When you have a purpose in life, a vision for what you want to achieve, and know why you want to achieve it, work becomes fun, and the time you spend working seems to just whizz by

With Christmas just around the corner I thought what better time to get in some new information about finance and money and at the same time get some brownie points for buying a great gift for family members.

Books make great presents and what a great way to spend some of those Christmas hours reading a new book.

Live Well, Spend Less is a simple, practical and definitely not boring book on living well while spending less. It will appeal especially to families but also to students, flatters and fixed income households. It incorporates tips, suggestions and serious strategies but with a light hearted, easy to apply, honest approach. Covering all aspects of life there are suggestions for making money as well using less of it. The intention is to motivate and encourage not hector and lecture. It is NOT a book about investment, mortgage repayment or banking. Each chapter includes immediate as well as longer term suggestions. The immediate ideas are to capture the initial enthusiasm and motivation and longer term strategies will result in bigger savings given time or effort. Topics include: food, energy, cleaning, cars, outdoors; family life, kids and money, leisure, celebrations, looking sharp and presents.

About the Author

Sophie Gray is the face and inspiration behind Destitute Gourmet, the DG series of cookery books and www.destitutegourmet.com. She is a popular speaker and teacher on food, family life and finances, and writes regularly for Healthy Food Guide, Parenting magazine and www.simplesavings.com.au. She is married to Richard and they have two children, Isabella and Jack. Sophie works fulltime communicating the destitute gourmet philosophy from their home in Auckland, New Zealand.

Our expectations are for the Reserve Bank to hold the Official Cash Rate steady tomorrow, even though the markets will be searching for clues as to how long the cash rate will stay at current levels.

Economists and analysts from the major banks all believe the OCR will be held at its current level of 2.5 percent.

Chief economist for Deutsche Bank Darren Gibbs suggests there is little scope for surprise in the Reserve Bank’s monetary policy statement and an official cash rate review.

The focus for markets will however be on the Reserve Bank’s updated economic projections, which were last published in September, and in particular, the central bank’s implied stance on monetary policy for 2010.

This morning (8am on 4 December 2009) the money markets were at the following levels:

Official cash rate    2.50% (unchanged)

90 day bill rate       2.78 (unchanged)

1 year swap rate    3.38 (up from 3.35)

3 year swap rate    4.87 (down from 4.95)

10 year bond rate   5.91 (down from 5.95)

Kiwi dollar             0.7273 (down from 0.7380)

It is always difficult to predict the next twelve months but some trends are starting to emerge and some earlier predictions are coming true.

I believe house prices, in the main centres, will continue to appreciate, especially Auckland which has already started to occur. This is due both to supply and demand. There are less new dwellings becoming available as there are fewer being built (especially in the apartment market), demand is increasing due to higher immigration figures, more Kiwis returning home and a natural population increase.

Interest rates will go up but in the second part of the year only as the Reserve Bank honors it’s commitment to the nation when it said it would keep rates low. The amount they go up all depends on the recovery happening, how strong it is and if unemployment is starting to fall.

Finance will be difficult to obtain for self employed, businesses and construction projects due to the demise of virtually all second tier lenders. This is a serious issue for the country and will hinder our future growth.

Each month the international credit crisis moves further into the background and hopefully next year it can be consigned to part of global economic history.