Costs to Consider Before Downsizing

When moving in retirement, don't forget about the property taxes, condo fees and travel expenses.

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Nearly Every Google AdSense Publisher Must Comply With EU Cookie Consent, Not Just Those Based In The EU

Even publishers based in other countries must get user consent to collect data if they get visitors from EU countries.

Please visit Marketing Land for the full article.

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What is Trump really up to?

THE idea of Donald Trump as the leader of the free world may seem absurd, but here’s why he’s already won.

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A Simple Model To Determine When To Go Agency And When To Go In-House

Not all marketing functions should be outsourced, but can your internal team really handle everything? Columnist David Rodnitzky explains how to decide when to turn to an agency.

Please visit Marketing Land for the full article.

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9 Essential 'Bang for Your Buck' Kitchen Items

You don't need drawers full of fancy cooking gadgets. Buy these tools instead. 

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How to Tackle 3 Common Interview Questions

Think like a hiring manager to devise the best answers.

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How to Handle a Parent Abusing Your Finances

Follow these steps if your mom or dad takes advantage of your personal information.

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Developing A Data Road Map: How To Implement A First-Party Data Blueprint

Once you've learned the basics for creating a first-party data strategy, it's time to move on to the next step. Columnist Mike Sands walks you through building a data road map and the initiatives needed to reach your goals.

Please visit Marketing Land for the full article.

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MarTech Europe Lowest Rates Expire Friday. Register Now!

Don’t miss out on MarTech Europe, THE conference for professionals at the intersection of marketing and IT. Register today for alpha rates, the lowest offered. The agenda features 20+ TED-style presentations covering strategic, managerial and implementation challenges that our speakers and their...

Please visit Marketing Land for the full article.

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How Much Does Your Spouse Earn? 4 Out of 10 Couples Can’t Answer That Question

Do you know how much money your spouse earns?

Believe it or not, four out of 10 couples do not know their spouse’s income, a recent Fidelity Investments study shows.

Many couples grossly overestimate their financial communication skills. “When we asked couples ‘Do you communicate well around financial issues?’ two-thirds of them said, ‘Yes, we do,” explained John Sweeney, Fidelity’s Executive Vice President of Retirement & Investing Strategies.

“But when we dug deeper and said, ‘Do you know what your spouse makes?’ 43% of the couples we surveyed could not correctly articulate that number.”

It gets even worse: Of the 43% unable to correctly name their spouse’s income, 10% got it wrong by $25,000 or more.

Right now you’re probably mentally quizzing yourself to see if you can recall your spouse’s income.

If you’re in the lucky 57% who can, well done! Having a clear picture of how much money is coming into your household is a key component of financial success.

Of course, it isn’t enough to just track income; you and your spouse have to be able to communicate about money going out of the household as well. You also have to be on the same page regarding financial goals, including homeownership, retirement and other milestone expenses.

Why Couples Don’t Talk About Money

You’d think that married couples, of all people, would regularly discuss their income and expenses. But there are a few big reasons why couples don’t know what their spouse makes — or what they spend.

“Societally, we’re taught not to ask what other people make, and we don’t talk about what we make,” Sweeney told us. “So we bring that to our relationships.”

It’s probably not a good idea to share your income on the first date, but some couples continue avoiding the income conversation even after marriage.

We also tend to avoid talking about our debts . Couples who are used to handling income and expenses independently may be hesitant to ask a partner to contribute to student loan debt, or to be honest about how much credit card debt they’re carrying.

As Sweeney put it: “It’s important for both halves of a couple to put all of their debts and assets on the table, in addition to their income, and say, ‘this is what we’re bringing to the relationship.’”

Why do couples need to communicate about both their debts and their assets? So they can turn these debts and resources into shared goals.

If couples don’t have shared financial goals, from paying off debt to saving for retirement, they’re likely to find themselves unable to achieve much financially. Big financial goals require couples to work together and agree on how to allocate their income.

How to Get Back on Track

Let’s say you’re part of a married couple with poor financial communication.

Maybe you don’t even know how much your spouse earns, or how much debt your spouse is carrying. Maybe you haven’t had a conversation about how much you need to save for retirement, or when you might be able to afford a down payment on a home.

