Giving Away 430 Copies of The World's Best Retirement Book

Can you give me your best idea for giving away 430 copies of The World's Best Retirement Book?

This is an e-mail that I am sending to over 200 media people and retirement planning consultants:

Hello :

I would like your advice.

How can I creatively give away 430 copies of my international bestseller How to Retire Happy, Wild, and Free ?

This book has just reached the milestone of over 100,000 copies sold, is still selling well, and appears as the number 1 listing for retirement-related books if you type "retirement" into Amazon.com's search feature.

The 430 copies that I want to donate are perfectly readable but slightly imperfect in appearance. In the words of my publisher Ten Speed Press, "These are just dinged up enough that we can’t sell them as new, or they have stickers (from stores) or some other issue. Some may be worse than others, some better."

Do you know if anyone would like to receive these copies provided they pay for the shipping?

The 430 copies could be given away at a retirement conference for executives or at a retirement seminar for employees.

In case you haven't read the book, I have attached the partial E-book edition of How to Retire Happy, Wild, and Free (in PDF format).

Let me know if you come up with a great idea.

The person who provides me with the best solution wins a set of 6 of my books — in perfect condition.

Please forward this message to anyone else who may be interested in contributing a great idea.

Thanks and so long for now.

Ernie Zelinski
Author of the Bestseller How to Retire Happy, Wild, and Free
(Over 100,000 copies sold and published in 7 foreign languages)
and the International Bestseller The Joy of Not Working
(Over 225,000 copies sold and published in 17 languages)

If you have a great idea either post it on this blog or send me an e-mail to success101coach@yahoo.com

Your idea will also qualify for the gift of 6 books.

Thanks.

American Dream Homes Are Actually Nightmares

Many dream homes purchased by Americans have become nightmares.

But given that many Americans thought that they deserved a $400,000 house with nothing down while earning a wage of $10 an hour, they were just as GREEDY as the bankers offering these loans, wouldn't you say? This is my take on it, anyway. As Newsweek magazine recently stated in a cover story, "The whole country has been complicit in a great fraud."

The results are quite striking: Nationwide, for those who purchased U.S. homes since the beginning of 2003, nearly one in three now have negative equity. Nearly half of buyers who purchased houses in 2006 are "underwater", which is the new term for owing more on the mortgage on your house than the house is worth on the real estate market.

Overall, one in six American homeowners owe more on their homes than the homes are worth. No more getting cash out of the equity of a house to live a life that people can't afford.

The question I posed to my friends was: Are these one in six, in fact, "homeowners" if they owe more on their homes than the homes are worth?

This was the response by my friend Todd Lorentz:

Ernie,

This is my take on it:

Technically, if they don't own any equity then they're "house-sitters".

The most commonly assumed home owner, then, is really the bank. However, the money that the bank lent was not real - they just made it up on paper and never actually had that amount in the first place to lend out. So the bank actually purchased the home through the people who are now the house-sitters, with money that didn't exist. If the money doesn't actually exist, then it is really not a true sale and the original home builder still technically owns it. But they didn't own it either if they also took out similar "fiat" loans to build it.

So yes, indeed, who are the real owners?

It appears that all of those "house-sitters" are living in in a nation that is filled with houses that nobody actually owns, or which have been acquired without using REAL currency to buy.

Therefore, America is functioning more like a "commune" where everyone, after a little tricky paperwork, can stake out a claim on a place to sqaut.

Yes, America is a nation of SQUATTERS and those house-sitters should be subject to the laws on squatting. If the orignal builders allowed them to "squat" there while knowingly accepting no REAL cash for it up front, then the house-sitters are actually squatters and
after a period of time the squatters can stake an ownership claim to it as their own. Then, that would make them full owners, free and clear, without spending a dime on it.

God Bless America!

Todd

Top 25 Places to Retire in Canada or the United States in 2008

Here is the 2008 list of Top 25 best places to live in retirement in North America or Canada according to Topretirements.com:

With me being Canadian, it's interesting to see Halifax, Nova Scotia on the List.

