wealth plan book review

The Best Retirement Planning Books for 2024

For your next good read, how about a book that will help improve your financial future?

Best Retirement Planning Books for 2024

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Rather than waiting until you quit your job to figure out how you’ll pay the bills and spend your time, start planning retirement well in advance.

Key Takeaways

• Workers of all ages can benefit from reading about how to successfully retire.
• Some popular finance books use a narrative approach that can be good for those who like fiction.
• Nonfiction books range from those that cover retirement generally to those that focus on a specific part of the process.

There are many things you can learn by doing, but retirement shouldn’t be one of them. Rather than waiting until you quit your job to figure out how you’ll pay the bills and spend your time , start planning well in advance.

“The short of it is that, in my experience, people don’t start thinking about retirement until they’re 60,” says Joe Conroy, a certified financial planner and author of “Decades & Decisions: Financial Planning at Any Age.” But by that point, the window of opportunity to make meaningful preparations for retirement may have closed.

To ensure you are on the right track, pick up one of these titles which are commonly noted as the best retirement planning books – or could be in the years to come.

"Your Money or Your Life"

"the richest man in babylon".

• “The Latte Factor”
• “The Automatic Millionaire”
• “Decades & Decisions”
• “From Strength to Strength”
• “Money Master the Game”

“The Retirement Savings Time Bomb Ticks Louder”

• “Retirement Spotlight”
• "Die With Zero"

Authors:  Joseph R. Dominguez and Vicki Robin

Many consider this book – first published in 1992 – as the spark for the financial independence, retire early movement . Written by Vicki Robin and Joe Dominguez, this book lays out nine steps to walk you through the process of evaluating how much money you earn and the value it provides.

Even those who don’t want to follow the book’s nine steps, which include adding up your lifetime earnings and tracking every cent you spend, may find "Your Money or Your Life" provides inspiration to buckle down and make wise financial decisions.

Author: George S. Clason

First published in 1926 by George S. Clason, "The Richest Man in Babylon" uses a series of stories to convey lessons about getting out of debt , saving money and increasing wealth.

“It’s really considered a personal finance classic,” says Craig Kirsner, president of Kirsner Wealth Management in Coconut Creek, Florida. While the stories are set in the past, they highlight financial issues that are still relevant today.

Some may find the language in “The Richest Man in Babylon” to be archaic and the stories dry, but they have proven inspirational to countless others.

“The Latte Factor: Why You Don't Have to Be Rich to Live Rich”

Authors: David Bach and John David Mann

If you like the narrative approach of using a story to teach financial lessons, “The Latte Factor” is another book that may appeal to you. It follows the story of Zoey, a young professional who learns the secrets to financial freedom.

“It’s a fast, easy-to-read book,” Kirsner says. “(It’s) about how anyone from millennials to baby boomers can make their financial dreams come true.”

Incidentally, once someone reaches those dreams and creates wealth, they may want to pick up Kirsner’s own book, “Help Preserve Your Retirement Assets and Leave a Legacy,” which details how to use trusts to create generational wealth .

“The Automatic Millionaire: A Powerful One-Step Plan to Live and Finish Rich”

Author: David Bach

Another Bach title gets the nod from Conroy as one of the best retirement planning books. “The Automatic Millionaire” focuses on the power of automatic payments to eliminate debt and build wealth. It’s a simple formula and highlighted with the example of a couple who has used the system successfully.

Along with “The Millionaire Next Door” – another personal finance classic – Conroy says, “These two books are great for building concepts that will do nothing but improve people’s retirement outcomes.”

“Decades & Decisions: Financial Planning at Any Age”

Author: Joseph Conroy

Conroy’s own book was written to be a valuable resource for workers regardless of their age. With the exception of the 50s, which gets two chapters, each age decade from the 20s to the 90s and beyond gets one section of the book.

“People don’t have the same attention span that they did in the past,” Conroy says. He deliberately wrote his book in a way that people could easily home in on practical takeaways for their season of life. “That way, you don’t have to read 200 pages.”

Filled with tips and strategies gleaned from Conroy’s years of financial planning experience, “Decades & Decisions” is intended to be a practical guidebook that readers can follow as they progress through their careers.

“From Strength to Strength: Finding Success, Happiness and Deep Purpose in the Second Half of Life”

Author: Arthur C. Brooks

Retirement is about more than money, and in this book, Arthur C. Brooks explores how to make the most of your second act of life.

