Taking aim at economic killers

Chad Viminitz is as much a guardian angel as he is a writer. He cares about people and, more importantly, he cares about their pocketbooks.

The Edmonton-based financial advisor published Money Assassins last year to demonstrate how easily many of us have fallen into debt but also how we can fight our way back into the black. This is the kind of book that is perfect for the vast majority of the population that is living paycheque to paycheque, struggling with being house-poor, and otherwise just hanging on to solvency by the tips of their fingers.

This dense but easily digestible book should be required reading for anyone with a bank account. Learning how to handle and manage your money should be taught in high school, if not earlier. There are lessons here that I wish I had known 20 years ago.

For instance, Viminitz writes about the ‘sleight of hand’ mind tricks that banks pull on unsuspecting customers with regards to their rewards programs. Everyone knows about these rewards — where you get points or other incentives when you use your debit or credit cards — except few think about how much it costs to participate in the program in the first place. With a gentle touch, he guides the readers to understand how cost prohibitive these rewards are.

“People forget sometimes that banks are in business to make money. The fees attached to these so-called rewards are punitive and help encourage people to spend irrationally,” he stated. “The best way to save money, and manage your money, is to use cash for your purchases, especially retail purchases. People do spend less when they have to count out the bills.”

He emphasized that these purchases should also be for necessary items, not purchases for whim or for want.

He uses the phrase “money assassins” to collectively refer to the evolution of consumer society, advancements in technology and the vastly increased access to credit and debt. In the introduction, he writes about how he wants to expose these three things for what they really do: they work against financial health, not for it.

In less than 200 pages he discusses at length how they do it and how people can fight back. He talks about how a resurgence in the lost art of saving is one of the keys to the new revolution of getting back on track and taking power away from the banks.

Naturally, he has to talk about how some people’s most valuable assets are, at the same time, the biggest threats to personal solvency. For most people buying a home or car means they have to access debt — sometimes incredible debt — through mortgages and loans. He devotes one chapter to living car lite. Using a fairly easily understandable formula, he guides the reader through determining how much owning a car really costs. This cost-benefit ratio is an eye-opening exercise, for sure, and it made me wonder if I could actually live without wheels. Certainly for many people it would be an undue inconvenience but that doesn’t mean it isn’t feasible. It would take a lot of lifestyle adjustment but it could be done and it would save tons of money.

He wrote it’s that kind of thinking that people shy away from but that it could and often does make the difference between a positive and a negative bank balance.