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Black Friday Shopping Tips

We all know Black Friday offers the best holiday season shopping deals, but they only come to those who are prepared and in the right place at the right time. Here are some tips to help you make the most of the sales and discounts so you get the most bang for your buck.


Do Your Research

 If you are planning on making a special purchase of a big-ticket item based on a Black Friday sale, it is important to remember to check consumer reports and read consumer reviews of the item before you decide to make the purchase. If the product is bad, just because you got it for cheap doesn’t make it a good deal. Take the time to make sure it’s a quality product and worth getting up early or staying up late for the price cut.


Browse the Deals Before You Go

Thanks to my site, you can get a good idea of what deals will be where well before Black Friday shopping starts. Knowing which retailers are going to have what on sale and when before the big day will help you decide where and when you want to go, will help with budgeting, and will help you see who you have left to shop for. As you browse the deals, make a list with the product, who it’s for, the price, the location, and any special hours for the sale.


Compare Prices Before You Head Out

Shop around to see what the average retail price of an item is before you leave, so you can go to the store that is offering the best deal. Check to see what usually comes with the item you are looking for, and what the store is offering. Many stores offer”stripped down” versions of products, which means you will have to spend money on accessories. Take time to see what accessories you will need to determine if the deal is really worth it or not.


Bring Ads with You

Bring sales ads with you so you can have them available if you need to call a store out on their “lowest price guarantee.” Most stores have a policy that will allow them to match or beat a lower advertised price, but will require you to show the ad as proof to process the price difference. Generally speaking, the store policy will not apply to online advertised deals, even in the case of the store website due to online only deals, but you can always print the web page where you saw the deal with the advertised price and give it a shot.


Use Store Credit Cards

I’m not saying go out and max your cards. You will still have to practice budget savvy shopping and make regular payments to avoid hefty interest charges, but many stores offer extra discounts and warranties if you make purchases on your store card. This, when paid in full as if it were cash, can offer extra savings benefits.


Early Bird and Night Owl Specials

 Many stores advertise early bird deals, generally between 4 and 11 a.m., to help draw in the crowd, but also offer night owl specials between the hours of midnight and 4 a.m. to draw in the crowd that doesn’t like to get up early, but would rather stay up late. Cashing in on these deals is not only a good way to beat the crowd, but it’s a good way to guarantee the getting will be good, because typically, once the deals are gone, they are gone.


Familiarize Yourself with Store Policy

 As stores are becoming stricter on return and exchange policies, knowing the store policies before you go can help you decide where to shop and what places to avoid. Most stores are now starting to charge a restocking fee and closing the return window, so customers do not have as long to return a product. The amount of time you have to return something is important since you’re buying nearly a month in advance. Having a receipt is also very important, because no receipt often means no return.


Don’t Forget the Gift Receipt

Many stores are printing a gift receipt so you can include a receipt with the gift in the event of return or exchange, without divulging how much money you spent on the item. While many stores do this automatically for holiday season purchases, it is important to ask for one so you can be sure to have it for the recipient.

Don't Make these Common Startup Mistakes

4 Ways Startup Employers Fail at Work-Life Balance

The startup work environment is stressful by nature. Entrepreneurs work hard to run their businesses and make ends meet. But when founders are very concerned about their startup’s success, they may overlook the needs of their employees.

The reality is, many people who work for startups, particularly in the technology arena, struggle with work-life balance. In fact, some companies have even gone as far as to find ways to extend the amount of time employees can work.

Instead of forcing employees to sacrifice their personal lives, startup employers need to create more work-life balance at their companies. Here are four ways startup employers fail at work-life balance and what could be done about it:

1. Overlooking personal lives and needs of staff.

Startup employees are humans, too. They have spouses, children, loved ones to care for and unexpected life events. If startup employers want to increase their employees’ happiness, they need to address their personal needs.

For example, according to Pew Research, half of working parents with children younger than 18 say it’s difficult to balance their careers with the responsibilities of raising a family. If an employee needs more time to be with family or other personal needs, try to work with his or her schedule.

