Weekend Reading – Dead simple investing, selling Berkshire, household expenses, and #money stuff + MORE Mar 31st

Chief of Defence Staff Gen. Jonathan Vance speaks to the media at Royal Military College of Canada in Kingston, Ont., on Wednesday March 29, 2017. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Lars Hagberg
OTTAWA – The country’s top soldier has pushed back on suggestions the armed forces is struggling from a lack of cash, saying he’s not convinced it is making the most of the money it already gets.
Yet chief of defence staff Gen. Jonathan Vance says he is also eager to see the government’s new defence policy, which has promised to put the military on a strong financial footing over the long term.
“The here and now is fine, we’re delivering,” Vance said in an interview with The Canadian Press. “But going forward, that’s when the government committed to sustainable, progressive armed forces.”
The question of military spending has taken on a life of its own over the last year, after U.S. President Donald Trump called on NATO allies to contribute more to their own defence…

Ford Motor Co. has joined financial regulators in raising concerns over Canadians’ appetites for longer-term loans to finance the purchase of new vehicles.
Regulators have warned in recent years about debt-burdened consumers taking advantage of loan offers that leave them in a negative-equity situation where they owe more on the car than it’s actually worth.
Mark Buzzell, chief executive officer of Ford Canada, told media in an interview at the Vancouver auto show this week, that Canadian automakers are selling 41% of their vehicles with loans of six or more years. It’s not uncommon to see loans stretch out to eight or nine years, with interest rates still sitting at near-record lows.
Ford says it is moving to reduce the number of sales it makes at longer terms, but it’s hard when the rest of the industry is doing so. “We really are trying to limit the trade cycles to shorter terms, but at the end of the day we have to stay competitive,” Buzzell told Bloomberg News…

Save, invest, prosper with My Own Advisor.
Weekend Reading
Welcome to my latest Weekend Reading edition.  I hope you’ve had a good week.  As I write this post, we’re bracing for yet another winter storm in Ottawa.  I suppose it could be worse – our friends down east in St. John’s might be getting up to 50 cm of snow over the next few days.  *Sigh*   Will winter ever end?  Sure, it looks nice but it’s been 5 months and I want to see solid ground

Here are my writings from the past week:
Can you have too much money in your RRSP?  Read on to find out what most readers told me.
This marks the end of Fraud Prevention Month # FPM2017 but I believe, based on my own recent case study here, every day of every month is fraud prevention month.
Enjoy the rest of these articles and we’ll chat next week.
Mark
The Globe and Mail offered some dead simple investing solutions for DIY investors.   On a related note, here are my ideas about some simple all-in-one investing solutions…

While materials and energy stocks are still mighty forces, the financial sector is by far the most dominant subset in Canadian equities