How do you get back on track?

After having a conversation about income, debt and assets, work on aligning your goals, Sweeney suggests.

Will you focus on getting out of debt? Saving for your children’s college education? Planning for retirement? Setting up an emergency fund?

Once you’ve set your goals, it’s action time.

“If you know what your income is and what your goals are, try to take some money off each paycheck to achieve those goals,” Sweeney told us. He also suggests putting money towards your goals first, before spending on anything else.

After you discuss your big goals, it’s time to start talking about smaller goals, including what Sweeney calls “transparent communication about the monthly budget.” You and your partner need to be in alignment about what’s appropriate to spend on clothes, restaurants, entertainment and other budget line items.

Some couples prefer to give each partner a certain amount of “mad money” to spend as they choose, but even that decision should be a shared financial goal.

Sweeney also reminds couples not to forget about the medium-sized goals. Cars and laptop computers need to be regularly replaced; children will probably need braces and summer camp; you’ll have holiday and vacation expenses to plan for.

Have regular conversations with your partner about upcoming expenses and how to prepare for them, to ensure there are no financial surprises.

Overwhelmed? We’ve Got Resources

At this point, you might be feeling a little overwhelmed — and we don’t blame you.

If you’re starting from a place where you don’t even know your spouse’s income, suddenly feeling like you have to plan for emergency funds, retirement, new laptops, next year’s clothing expenses and more might seem like an impossible task.

Here are some resources to help you and your spouse start the next part of your financial journey together:

If you want to rate your financial communication skills, take Fidelity’s Couples Quiz. Its nine questions will give you a better picture of how you and your partner communicate financially.

If you want to improve your financial communication skills, The Simple Dollar has a guide to help you structure that first big money talk with your spouse.

If you want tools to help you plan your budget and goals, we’ve got a guide to help couples create a budget and plan for big financial goals.

If you don’t feel like you and your spouse have enough money to put towards your goals, we’ve got a story about a married couple who cut their monthly bills by $1,045. Chances are you can shave a little off your own monthly bills, and put that money towards your goals.

If you want a plan to save for your medium goals, Frugal Confessions has a step-by-step guide to help you figure out when to start saving for that new car and when to start saving for your big family vacation.

If one of you earns more money than the other, read our guide to financial planning when there’s income inequality in a relationship.

If you want to continue strengthening your financial communication, read Six Figures Under’s guide to setting up a monthly budget meeting with your spouse.

And tonight, ask your spouse to guess how much you earn — and see if your spouse gets it right!

Your Turn: Can you correctly name your spouse’s income? How would you rate your level of financial communication, and where would you most like to improve?

Nicole Dieker is a freelance writer focusing on personal finance and personal stories. Her work has appeared in The Billfold, The Toast, Yearbook Office, The Write Life and Boing Boing.

The post How Much Does Your Spouse Earn? 4 Out of 10 Couples Can’t Answer That Question appeared first on The Penny Hoarder.

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Forecast: Instagram Will Pass Google, Twitter In Mobile Display Ad Revenue By 2017

EMarketer predicts Instagram will earn $595 million in ad revenue this year and $2.81 billion by 2017.

Please visit Marketing Land for the full article.

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Sacked Grill’d worker’s election biffo

SACKED Grill’d worker Kahlani Pyrah has dismissed any suggestion of political ambition, playing down her fiery contribution to student politics at University.

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Pension fraud rockets as freedoms take hold

Michael Trudeau

fraud2.jpg

Worrying figures from the City of London Police and a financial advice firm specialising in pensions seem to suggest pensions fraudsters are stepping up their efforts in wake of the new pension freedoms.

Worrying figures from the City of London Police and a financial advice firm specialising in pensions seem to suggest pensions fraudsters are stepping up their efforts in wake of the new pension freedoms.