Also, let employees telecommute or offer the occasional half-day. If a staff person isn’t required to meet with a client or customer in person on a particular day and the job can be done from home, there’s no reason he or she needs to come into the office.

2. Not addressing burnout immediately.

Most people who apply for startup jobs realize that they’ll be working long hours. But regardless of how much a person loves his or her job, burnout may be inevitable when working in excess of 80 hours a week.

Startup employers who have employees on demanding work schedules must have a plan in place for when a staffer experiences burnout. Whether it’s giving the person paid time off from work or shortening the workload for a week, give the employee time to recharge.

3. Piling on responsibilities for employees.

Many startups can’t hire a lot of talent, especially in the early stages. This is why some startup employees are required to wear many hats and take on responsibilities outside of their job description.

When giving out the extra assignments, ask employees if they’re physically and mentally able to take them on. Once they have accepted the tasks, continue to check in with them to be sure they aren’t feeling overworked or exhausted.

4. Ignoring mental illness and stress.

Startups can be extremely stressful work environments and require employees to work longer hours in the office. Because of this, employees can be prone to depression and stress. Research by the Finnish Institute of Mental Health showed that people who work more than 11 hours a day are more prone to work-related depression.

Startup employees are likely to have days when they’re required to work more than eight hours a day. But if this becomes a common occurrence, take action to ensure staffers remain happy, healthy and productive.

Depression can negatively affect an employee’s performance at work. If someone is showing symptoms of stress or depression, address the situation immediately. Lesson the workload or let the person take time off from work.

Beware of the Masque Attack Hackers

There was the potential for hacks using a newly identified technique known as the "Masque Attack," the government said in an online bulletin from the National Cybersecurity and Communications Integration Center and the U.S. Computer Emergency Readiness Teams.

The network security company, FireEye Inc, disclosed the vulnerability behind the "Masque Attack" earlier this week, saying it had been exploited to launch a campaign dubbed "WireLurker" and that more attacks could follow.

Hackers could potentially steal login credentials, access sensitive data stored on iOS devices and remotely monitor activity on those devices, the government said.

Such attacks could be avoided if iPad and iPhone users only installed apps from Apple's App Store or from their own organizations, it said.

Users should not click "Install" from pop-ups when surfing the web. If iOS flashes a warning that says "Untrusted App Developer," users should click on "Don't Trust" and immediately uninstall the app, the bulletin said.

Representatives of Apple could not immediately be reached for comment.

(Reporting by Jim Finkle; Editing by Bernadette Baum)

Managing Your Credit Report

If you find information on your credit report that doesn't belong to you, one of two things happened: Either someone stole your identity, or there's an error in the credit reporting system. You definitely don't want the problem to be identity theft, but fixing credit report errors can also be a complicated, frustrating endeavor.

Lisa Marie Allen of Fremont, Calif., knows this from experience. When she got a new job, her employer ran a credit check and saw 10 negative items on her credit report. Allen was shocked, not to mention concerned someone had stolen her identity, according to ABC 7 San Francisco, which reported her story. It wasn't a case of fraud: Her credit history had been mixed with that of another Lisa Marie Allen.

Allen was dealing with something called a mixed file, which often happens to people with common names. In Allen's case, it seemed the other Lisa (who reportedly lives in Texas) had $350,000 in debt that was showing up on California Lisa's credit reports. The two not only share a name, they also had the same Social Security number, further muddying the difference between the women.

California Lisa straightened out the problem with the Social Security Administration, ABC reports, but the cleanup wasn't as swift with the credit reporting agencies. She eventually had to hire a lawyer for help clearing her reports of information that wasn't hers.

Ideally, consumers can manage something like this themselves, because each of the credit reporting agencies provides clear instructions on their websites for disputing inaccurate credit report information. For some reason Allen never figured out, the dispute process wasn't working for her. She's not the only one who has struggled to remove inaccuracies from credit reports, even though it seems like it should be a straightforward process. It's frustrating, but persistence is key to maintaining an error-free credit report. That's one of the many reasons you should check your free annual credit reports regularly.

