Archive for February 22nd, 2008
Filed under: Estates
Out on the flats of the prairie in Johnston, Iowa, sits this surprising home, a French-styled chateau plunked down into the heart of the midwest. This ten-year-old home presents an elegant exterior with it’s tree-lined driveway but inside it’s a bit quirky. You’ve got a sort of country kitchen, a dark wood study packed to the brim with fish and game trophies and antiques everywhere. The first floor public rooms have columns and some charming plaster details but then you’ve got my personal pet peeve, those round lights inset into the ceilings in the bedrooms which rather destroy the classic effect. The home is 8264 square feet and there are five bedrooms. The exterior includes a private pond and a swimming pool on 4.66 acres. It’s a lot of house for not that much money, it’s listed at $1.495 million.
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Continue reading Chateau on the Prairie, Estate of the Day
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Soc.Gen: Lying trader created $7B losses alone
CNN - The author of the fraud started taking his non-authorized, directional positions in 2005 and 2006 for small amounts, but in an important manner beginning in March of 2007,” the report stated, adding that the bank didn’t become aware of events until
Create your own pension plan
CNN Money - FORTUNE Small Business) — Like many successful business owners, Bob Johnson, founder and CEO of Johnson Insurance & Financial in McKinney, Texas, was hungry for juicy tax breaks.
Many Cubans hope economic reforms coming
BusinessWeek - S.-style capitalism, even though many are hoping the new government could accept tweaks to the system and enough small SAP NetWeaver BIA Learn Business Intelligence Ideal Practices That Enhance Operations.
EU panel suggests Alimta use for lung cancer
Reuters - Reuters is the world’s largest international multimedia news agency, providing investing news, world news, business news, technology news, headline news, small business news, news alerts, personal finance, stock market, and mutual funds information
Bank of the West launches small business campaign
East Bay Business Times - When is a lease not a lease? When it’s a loan or sale [San Francisco] California’s Umpqua Bank president to retire [East Bay] Umpqua Bank’s Fike announces retirement [Portland] Bank of the West this day launched a small business campaign offering
RJR to get $388M from defunct joint venture
Charlotte.com - News View Business Banking Columnists Moneywise Sports Entertainment Living Local News Data Center Mobile News Multimedia Blogs but to judge from current transaction prices, it would not be enough to pay for one totally unless it was very small
Friday’s Tech Winners & Losers
Street.Com - Slowing growth in the company’s QuickBooks record-keeping software line for small business because of a tougher economy was partly responsible for dragging revenue down, stated Intuit. BlackBerry maker Research In Motion RIMM gave up some of its gains from
University of Texas System develops statewide high school curriculum
San Antonio Business Journal - Local nonprofit gets $50,000 grant from AT&T [Jacksonville] AT&T expands wireless broadband coverage [Jacksonville] AT&T enhances small-business resource site [San Antonio] Bank of America chosen for Dow Jones Industrial Average [Greensboro] Massive oil
U.S. Chamber Honors the Nation’s Exemplary Small Businesses
CNBC - Chamber of Commerce announced the winners of the Blue Ribbon Small Business Award for dedication to excellence in several categories of entrepreneurship. “Winners of the Blue Ribbon Small Business Award represent the country’s finest small business
Showdown Between Baltic Airlines
BusinessWeek - carrier is just starting to show muscle, while Latvia’s airline is leaps and bounds ahead, due to Flick’s smart business It was a small, ill-defined company without a regular customer base. It was unsure whether its identity was as a classy
Starbucks realigning, slicing 600 jobs
Dayton Business Journal - has nearly 16,000 stores,including seven full-service locations in the Dayton area, plus several smaller kiosks or small Get the latest local business news delivered to your inbox. Sign up Today!