“I appreciate how Brooks focuses on your purpose when you retire,” said Michael Conway, president and CEO of Conway Wealth, in an email. “By finding your purpose and aligning how you invest your money with that purpose, it will provide a much more fulfilling financial picture for your retirement. ”

“From Strength to Strength” pulls together data and information from a variety of sources and studies. Brooks also shares his own personal experience in a book that covers a lot of ground about how people find purpose.

“Money Master the Game: 7 Simple Steps to Financial Freedom”

Author: Tony Robbins

Not everyone loves the enthusiastic, possibly over-the-top approach of Tony Robbins, but there is no denying that he has been an influential figure in the world of personal finance. “Money: Master the Game” is considered by many to be one of his best works.

“It starts to educate a retiree in more tactical thinking,” says Michael Foguth, founder and president of Foguth Financial Group in Brighton, Michigan.

In addition to providing actionable tips, Robbins is a cheerleader for his readers, encouraging them to dream big and believe that they, too, can achieve financial freedom.

Author: Ed Slott

This book, which was just released, is a follow-up to “The Retirement Savings Time Bomb ... And How to Diffuse It.” It covers the latest developments in retirement savings accounts and how legislation such as the Secure 2.0 Act is changing the game.

“Ed Slott is a nationally recognized retirement planning counselor and bestselling author,” said Troy Owens, a San Diego-based wealth planner with AlphaCore Wealth Advisory, in an email. This book delves into the myriad rules and regulations that govern retirement savings accounts .

“While it’s not the most exciting read, I would recommend this to all of my clients that are transitioning into the retirement phase of life,” said Owens.

“Retirement Spotlight: Illuminate Your Life, Reveal Your Finances, Brighten Your Retirement”

Author: Michael Foguth

For a holistic approach to retirement planning, you can pick up Foguth’s book, “Retirement Spotlight.”

“I walk people through what a retirement would look like,” Foguth says. “This is more the psychological side of it.”

Published in 2016, the book explores retirement myths, discusses guaranteed income and helps readers envision their ideal lives. However, it isn’t a do-it-yourself guide to investing, and Foguth recommends readers use the book as a starting point for conversations with their financial advisors.

"Die With Zero: Getting All You Can From Your Money and Your Life"

Author:  Bill Perkins

"Die With Zero," published in 2020, has gotten a lot of buzz within the personal finance community. That’s because author Bill Perkins takes a different approach to retirement savings . Rather than hoarding mountains of cash to be left for heirs, he proposes that people try to spend what they save before they die.

The book is a logical choice for anyone who is childless or not planning to leave an inheritance. But even those who want to share the wealth with others will find “Die With Zero” to be a thought-provoking read.

9 Social Security Calculators

Rachel Hartman June 20, 2024

Tags: Investing for Retirement , aging , baby boomers , financial advisors

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The Psychology of Money by Morgan Housel

The total money makeover by dave ramsey.

• Smart Couples Finish Rich by David Bach

The 5 Money Personalities by Scott and Bethany Palmer

Recommended by taylor kovar.

• In the Meantime by Shehara Wooten

Unstoppable Prosperity by Charles Payne

The richest man in babylon by george s. clason.

• Finding a Financial Advisor

7 Top Investing Books Recommended By Financial Advisors

Suzanne is a content marketer, writer, and fact-checker. She holds a Bachelor of Science in Finance degree from Bridgewater State University and helps develop content strategies.

Books are a tried-and-true resource for financial advice, but there are hundreds of options to choose from.

We asked 10 independent financial advisors from the Investopedia 100 Top Financial Advisors list to recommend their favorite books for retail investors, and the topics touched on everything from financial planning for couples, to the behavioral psychology of money, to how to start legacy planning. 

Below, read more about the top picks from Investopedia top advisors.

Investopedia/Alice Morgan

Recommended by Jared Tanimoto, Christina Livadary, Gideon Drucker, and Fran Walsh

Morgan Housel’s The Psychology of Money is a collection of 19 short stories that frame personal finance and financial planning as a behavioral field instead of a quantitative one. The stories present personal finance as a means to living a fulfilling life, and Housel encourages a holistic personal finance approach by reflecting on people’s emotions, relationships, and history with money as foundational elements of financial decision making. 

Four independent financial advisors—Jared Tanimoto, Gideon Drucker, Fran Walsh, and Christina Livadary—recommended this book for those looking to improve their understanding of financial topics. Read on to learn why.

