Book review: Happy Go Money by Melissa Leong, a spending plan you won't resent

Most of us already know that saving is good and debt is bad, and knowing it hasn't made anyone feel better about their paycheque. Melissa Leong's 2019 book Happy Go Money is about the part that's missing: how to do both without feeling miserable. Leong is a Canadian finance writer best known as the money expert on CTV's The Social. The book mixes happiness research with the basics of spending, budgeting, investing and mindfulness, and reviewers note that it covers both Canadian and American options.

It is a starter guide. If you have never had a budget, never opened a TFSA or never talked about money with your partner without an argument, it is meant for you. If you already track your net worth, you'll skim a lot of it.

What's different about it

Leong starts with feelings and gets to the numbers afterward. Her premise, as the publisher puts it, is that money can't buy happiness on its own, but how you spend and save has a lot to do with how much you enjoy your life. Two features make it practical. Each chapter ends with a "Your Happy Money To-Do List" of small actions, and "Money Talks" tips sit alongside the text to nudge you toward a better relationship with money. Chapter titles such as "Check Yourself Before You Wreck Your Wealth" tell you the tone: friendly, a little cheeky, direct.

Five of Leong's ideas

Leong talked through several of these ideas in interviews when the book came out.

Give yourself a spending account. Leong told Golden Girl Finance that she keeps one for things that make her happy, and that having the planning in place is what lets her treat herself without guilt. The idea is simple: decide on an amount for enjoyment, keep it somewhere separate, and spend it without guilt. A simple way to size it: take your monthly take-home pay and subtract what you can't avoid and what you've decided to save. What's left is the spending account, and the monthly budget planner shows the figure.

Spend on experiences with other people. Leong described how she and her friends stopped swapping birthday gifts and now plan an event instead, setting aside an amount each month for a new activity. An escape room, she said, costs around $25 to $30 for the activity plus about $20 for a meal afterwards. Under $50 for an evening you remember is a very different spend from an impulse buy you forget.

Build an emergency fund early. In a Teach Me How To Adult interview, Leong suggested at least three months of living costs set aside, and more for people with irregular income. She calls it an "oh crap fund". A chapter summary on Bookey gives a range of three to six months. Either way the principle is the same: have a cushion before you need it. If your costs are $3,000 a month, three months is $9,000.

Know that a TFSA is not just a savings account. Leong has stressed that the TFSA is an investment account, not only somewhere to park cash. You can hold investments inside it and the growth and withdrawals are tax-free. The TFSA guide explains how the contribution room works, and the contribution room calculator shows you what you have left.

Take free money first. In that same interview she was blunt: when a program gives you essentially free money, go. In a Canadian paycheque that is usually an employer RRSP match. RRSP employer matching covers how it works and whether to always take it.

Is it too basic for you?

Readers are split. A few call it a book they wanted to highlight in full, and others rate it as a light read that works for beginners and repeats what experienced savers already know. One reviewer found the voice a bit sharp in places. Both reactions are fair: a book this broad and this entertaining is rarely deep. That is how reviewers describe it, not Leong's own view.

The other limit is depth on investing. A book that spends a chapter on each of spending, budgeting, investing and mindfulness can't teach you to build a portfolio. When you are ready, Couch Potato investing in Canada is the natural next step.

If you've read Andrew Hallam's Balance, you'll recognize the theme. Leong's version is a friendlier guide to your first year of getting organized, where Hallam leans toward investing philosophy.

The book suits young adults, newcomers to Canada who want the vocabulary, and anyone who has always felt budgets are a punishment. It is not for readers who already have a plan and want to optimize it.

Happy Go Money: Spend Smart, Save Right and Enjoy Life

by Melissa Leong

ECW Press, 2019.

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