1. Asheville, NC
2. Sarasota, FL
3. Prescott, AZ
4. Paris, TN
5. Winston-Salem, NC
6. Athens, GA
7. Green Valley, AZ
8. San Diego, CA
9. Austin, TX
10. Phoenix, AZ
11. Halifax, Nova Scotia (CAN)
12. Charlottesville, VA
13. Fort Myers, FL
14. Venice, FL
15. Oxford, OH
16. Sedona, AZ
17. Gainesville, FL
18. Flagstaff, AZ
19. San Luis Obispo, CA
20. Old Saybrook, CT
21. San Antonio, TX
22. Mount Airy, NC
23. Beaufort, SC
24. Tucson, AZ
25. Crossville, TN

Americans Changing Their Retirement Plans

A severe economic downturn will make you realize that Oscar Wilde wasn't kidding when he said: "It is better to have a permanent income than to be fascinating." Indeed it is time to change your retirement plan.

A new AARP survey confirms that a lot of older Americans have changed their retirement plans and now have no intention to drop out of the workforce.

Apparently baby boomers are delaying retirement plans indefinitely. Indeed, a whopping 70 percent of workers plan to work during their retirement years.

Part-time retirement jobs are the top choice in the survey of 1,500 Americans ages 45to 74 who are working or looking for work.

Of course, as I have indicated in How to Retire Happy, Wild, and Free when you retire isn't always completely in your control. A large number of workers retire because of layoffs, buyouts, health problems, or to care for relatives.

What's more, recent research from the Urban Institute suggests that part-time and flexible work arrangements for retirees may be drying up for all but highly educated workers because of the credit crunch and more people needing to work full time for financial reasons.

7 Spiritual Laws of Money

Retirement living became a little more difficult with the financial crisis that is happening in global markets.

If you really want to get rich, the first thing you need to learn is how to spend money — or NOT spend it — as the case may be.

To help you keep your retirement planning, here are 7 Spiritual Laws of Money:

1. If money becomes your primary focus in life, then money is all that you will get.

2. The person with no money may be poor; however, not as poor as the person who has nothing but money.

3. Abundance isn't a matter of acquiring how much money you desire; it's a matter of being happy with how much you presently have.

4. It's better to be out of money than out of new creative ideas on how to make money.

5. Money-making ideas are gifts from the Universe; you must act fast on them, however, if you want to be prosperous and wealthy.

6. Spending a lot of money — particularly money that you have not yet earned — will get you trapped into thinking you are having a good time when all you are doing is spending a lot of money that you will have a difficult time earning.

7. Above all, the value of money lies in the creative and spiritual uses to which it can be put and not in how many possessions it can buy.

Forget the Financial Crisis and Enjoy Your Retirement Instead

Forget the financial crisis out there and how much your retirement funds have gone down.

Enjoy your retirement instead. Here are some ways:

• The failure of your imagination — total seizure, in fact — in the workplace for so many years can be replaced it with mental playfulness, natural curiosity, and an eagerness to learn how to enjoy leisure like never before.
• You no longer have to worry about being laid off and how you are going to break the news to your spouse.
• You can tell your younger working friends, "You know that Social Security deduction they keep taking out of your paycheck? Well, it's going to pay for my retirement and there may be nothing left for you when you retire."
• You can be busier than ever — wondering how you every had time to go to work.
• You can now wear a Retirement T-shirt from Cafe Press announcing: Retired: So I just have to do what the voices in my wife's head tell me to.
• Read How to Retire Happy, Wild, and Free.

An E-Mail about The Book for the Retired, Unemployed, and Overworked

I received this e-mail the other day about The World's Second Best Retirement Book

----- Original Message -----
From: Stacey L. Scott
To: vip-books
Sent: Friday, September 19, 2008 8:11 AM
Subject: For Ernie Zelinski - THANK YOU!!!

Dear Ernie,

I just started reading The Joy of Not Working: A Book for the Retired, Unemployed, and Overworked yesterday.

I'm on page 57 (the letter from Les.)

I took this morning off from work because I needed some "mental time" away from work and a romantic relationship has ended after a year of off-again on-again torture.

I'm giving my notice at work when I go in today. I've been saying that for over a year and a half - and dreaming about it every day. Today is the day.

I know in my being that the Universe will provide more holistic abundance to me then I could have ever received from staying at my job and being untrue to myself.

I am a healer (holistic wellness coach), writer and overall catalyst for change and evolution. I can now joyously live that life fully.

NOTE: I'm going to add "world traveler" to my bio!! J

Thank you for your book and your courage to think outside of the box. It has truly inspired me.

Do you love your life? Do you have work-life balance? Do you wake up every morning excited about your day? Are you doing what you want with your life? If you answered no to any of these questions, you should really consider reading The Joy of Not Working: A Book for the Retired, Unemployed, and Overworked by Ernie J. Zelinski.

If you answered yes to any of the above questions, I still recommend that you read this book.