Future Ventures plans IPO to raise Rs 3,700cr
Business Standard - Future Ventures India of Kishore Biyani’s Future Group is ready to hit the market soon with an initial public offering (IPO) of around Rs 3,750 crore. Though the issue is 100% book-built, it would carry a small price band to make it affordable to
This week’s S.C. legislative action
Spartanburg Herald-Journal - It grants a group of at least 10 small businesses to join together and negotiate cheaper insurance rates than an individual business. Previous say law had allowed businesses to join together for health insurance but set a minimum of 1,000 total
Bank of the West launches small business campaign
MSN MoneyCentral - Bank of the West today launched a small business campaign offering reduced rates on commercial real estate loans, lines of credit with no fees, free business checking as well as other discounts and services on business products. “With the economy
Technology helps music publisher reap profits from college fight songs
San Diego Union-Tribune - But the shelves of a shop catering to Alabama fans show just how far the business can go. The list goes on: “We’ve had door bells, car horns, small footballs you might give a kid, watches, door mats and a golf
Sector Glance: Chinese Web cos. mixed
Boston Globe - Globe News Business Sports Lifestyle A&E Things to do Travel Vehicles Jobs Real Estate Local Search Technology Healthcare Markets Small business NEW YORK— Shares of Chinese World wide web companies traded blended Wednesday, with shares of Shanda International
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Posted by: in Your Business
No, “the sandwich generation” phrase has nothing to do with eating sandwiches while watching “Leave it to Beaver.” It means that Baby Boomers are stuck in the middle - taking care of children and aging parents at the same time.
I’m finally out of the “sandwich” phase. My mom and mother-in-law both died within the last year, and my children are finally out of college and on their own, but for many years I was running back and forth between my mother’s home in Ohio and all the things my kids were doing. It’s exhausting, both mentally and physically.
An article in FoxNews about this subject discusses some of the “plan ahead” things you need to do to deal with issues relating to an elderly parent: things like powers of attorney, long-term care insurance, and living wills. Some parents are easier to deal with than others. After several years of struggling to keep her easy checking account balanced, my mom was very willing to turn her financial affairs over to me. On the other hand, my mother-in-law refused to give up her checkbook, even after she couldn’t write checks.
My recommendation is to speak with your siblings and parents. Work out a plan that includes everyone. Do it before you have to.
If you’ve other advice for dealing with “sandwich” issues, we would love to hear them.
Tags: baby boomer, durable power of attorney, living will, long-term care insurance, retirement
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Filed under: Estates
 I was going to leave this one for the Sunday real estate round-up but a couple of you’ve mentioned it to me in the tips I decided to take a look at it a little early. And rightly so, a $64 million townhouse is worth a post to itself. The Henry T. Sloane mansion on East 68th Street in New York City would be the most pricey townhouse sold in city if it sells for the asking price (a record of $53 million was set for the Harkness mansion in 2006). It’s not the most costly listing price, as far as I know, the penthouse at the Pierre listed for $70 million still claims that honor.
Why so much? Part of it is location, the townhouse is located just steps away from Fifth Avenue on the East Side. Part of it is size, the building has 18,500 square feet total spread out over five stories. Two of the stories have 17-foot ceilings. There are 15 bedrooms and 17 bathrooms, seven fireplaces, a ballroom and a rooftop garden. Part of the lure is the history and design, the mansion was designed by architect Charles Pierrepont H. Gilbert for Sloane, the heir to a furniture empire, in 1905. The home is classic Beaux-Arts style and five of the rooms have all their original details intact. The wood-paneled ballroom with original oil-painted murals is particularly noteworthy.
The real estate broker Paula Del Nunzio and Brown Harris Stevens, the real estate firm she works for, could split a commission of $3.8 million on the sale. These days it’s hard to predict just how a pricey listing will behave. Some stay on the market for years until the right buyer with enough cash comes along. Some are snapped up almost immediately. This one, given the size, location and history probably won’t linger long.
[Thanks Lana and David]
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Whether it’s a souvenir from your company or a gift from your coworkers, you probably receive at least one mug a year.
See the photo above? That’s all the extra mugs I own. Extra. Meaning, these are the mugs left unused in my home. From my count, these are 24 extra mugs. Do you know how old I’m? I’m 24. It’s like I’ve been given at least one mug a year since I was born!
Obviously, it would sound insane to keep all these mugs (even if that’s what I’ve been doing the past few years). So what does one do when their home or office is overrun with mugs? Here are some ideas:
Regift them. Just make sure you don’t give them back to the same person. That would be embarrassing. Also, make sure the regifted mugs are in good-as-new condition.
Give them away. To charity, to a needy person, etc. I gave half of mine to the junkyard dealers who showed an interest in them (they came over to pick up some other stuf, but saw the mugs too). If you’re not going to use them yourself, it’s much superior that they go to people who can actually use them.
 Art-ify them. You can make old, boring designs your own by turning the old mugs into an art project. Here’s a great tip from instructables on how to do it.
Plant in them. You can put soil and a seedling or seeds in old mugs and watch them grow. The downside is that the mug doesn’t have a hole under it, so you risk drowning the plants. Either be careful with your watering or find a way to carefully drill a small hole under it. (The picture on the right is from my plant mug.) Great to put in your cubicle.
