Technology Update – 25 August 2008
With So Many Prices Up, Try More Coupons: Not only are gas prices high, but many of the services we use prices have gone up and up. You might want to pay more attention to using coupons. Just visit WOW Coupons. You’ll find coupons for major retailers,restaurants, grocery and travel. http://www.wow-coupons.com
Take A Quick Vacation: The end of summer is getting dangerously close but Labor Day may be the right time for a driving trip to see family or just have one more chance to spend time with family before we get in the routine of life. If a trip in your car is being considered, the cost of gas is a deterrent. Try knowing before you decide what your gas cost will be. Drive Pricing will help you with this. Start by adding your starting point. Then, enter your destination. Next, enter your ZIP, along with your car’s miles per gallon. You can also specify the grade of gas you use. When you click Go, you’ll see how many miles you’ll be travelling. It will even calculate the cost of gas! http://www.drivepricing.com Very cool!
Check Out Your Airline Seat: Ok, you have decided to fly for that quick trip. You book your ticket and select a seat. When you get on the plane, you find that the seat is less than desirable. SeatGuru can help ease your travel woes. Start by selecting your airline. Then, specify the type of plane.You’ll get a map of the seats. You can see which seats are good and which are bad. You’ll also see if a seat has a power outlet. SeatGuru offers other helpful tools, too. You can find
contact information for an airline. There are also answers to your questions on baggage, checking in and more! http://www.seatguru.com
That’s enough for this issue. If there is anything I can do to help you please let me know. Business or otherwise, I am here to help. Just let me know how I can help.
Jerry Robertson
Sanity Check time again. It is NOT as bad as the press makes it seem.
I have noticed that the closer we get to the election, the worse the housing market reports seem to get. I can’t prove it but I think we have a situation of making it seem as bad as we possibly can. I have been looking at numbers again and this is what I see.
1. There are 129,871,000 housing units in the United States. That data comes from the US Census Bureau and is the current information for second quarter of 2008. Seems like a good source and reasonably current, doesn’t it?
2. According to RealtyTrac the number of foreclosures in July rose to 272,171 ( about 100,000 over last year at this time). They use words like ’surge’, ’sharp rise’, etc to describe an increase to about 2% (3.2 million homes) of all homes in the United States. Most of those foreclosures are in 4 states. California, Florida, Ohio and Michigan with Nevada getting the 5th place.
If you live in one of those places then I have to say you are not having a good time and when the press talks about a recovery in 2009 those are the places they are talking about.
If you live in Georgia and especially Atlanta, the story is different. Interest rates are about 6.5% and housing prices are perhaps as low as they are going to get and this is the time to buy. There are 56,530 active listings today in the FMLS so inventory has fallen some but we are still in a heavy buyers market and with interest rates this low it is a perfect time.
Even if you have to sell first it can be a good time to buy. Just be willing to give up a little on your sale, have the property in great condition and you can move up into a great house and get a good deal. You will gain in equity position so don’t be afraid of the market here.
If you are thinking of waiting to see if we are at the bottom, consider that interest rates are on the rise a little bit and a half percent increase can wipe out the savings of a $10,000 price decrease on a $200,000 house. I would rather see you pay a little more at a lower rate to get the lower payment. After all, if you are not paying cash then you are buying a payment and the lower, the better and when the market recovers you will still be in a great position in a few years.
Enough for now. I just wanted to remind and encourage you that buyers are going to do well in this market if you are ready and if your credit is ok. It does not have to be perfect either. Call me if I can help.
We are planning a buyers education meeting so we can answer any questions you might have. If that interests you then email me and let me know. We’ll get you on the invitation list. Even if you have a home and just want to know more about the lending process and how things work today after all the changes, let me know.
It’s a Good Life!!
Jerry Robertson
Technology Update 11 August 2008
Ok, it’s time for another tech update. Here are some great things to make life easier on the web and around the house.
Backup Your SmartPhone: Dashwire makes it easy to back up your data. You just connect your phone to your computer. You need to remember to synchronize your phone. That’s often easier said than done. Dashwire will help. You don’t need to connect any cables. You don’t need to remember to back up. It’s all done automatically and backed upto the Internet. You can also update your phone from the Web! Now, that’s handy.Dashwire works with Windows Mobile smartphones. But it will soon work with BlackBerrys, too. http://www.dashwire.com
Picking A New Cell Phone and Provider Is Tough: Choosing a phone is only half the battle. You then need to decide on a cell phone plan. Unfortunately, cellular providers don’t make it easy to compare plans. BillShrink may just come to your rescue! Start by selecting your current monthly bill amount. Then, select the number of minutes you use. You can also specify information on text messaging and data usage. Billshrink will provide you with a list of suitable plans from the major providers. You can find the least expensive plan. You’ll also see your yearly savings! http://billshrink.com
Carry Your Video Camera Everywhere: For only $30 more than the original Flip Video, you get a slimmer body, rechargeable battery and an overall great little cam. It has an easy-to-use USB connection built into it that flips out with the touch of a button. It runs on batteries and holds one hour of video. http://www.theflip.com
Get Full Length TV Shows and Movies On The Internet: “Legally”. NBC has done it right with a library of TV shows and movies allowing you to pretty much constant entertainment. With easy to use search interface and fast load times, the shows have very good video quality. Best of all the shows have fewer ads. And the best thing. It’s Free.