“What stood out to me was the way he incorporated a lot of stories that were relatable and made investing principles a lot easier to understand,” Tanimoto said. “Then he broke it down into a bunch of different sections that kind of help put asset allocation and risk and diversification and the power of saving into an easy to digest book.” 

“It’s really reaffirming that focusing on the behavioral aspects of finance, your emotions about money, and what your family thinks about money, all of that dictates way more than how much you have in assets,” Drucker said. 

“As much as people like to think of money as math and numbers (which it can be at times), personal finance is behavioral above all else!,” Walsh said. “This book does a fantastic job making people understand why individuals make the decisions to do, and thinking about things in a certain way can help us create much better financial behaviors to grow wealth over time.”

"This book has something for everyone," Livadary said. "If you're just beginning your journey, Morgan Housel outlines a clear and simple way to think about investing, if you're an intermediate investor, this book can reaffirm some age-old truths that you might have forgotten, and if you're an expert investor or an advisor, this book clearly lays out anecdotes that can help you simplify your approach to investing and building wealth."

Recommended by Gabriel Shahin

Dave Ramsey’s The Total Money Makeover organizes financial planning into seven steps to lead readers out of debt and toward sustainable saving mechanisms. The book includes budgeting templates and personal anecdotes, which color and contextualize Ramsey’s straight-forward advice, making it a great read for retail investors who want to gain control of their personal finances but may not know where to start. 

“I think it just has such good core characteristics,” Shahin said. “It could be for young people or people that just realized, ‘I need to start to do something’, so it's a great entry level read.”

Smart Couples Finish Rich by David Bach  

Recommended by shawn tydlaska.

In Smart Couples Finish Rich , author David Bach provides simple tools and advice for couples merging their finances. He tackles issues ranging from credit card management to long-term care and facilitates conversations about values and goals along the way.

Bach provides a framework for couples to collaborate on a financial plan that will provide a secure financial future for both people, as individuals and as a unit. Tydlaska highlighted Bach’s enjoyable and approachable writing style and said that the book could be useful for anyone looking to understand more about their personal finances.  

“My wife and I both read it at the same time, and it was a good book to get the conversation started about finances and how to combine finances and to start an open dialogue around a subject that can be kind of a taboo topic,” Tydlaska said. 

The 5 Money Personalities by Scott and Bethany Palmer provides advice and a behavioral framework for couples approaching their finances together.

It argues that healthy financial relationships are founded on understanding each other’s perspective of money, and using their created “Money Personality structure,” couples can better understand how to collaborate on financial decisions and build a sustainable financial future together. 

“During a planning session a few years ago in which both spouses were arguing about their finances, I realized that there must be something out there that can help couples become unified with their money,” Kovar said. “In my research, I stumbled across The 5 Money Personaliti es and knew almost immediately that this had the potential to save marriages. It has been a staple of our firm ever since!” 

In the Meantime by Shehara Wooten 

Recommended by reshell smith.

Shehara Wooten’s book In the Meantime illustrates different Black journeys to financial freedom and gives advice on how readers can clarify their values and redefine financial freedom to achieve personal financial success.

The book describes the historic and systematic barriers to financial success in the Black community and provides principles to increase financial stability and provide wealth for generations to come. During the writing process, Wooten consulted financial professionals, one of which was Reshell Smith. 

“It addresses some of the challenges that we all have with finances," Smith said. "She took us through the past with her as she was writing the book, so I think it's very personal."

Bonus Advisor Recommendation

In her book A Woman’$ Worth , Reshell Smith outlines the basics of personal finance, from credit to investments, in order to form positive habits with money. Described in parallel with Smith’s personal experiences with money, the book frames 7 key principles for readers to understand in order to achieve financial freedom and security.

Recommended by Prince Dykes

In Unstoppable Prosperity by Charles Payne, Payne uses stories from his personal experience to provide readers with a fundamental knowledge of investments and advice for coping with the ebbs and flow of the market.

Dykes read the book because he had watched Payne on Fox Business Network and wanted more investment knowledge. He was pleasantly surprised by the book’s content, and he would recommend it to any person with a bit of money to spare to start investing. 

“Usually books are very fundamental-based or technical-based… the Warren Buffett style is very fundamental, or there’s technical style where it's mostly about charts and timing and bar graphs. [Payne] does a great job with merging the two,” Payne said.

The ‘Wesley Learns’ Series is a collection of 3 books by Prince Dykes and his son Wesley Dykes: Wesley Learns to Invest , Wesley Learns About Credit , and Wesley Learns About Insurance . Written for and about Wesley, these engaging narratives about financial topics introduce children to personal finance and the wide application of financial concepts. 