Pension fraud rockets as freedoms take hold

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Worrying figures from the City of London Police and a financial advice firm specialising in pensions seem to suggest pensions fraudsters are stepping up their efforts in wake of the new pension freedoms. According to figures from the City of London Police, the total amount lost to 'pensions liberation fraud' - a type of fraud where scammers convince investors they can get better returns from riskier, often fictional investments - skyrocketed to £4.7 million in May 2015, more than treble the £1.4 million lost the month before. The police qualify their own findings by saying figures can be 'extremely varied', owing to the varying amounts victims will have invested. One particularly wealthy victim, for example, can skew the figures for a given month. However, the May fraud total is the largest single month by far since May 2013 - which is as far back as the released figures go. Indeed, May 2015's pensions liberation total is almost treble the second-highest month for fraud, October 2013. Soft targets The average amount lost per reported case over the 25-month period recorded by police was £6,979 - but the May 2015 average was more than £60,000. "Clearly the fraudsters are fully aware that many pensioners now have ready access to large capital sums and are potentially a soft target for the many and various scams that currently exist," says Malcolm McLean, senior consultant at advice firm Barnett Waddingham. "These usually start with a cold call, a text message, or an email offering a free review with the prospect of substantially increasing the value of their savings by, for example, taking advantage of the "amazing" investment opportunities that they can provide. "The results are invariably negative for the saver, with some of the victims losing the whole of their savings in consequence of being duped by the fraudsters," he adds. Meanwhile the government has launched a task force of government, regulators, trade bodies and criminal justice agencies to warn pension investors of the threat scammers pose. In a statement from the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), the government says the hidden nature of scams makes accurate calculation difficult, but that recent estimates suggest it could even be as high as £1 billion. Conclusions But a spokesperson for the DWP argued it is difficult to draw conclusions from a single remarkable month. "You are looking at one month's data, and we need to perhaps look over a longer period of time rather than just one month," the spokesperson says. Although he concedes it could mean fraudsters are targeting people with bigger pension pots, he adds: "I don't think one month's data in isolation will give you an accurate picture of what is going on." Take up of the new freedoms by over-55s has been enthusiastic, with firms reporting telephone lines clogged with people enquiring about their options, and the government reporting £1 billion being withdrawn in the first two months alone. The taxman has also been enjoying the extravaganza, with the government set to net tax revenues from people accessing their pension pots almost four times greater than first forecast. We've been warned that giving savers access to their retirement savings from 55 could trigger a fraudster feeding frenzy, as research from KPMG showed that investment fraud was on the rise in 2014. Meanwhile, a straw poll by pensions advice specialist Portal Financial found that two out of five surveyed people reported receiving more suspicious pension-related cold calls in the month leading up to the new freedoms' implementation. This article was written for our sister website Money Observer

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Easier mobile switching being pursued by Ofcom

Laura Whitcombe

mobiles.jpg

Switching mobile phone provider could soon get easier now the regulator Ofcom is consulting on the issue.

Switching mobile phone provider could soon get easier now the regulator Ofcom is consulting on the issue.

Ofcom has proposed "a simple process" that would see the new provider made "entirely responsible for the switch".

Easier mobile switching being pursued by Ofcom

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Switching mobile phone provider could soon get easier now the regulator Ofcom is consulting on the issue. Ofcom has proposed "a simple process" that would see the new provider made "entirely responsible for the switch". At present, consumers have to deal with several different processes, depending on whether they wish to keep their existing phone number – referred to as 'porting'. If they do wish to port their number, they have to get a 'PAC' code from their existing provider and give it to the new one. Unnecessary harm Ofcom said: "There are indications that current mobile switching arrangements are likely to generate unnecessary harm for customers, whether or not the switch involves a number port." It added that half of recent switchers experienced a number of "issues" with the process they went through. These included switching costs such as early termination charges, the time taken and hassle involved in multiple switching processes and double-paying to ensure continuity of service. The latter problem is caused by consumers having to co-ordinate the end of their old contract with the start of the new service. In order to avoid being cut off switchers choose to subscribe to overlap two services. Ofcom will also be considering instances of 'slamming', which occurs where consumers are switched to another provider without their consent. It will also investigate 'erroneous transfers' that include problems such as the wrong mobile phone number being switched. The regulator said that the number of consumers considering a switch, comparing providers and actually switching have all declined recently. Switching rates for mobile fell from 9% to 6% between 2013 and 2014. "Concerns that a switch may be difficult may also play a part in deterring some consumers who have not switched from engaging in the process," said Ofcom. Time consuming Richard Neudegg, regulation expert at uSwitch.com, added: "It is frustrating that it remains unnecessarily difficult and time consuming to swap mobile providers when 93% of us now own mobile phones. "It's about time all of the telecoms sector fell in line with other industries, where the provider you're moving to handles the switch, rather than the provider you're leaving." He also said: "However, mobile is just one part of the bigger picture. Ofcom made changes to switching broadband in June, which improved the experience for some customers. However, these didn't apply to mobile, pay TV or Virgin Media's broadband network, so there is still plenty of room to shake things up there too." In June, switching broadband provider was made easier, when it became no longer necessary to get a MAC code from your existing supplier in order to leave. That process was deemed "confusing" and "time consuming" for the customer and could deter them from moving to a better deal, said Ofcom. The move should mean customers switching between the likes of BT, EE, Sky and TalkTalk will have a "simpler and smoother" experience, it added.

