It may not feel natural to be transparent about your finances, but five Vancouver women have shown that being honest with others about your financial situation can make you feel more accountable for it. The Smart Cookies money club started as a group of women conversing about personal money issues and the lessons learned from their time together have been turned into a book, The Smart Cookies’ Guide to Making More Dough.
Andrea Baxter gathered four other women together to form the money club in 2006 after she'd accumulated $18,000 in debt beyond her mortgage, and in two and a half years the five members have helped get everyone on track and keep them there. As reported by The New York Times, the Smart Cookies' meeting agenda follows the same format every time: Good news from every member, a spending check-in, individual debt reports, brainstorming about how to make more money, a discussion topic that someone has researched, and goal setting.
Does a money club sound appealing to you, or is it too much sharing for your level of comfort?
well i'm kind of sold on the idea of a financial adviser so if there's a way to have productive conversations in a money club, then i think that i would be game to join. my fear is that it would just be a bunch of folks like me talking about how they are in a rut, but if there was someone that has a background in finance, or debt consolidation, then i'd be interested for sure!
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