Recommended by Nicole B. Simpson

The Richest Man In Babylon is a collection of ‘Babylonian parables’ used to communicate advice about personal financial planning. The book, published in 1926, offers seven timeless tips to advise readers on financial matters from investing to saving. Recommended to her by her mentor in 1991, Simpson found the book easy to read and understand as she was trying to gain her bearings in the securities industry. 

“This was one of the books that helped me conceptually understand that which I was studying for the Series 7, how to apply it, not only in my own life desiring to be financially free, but also if I should ever go into the advisory field,” Simpson said.

The Quiet Shift by Nicole B. Simpson and Sharon Stanford shares key principles and tools for financial legacy planning for people approaching the ends of their lives. The book asks readers to question how they can create a financial legacy in order to preserve family dynamics generation to generation.

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Wealth Management: How to plan, invest and protect your financial assets (Financial Times Guides) 2nd Edition

Purchase options and add-ons.

The Financial Times Guide to Wealth Management is your comprehensive guide to achieving financial security and stability by planning, preserving and enhancing your wealth. As well as being fully updated throughout, it includes five new chapters on socially responsible and impact investing; property, land and woodlands; single premium investment bonds; non-trust structures and young people and money.

Whether you&;re a beginner wanting an introduction to financial planning or an experienced investor looking to pass your wealth on to others, this is the book for you.  Drawing on his 25 years&; experience as a financial adviser to successful families, and written in clear and concise language, Jason Butler will give you both the understanding and confidence you need to make successful financial decisions, enabling you to:

- Define your life goals and financial personality so that you can build an effective wealth plan

- Navigate the maze of investment options and choose the best one for your needs

- Understand when and how to get professional help which delivers value

- Clarify the need for and role of insurance, tax structures, pensions and trusts

- Develop a wealth succession plan which matches your values and preferences

• ISBN-10 129200469X
• ISBN-13 978-1292004693
• Edition 2nd
• Publisher FT Publishing International
• Publication date November 13, 2014
• Language English
• Dimensions 6.14 x 1.23 x 9.21 inches
• Print length 544 pages
• See all details

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Editorial Reviews

"Few books have its clarity and none its scope. It simplifies complex issues and shows you not only how to make your money work for you and your family but also how to enjoy it. ’'

David Kilshaw, Private Client Partner, Ernst & Young LLP

“ A brilliant book, written in an accessible manner to help you understand the importance of life goals and values in the wealth management process. It is the best book I have ever come across on wealth management .”

Dr Lien Luu, Senior Lecturer in Financial Services, Northampton Business School & Certified & Chartered Financial Planner

“ Many people’s lives would be significantly enhanced by having a great relationship with a financial adviser. Jason’s impeccably researched guide is an insight into how the best financial advisers do business and could help you re-evaluate your relationship with your money .”

David Jones, Head of Financial Adviser Services EMEA, Dimensional Fund Advisors

“ This book, from one of the UK’s leading Financial Planners, provides the essential knowledge that investors need to help them think about and plan for their financial future ”

Steve Gazzard CFP CM , Chief Executive, Institute of Financial Planning

“A practical, easy-to-read guide that provides a framework to help us all achieve our financial goals. This book is essential reading for investors. ”

Cynthia Poole, Director, Raymond James Investment Services

From the Back Cover

&;This book, from one of the UK&;s leading financial planners, provides the essential knowledge that investors need to help them think about and plan for their financial future.&;

Steve Gazzard CFP CM ,chief executive, Institute of Financial Planning

&;A practical, easy to read guide that provides a framework to help us all achieve our financial goals. This book is essential reading for investors.&;

Cynthia Poole, director, relationship management, Raymond James Investment Services

&;A brilliant book, written in an accessible manner to help you understand the importance of life goals and values in the wealth management process. It is the best book I have ever come across on wealth management.&;

Dr Lien Luu, senior lecturer in financial services, Northampton Business School; certified and chartered financial planner

About the Author

Product details.

• Publisher ‏ : ‎ FT Publishing International; 2nd edition (November 13, 2014)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Paperback ‏ : ‎ 544 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 129200469X
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1292004693
• Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.8 pounds
• Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.14 x 1.23 x 9.21 inches
• #1,618 in Business Finance
• #3,363 in Wealth Management (Books)
• #26,245 in Personal Finance (Books)

About the author

Jason butler.

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