Her issues are now resolved, ABC reports, but while she waited for her corrected file, Allen couldn't open a bank account or get a car loan, her lawyer told ABC. Credit reporting errors are fixable, but they can be costly in the meantime, which is why you want to know of any issues as soon as they arise.

College Prices on the Rise ... Again!

College prices in the U.S. have again increased faster than the rate of inflation, extending a decades-long pattern of higher-education costs.

Tuition and fees at private nonprofit colleges climbed 3.7 percent on average to $31,231 this academic year, according to a report today by the College Board. For in-state residents at four-year public schools, costs rose 2.9 percent to $9,139. Inflation, measured by the personal consumption expenditures index, rose 1.4 percent in the year through September.

The good news is that increases this year are smaller than the average for the past five-, 10- and 30-year periods, and more public school students saw no increase at all, the New York-based College Board said. The bad news is that cumulative undergraduate debt is rising as real incomes haven't grown for more than a decade except for top earners, said Sandy Baum and Jennifer Ma, the report's authors.

"College price increases are not accelerating. But they are accumulating," Baum and Ma wrote. The widening gap in pay between college and high school graduates is more about "declining wages at the lower end of the distribution, as opposed to increases for those with a college education."

As families continue to struggle to afford college, the Obama Administration plans to introduce a ratings system to show which colleges provide the most value, with metrics such as graduation rates and average student debt.

Room, Board

Including room and board, costs average $18,943 for in-state students at public schools and $32,762 for out-of state residents. At private schools, the bill is $42,419. Those amounts don't include items that aren't directly billed by the school, such as transportation, books and laundry.

A decade ago, tuition and fees jumped 10.4 percent for in-state students at four-year public colleges and 5.8 percent at private schools, according to the nonprofit College Board, which administers the SAT entrance exam and whose members include universities.

Tuition and fees have been outpacing overall inflation for decades.

Costs didn't rise for about 12 percent of full-time students at four-year public colleges, up from 4 percent a decade ago, according to the College Board.

After accounting for financial-aid grants, which about two-thirds of full-time students receive, actual costs are lower than the published prices.

 

Total Borrowing

The total amount borrowed for college by all students, $106 billion, declined 13 percent in 2013-2014 from three years earlier, according to the report. More than 90 percent of the loans were government backed.

Some of the drop in borrowing may reflect the decline in college enrollment, including at for-profit colleges, where students typically borrow more than their nonprofit counterparts, Baum said in an interview. Some students may also be more cautious about taking on education debt, she said.

Higher education enrollment, including at two-year colleges, declined in 2013 for a second straight year, the U.S. Census Bureau said in a September report.

In a separate study, cumulative student debt for class of 2013 graduates at nonprofit colleges who borrowed was $28,400, up from $27,850 a year earlier, according to The Institute for College Access & Success, an Oakland, California-based advocacy group.

About 69 percent of college seniors at those four-year schools graduated with student debt, TICAS said today. Last year, the group's report included for-profit schools.

To contact the reporter on this story: Janet Lorin in New York at jlorin@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Lisa Wolfson at lwolfson@bloomberg.net Chris Staiti

Here is a GREAT reason to live at The Grove Garden Apartments or Peartree Apartments, both conveniently located in the beautiful town of Sunnyvale, CA.

The number of violent crimes across the United States is estimated to have dropped by 4.4% in 2013 from the year before, according to data recently released by the FBI. In all, the number of such crimes declined by nearly 15% in the last 10 years.

Putting this drop into context, John Roman, senior fellow at the Urban Institute, told 24/7 Wall St., "A 4.4% reduction in violent crime is astonishing. If you saw a similar increase in GDP, or a similar decrease in unemployment, it would be huge national news."

