy motivational homilies and feel good slogans. I think we can anticipate some additional titles soon---AQ at school, AQ in the boardroom, and the ultimate expression of AQ "theory"---AQ in the bedroom. There are an unlimited number of contexts for this "theory" to be applied to...each less convincing than the former. Want to be happier and more successful at work? This one won't help.

Dear ANONYMOUS Reader from Sedona: I'm sorry to say, but you're all wrong. You obviously did not read Stoltz's "Turning Obstacles into Opportunities". You cannot appreciate the value of the metaphor when you don't know anything about the extensive investigation and thorough scientific research behind it. That's a stupid as thinking you can learn to drive by reading the operators manual of a car. The metaphor is not the method itself.
The book is well worth reading AFTER reading "Turning Obstacles into Opportunities".