You Have A Lot Of Data On Your Hard Drive: Fortunately, desktop search programs make it easy to find files and e-mail. You don’t need to know where something is stored or its file name anymore. Simply type a word or phrase that’s contained in a file or e-mail and Windows will go find it for you. Previous versions of search in Windows didn’t work very
well. Microsoft fixed it with Windows Vista. And it just got better. Microsoft has just released Windows Search 4.0. It supports encrypted documents and finds what you are looking for faster. And there’s good news for XP users: Microsoft has made Windows Search available in XP.
Don’t want to wait for Windows Update http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=BC28ED7F-C51B-49CD-B505-95B91B453284&displaylang=en
Have a great week and let me know if there is anything I can do for you, business or otherwise. Just let me know.
Thanks for listening,
Jerry Robertson
Room for rent.
Not really but it is a possibility. My middle son, Michael has a new job that starts in a couple of weeks. He just finished college at Piedmont College in Demorest, GA and when he graduated he knew what he wanted to do. He wanted to coach college level tennis. He applied to several schools around the country and began working out of Magnolia Racquet Club coaching summer camps and doing private lessons.
A couple of weeks ago he got a call from Washington and Lee University in Virginia and they wanted to meet him. Can you say ‘road trip’? So he and his older brother David took off and spent the weekend up there. Long story short, the offered him the job of Assitant Men’s Tennis Coach and he starts in a couple of weeks.
We are really proud of him and while we will miss seeing his face around here, this is a great opprotunity to do exactly what he wants to do. We don’t all get that chance and we are pleased that he gets to do this.
We are going to have an open house (on the 24th of August) so he can see his friends and they can wish him well. I’ll post more details on the party but if you know Mike you are welcome to attend.
Thanks for letting me brag a bit.
Jerry Robertson
Obama is right. Sort of.
I agree that we ought to inflate our tires correctly. It makes the car more efficient but that is not going to fix the energy problem. We need more supply if we are going to lower the price (see supply and demand) because the demand is not going to go down significantly. Not for cars which makes up something over 70% of our oil consumption.
I agree that we ought to be good stewards of what we are entrusted with. This Earth is not the only one we get but it is the only one we have for now (See New Earth and New Heaven) and we need to care for it. After all, it was one of God’s creations and that alone makes it valuable.
I am not sure what we have to do but I am sure of one thing. The Democrats and the Republicans are not going to fix this unless we make them. Turn off the TV and read about what they are doing. Vote and talk about what you read and see if you can make some more folks understand.
I heard today that some Republicans are moving toward the Democrats in the name of compromise and getting along. I don’t want to get along. I want change. Not Obama’s version of change because that is just more noise from DC. I want real change that gets a real energy policy for this country so we are FREE of foreign oil. We have more here than they have there so let’s just go get our own and stop bickering about it.
Anyone agree with me or am I wrong? Let me know.
Thanks for listening
Jerry Robertson
I'm tired
I just volunteered to help Bob Barr with his campaign for President of the United States. Some would say that a vote for a Libertarian candidate is a wasted vote but the more I think about it, this is the only way my vote is not wasted. Frankly, I am disappointed in both the Republicans and the Democrats. Neither one seems to stick to their principles nor are they truly looking out for the people they represent.That fit that happened on the floor of the House of Representatives today has just about finished it for me.
Our government has grown by 58% in the last 8 years. Bush created the budget. Thanks. The democratic congress passed the budget. Thanks. All they seem to be interested in is getting 51% of the vote so they can say they have a ‘mandate’ from the people. That way they get to keep their cush jobs with the extra special benefits that none of the people they represent get to enjoy.
The only way I see this working in the long run is to take away their toys. In this case that means power and that means money. If we don’t get tax reform (as in The Fair Tax) I think we are going to struggle for a long time before it gets better. Actually, I don’t think it will get better until we get the Fair Tax or something very similar to it.
Don’t get me wrong. This is a great country and I don’t see us falling or failing but we won’t thrive either. If we don’t figure out a way to get past the ‘evenly divided’ state that we are in this is going to languish as it is for a long time.
Check out the Fair Tax and take a look at the Libertarian Party. They may be a viable alternative to what we have been strugging with for the last 20 years. We have not had a ‘landslide’ vote since Ronald Reagan won in 1984 with 49 states voting for him. Walter Mondale won his home state of Minnesota and Washington DC. I don’t expect Bob Barr to win by a landslide but if enough of us vote for him it just might send a message about the value of Liberty and responsible government.
Thanks for reading my rant. I feel better now.
It’s a Good Life!
Jerry Robertson
Welcome