Even as the nation becomes increasingly safe, a number of large U.S. cities still stood out for their low crime rate. Across the country, 368 violent crimes were reported for every 100,000 people last year. Such crimes include murder, rape, aggravated assault, and robbery. In America’s 10 safest cities, there were fewer than 100 such crimes for every 100,000 people. Based on violent crime data published by the FBI’s 2013 Uniform Crime Report, these are America’s safest cities.

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In many of the safest cities, murder counts were extremely low. Nationwide, the FBI recorded 14,196 murders in 2013, or 4.5 murders for every 100,000 people. By comparison, each of America’s 10 safest cities reported less than five murders overall last year. Naperville, Illinois and Frisco, Texas did not report a single murder in 2013.

In addition to a low violent crime rate, the nation’s safest cities largely had extremely low property crime rates as well. As of last year, eight of these large cities were among the 25 cities with the lowest property crime rates. Nationwide, there were 2,731 such crimes for every 100,000 people. By comparison, in three of the safest cities -- Naperville, Illinois; Irvine, California; and Cary, North Carolina -- there were fewer than 1,400 property crimes per 100,000 residents.

According to the Urban Institute's Roman, reducing crime “is about economic policy, it’s not about crime policy.” He added, “The idea is that if you make a city more economically vibrant, you attract people to that city who bring with them resources to try and make that city better. And those resources benefit all of the people who are already there.”

The especially high household incomes in area with low crime rates, and the generally low incomes in areas with higher crime rates, appear to support Roman’s statement. In fact, Frisco and Naperville had the highest median incomes among large U.S. cities. In all, eight of the nation’s safest cities had median household incomes of more than $70,000 last year. By comparison, the median household income across the U.S. was $52,250 in 2013.

Education is another factor related to crime rates. More than 92% of adults 25 and older had completed at least a high school diploma in eight of the nation’s safest cities, well above the national rate of 86.6%.

However, higher incomes and an educated population alone may not explain all differences in local crime rates. Roman noted that, in some areas where crime is especially problematic, there are “structural disadvantages in that crime is such a cultural norm that it’s hard to fix.”

The FBI has attempted to discourage direct comparisons of crime rates between cities because local factors cause reporting to vary considerably between cities. Despite this characterization, Roman suggested that some comparison can be useful. “To me it's analogous to saying we shouldn’t rank how well schools are doing. How are you ever supposed to help the lowest-performing schools if you don’t tell them they’re the lowest-performing school?”

To identify the safest cities in America, 24/7 Wall St. reviewed violent crime rates among the nation’s cities with populations of 100,000 or more from the FBI’s 2013 Uniform Crime Report. Property crime rates also came from the FBI’s report. The data were broken into eight types of crime. Violent crime was comprised of murder and nonnegligent manslaughter, rape, robbery, and aggravated assault; and property crime was comprised of burglary, arson, larceny, and motor vehicle theft. In addition to crime data, we also reviewed median household income, poverty rates, and educational attainment rates from the 2013 Census Bureau’s American Community Survey.

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These are the safest cities in America.

10. Sunnyvale, California
> Violent crimes per 100,000: 97
> Population: 148,160
> 2013 murders: 4 (87th lowest)
> Poverty rate: 7.3% (14th lowest)
> Pct. of adults with high school degree: 92.1% (51st highest)

There were just 97 violent crimes committed per 100,000 people in Sunnyvale, the 10th lowest rate among large U.S. cities, and considerably lower than the national rate of 368 per 100,000 people. Robberies and aggravated assaults accounted for the bulk of the city’s violent crimes, and there were just four documented murder cases last year. Like in other large cities, safety is often accompanied by financial well-being. A typical household in Sunnyvale earned nearly $99,000 last year, more than in all but four other large cities. Sunnyvale residents were also among the least likely to live in poverty, with a poverty rate of just 7.3%. As is common among wealthier populations, Sunnyvale adults are well-educated. Nearly 60% of adults 25 and older had at least a bachelor’s degree as of last year, one of the highest attainment rates nationwide.