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Are Business Cards Old School?

By Dawn Berryman What do you consider your most important piece of marketing material? Your catalog? Your packaging? Your advertisements? Your social media accounts? How about your business card? Is that still as important as it once was or has it been replaced with LinkedIn and other contact apps? Historically, your business card has often […]

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10 Rules for Surviving Your Open Plan Office

Open plan offices can drive you crazy if overhearing phone conversations and watching your coworkers eat drive you bonkers. See 10 tips on how to survive.

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10 Rules for Surviving Your Open Plan Office

Open plan offices can drive you crazy if overhearing phone conversations and watching your coworkers eat drive you bonkers. See 10 tips on how to survive.

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Want a Free College Degree? Study Abroad in One of These Countries

As college costs in the U.S. skyrocket, students everywhere are looking for ways to cut costs. Here’s one unusual way you might not have considered: Go abroad.

At least seven countries not only offer free or low-cost education to international students, according to The Washington Post. Many of the courses are in English, and quite a few are full four-year programs — meaning you could get a free college degree and an international travel experience.

Want to be a globetrotting student? Here are a few of the countries to consider.

1. Germany

Last October, Lower Saxony became the last German state to make higher education free for citizens and foreigners — so now the entire country’s college system is free.

You can choose from 900 undergraduate or graduate degrees, all in English, according to the Post. Ja, bitte!

2. Finland

Finland offers a number of programs in English, and charges no tuition, at least for now; a new government may introduce modest fees to fill a budget gap by 2016 or 2017. So if you’re planning to study there, consider going soon!

One cool feature? A Finnish bachelor’s degree takes only three years to earn, not four. So this option could save you both money and time.

3. France

France offers a range of programs, with a range of costs. Public institutions charge between €181 and €596 ($200-$665) per year; private schools charge more, but still less than many U.S. schools.

Foreign students must also prove they have €615 ($686) per month without working, to use for incidentals, so make sure to beef up your bank account before you move.

4. Norway

Norway’s colleges are free for international students. However, be ready for sticker shock: Norway has one of the highest costs of living for expats.

If you’re thinking about earning a degree abroad but want to return stateside to work, think about talking to potential employers about how they’d view your foreign degree. Consider lining up a credential evaluation, which helps U.S. employers understand whether your degree is from a reputable institution in its home country.

Want to learn more? Read the full post, including three more countries that offer free or low-cost college degrees.

Your Turn: Would you move to another country to save money on your education?

Rachel Kaufman may or may not be two dozen hamsters masquerading as one human in a trench coat.

The post Want a Free College Degree? Study Abroad in One of These Countries appeared first on The Penny Hoarder.

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Taxicab authority trims field in hunt for new administrator

The Nevada Taxicab Authority has narrowed the field in its search for a new administrator and will forward the names of two people with taxi industry regulatory experience in big cities and a current Nevada government department head.

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Sacred site eyed for burial use

WOULD you want to be buried on sacred Aboriginal land? A packed Sydney cemetery is eyeing off an ancient burial site next door for its expansion plans.

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