Sell them. You can host a garage sale and include your mugs. If you really want to sell them quickly, you should price it at a “please just take it away from me” price. I don’t think you could sell personalized mugs, though. So try to keep those instead.
Any other ideas on how to reuse those old mugs?
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Japan's 10-Year Bonds Erase Weekly Loss as Local Stocks Fall - Bloomberg
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Posted by: in Small Business
Filed under: Products and services, Management, Industry, Consumer experience, Competitive strategy, eBay (EBAY), Marketing and advertising, Small business
 For the past several years, eBay (NASDAQ: EBAY) has pretty much cornered the market for on the web auctions. It has created such large barriers of entry, that smaller sites have difficulty breaking into the market. But this week’s seller boycott on eBay has opened the door for some smaller companies.
We took a look earlier this week at the reasons behind the current eBay strike. We made note at that time, that some of your larger name competitors, such as Overstock.com (NASDAQ: OSTK) were going to be capitalizing on the sellers’ strike, but now we’re also starting to hear about gains made in some smaller companies that you may have never heard of before.
In a recent article from Seattle Post-Intelligencer, two Washington-based companies said they’ve been loving all the negative attention that eBay has been receiving as of late.
 The first company that the article mentions is CozyBug.com. Never heard of it? Don’t worry, most people haven’t. This small on the web site is very similar to eBay, but it focuses on selling items that are too large to ship, or items that people usually want to see first hand before making their purchase. The site, while being nationwide in its reach, has been trying to establish itself as the web’s “local on the web flea market and garage sale”.
Sounds like a great concept, but there has been one problem… luring in eBay users and convincing them to switch to CozyBug. Well, this week eBay’s new policies have become CozyBug’s best marketing campaign ever.
Just how much of a difference can a week make? The numbers don’t lie. Before this week, CozyBug has been getting about 10,000 visitors per month. This week traffic has ballooned. Its per day traffic has jumped to 15,000 visitors! In case you were wondering, that is more than a 4,400% daily increase. Not too shabby.
According to the company’s founder and CEO, David Cantu, “EBay is too big… this was bound to happen…” But how has the increased site traffic translated into members? The site has gained 100 newly registered members so far. OK, I know what you’re thinking, 100 new members doesn’t sound like such a large change. Fair enough, but consider that in the previous 10 months that the site has been up and running it had gained a total of 700 members, so this week has seen over a 14% jump in members. Yes, that is a material increase for the site to say the least.
Enough about CozyBug, let’s take a look at the next company, MommyAuctions.com. The eBay strike has boosted the number of items listed for sale on the site from 2,500 to 4,000 this week alone. As far as traffic, the site has seen an increase from 3,630 average visitors in January to a current average of 4,650, a 28% increase.
The real question is, what is going to happen next week? Will eBay users go back to what they know best, or can we expect to see some of these migrating sellers staying away from eBay permanently?
If you’re an eBay seller that is currently involved in this week’s boycott, I would love to hear your thoughts on this matter. Are you basically planning to just boycott the site this week, and return to business as usual next Monday? What options have you been exploring this week for the selling of your goods, or have you basically just taken the week off and not selling on other sites?
Michael Fowlkes has worked as a stock trader for seven years and spent the last four years working as an analyst for the online investment advisory service Investor’s Observer.
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Posted by: in Small Business
Filed under: Small business
 Last year, I talked to the co-founder and CEO of TrialPay. I was certainly intrigued by his business model … and so are venture capitalists.
This week the company announced a $12.7 million round of capital. The investors include: Index Ventures, Atomico Ventures and former PayPal executives.
TrialPay has developed a new payments platform, based on its Offer-Matching Technology system. Essentially, the goal is to increase the chances of consumers buying a product (yes, that’s always something that’s interesting).
Here’s how it works: First, you can get a product for free. But, in exchange, you need to buy something from a vendor from TrialPay. There are more than 3,000 of them.
Thus, an advertiser acquires a new customer. Then, a vendor gets paid for a product (from the advertiser). And, more importantly, the consumer gets something for free.
No doubt, this is not simple to pull off. Basically, TrialPay had to spend lots of time developing a system to allow for the right kind of offers.
So far, though, it seems to be getting traction. TrialPay has 5.2 million registered users, with more than 15,000 new signups every day.
Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook and The Edgar Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements . He also operates DealProfiles.com.
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