How to Find a Financial Mentor

In my post titled How to Create a Budget, here's what I suggested for step #5:

Have a Trusted, Financially Successful Friend Review Your Cash Flow Plan and Make Suggestions

Find someone you know, trust, and respect who is doing well financially and ask them to look over your cash flow plan. Specifically ask for them to help you identify places where you may be spending more money than you need to.

A reader responded with the following comment:

Finding a mentor I trust enough to share money matters with is the hardest part for me. I feel like my family is doing much better than most of our contemporaries or it's just not a subject that is easily broached in conversation to be able to tell if that person would be a good person to discuss this topic with.

So this got me to thinking: where would I go to find a mentor if I was in need of one?

After considering it a bit, here are some places I personally would look:

• Church - Many churches (especially larger ones) offer courses by Dave Ramsey or Crown. While some may say that these aren't generally that financially advanced (to which I would agree, though you don't need to be a scholar to do well financially), they are usually pretty good at identifying places where a person could save some money.
• Friends - If you have no friends doing better than you are, you need some new friends. I can think of a few that I have asked for financial thoughts recently on one issue or another.
• Online - I would seek out some advice from bloggers I trusted if I felt they could help me. Let's face it, these are real people dealing with real issues, and they often have experience we could all learn from. And by the way, if any FMF readers want some budget review help, send me your information and questions and I'll post it as a "Help a Reader" piece. You'll get plenty of advice from FMF readers.
• Research - If I was looking to cut costs, I'd Google a bit for online articles, check out appropriate library books, and look for free e-books on the subject on Amazon.

Well, that's my list. What do you have to add? Where would you turn if you needed someone to review your budget?

Comments

[L Rob]

It wouldn't hurt to have a friend that is also in the money/finance business. Auditor, banker or in the credit card business. That's like having a friend with a lot of benefits.

They're usually the ones that can point you in the right direction without any hidden agenda or without targeting your wallet or finances.

If none of your friends fall under any of that category, maybe your friend's friends will. No wrong in asking! That's what I'd do...:-)