Chance Gates' Blog

Image via CrunchBase

More businesses are seeking greater mobility and are opting for computer tablets over laptops, according to a recent study from Robert Half Technology.

The study shows that companies expect to increase tablet usage by 50 percent within the next two years.

“Tablets are simply more mobile,” says Soowan Scheuermann, marketing manager for the staffing firm. “They’re lighter and smaller. It’s more feasible to carry around a tablet to make notes than it is with a laptop.”

Companies have plenty to choose from in tablets too as tech companies continue to introduce new models ever since Apple recreated the tablet market with the launch of its iPad in 2009. Apple had sold nearly 15 million iPads through December 2010. But besides Apple’s iPad 2, which recently debuted, companies such as Motorola, Acer, Samsung, LG, Blackberry, and HTC also are launching tablets.

Goldman Sachs estimates that overall tablet sales would increase by 500 percent in 2011.

Source: “Laptops Gather Dust as Business Turns to Tablets,” San Antonio Express-News (March 10, 2011)

Logging in allows you to save your favorite properties and get instant updates price changes,  new pictures and open houses on the property.

As a Reno/Sparks real estate professional, I encourage all questions and comments on the Reno/Sparks real estate market or any of the articles posted in this blog. Please feel free to use my back door to the MLS and search the houses available in the Reno/Sparks and most Northwest Nevada neighborhoods. I can be reached by email @ chance@ballard-company.comhttp://www.myspace.com/chancegates .  You can also follow me at http://www.twitter.com/chancegates .  If you are behind on your house payment and looking for a loan modification, go to making homes affordable For a free copy of my report   “5 Steps For Reno/Sparks Homeowners To Prevent Foreclosures” go to my about page http://chancegates.com/about and ask for more information on preventing foreclosures. or   to request a modification.  If the modification fails, contact your local real estate professional to help short sale your home.  To make sure there is no deficiency judgment a homeowner might find it necessary to hire an attorney.

by Kathy Kristof
Friday, March 18, 2011

provided by

Forget those phishing emails that attempt to get your credit card or bank sign-in information. When crooks want to know how to get into your bank account, they post a message on Facebook. These messages appear so innocuous and so appropriate in the Facebook setting that you are likely to not only get conned, but pass on the scam

Facebook is the new frontier for fraud, says Tom Clare, head of product marketing at Blue Coat, an Internet security company that does annual reports on web threats. In just this past year social networks have soared to 4th from 17th most treacherous web terrain — behind porn and software-sharing sites, which you probably know to avoid.

What makes Facebook so treacherous? Us.

It starts with the fact that we are inundated with requests to set up passwords to get into our work computers, our online bank accounts, Facebook and every other web-based subscription. So what do we do? We use the same password.

“Crooks understand that most users use the same password for everything,” says Clare. “If they can get your user credentials for your Facebook account, there’s a good chance that they have the password for your bank account.”

If you are smart enough to have separate passwords for Facebook and your financial accounts, crooks get at you through a variety phishing attempts that you might think are Facebook games and widgets. But look closely and you’ll realize that they deliver answers to all of your bank’s security questions — and possibly clues to your passwords — right into the hands of the crooks.

Think it couldn’t happen to you? Let’s see if you recognize any of these recent Facebook messages that jeopardize your security. All of these came from my Facebook friends in just the past few weeks:

1. Who knows you best?

The message reads:

Can you do this? My middle name __________, my age ___, my favorite soda _______, my birthday ___/___/___, whose the love of my life ______, my best friend _____, my favorite color ______, my eye color _______, my hair color ______ my favorite food ________ and my mom’s name __________. Put this as your status and see who knows you best.

How many of these are the same facts your bank asks to verify your identity? Put this as your status and everybody — including all the people who want to hijack your bank account and credit cards — will know you well enough to make a viable attempt.

2. Your friend [Name here] just answered a question about you!

Was it possible that an old friend answered a question about me that I needed to “unlock?” Absolutely. But when you click on the link, the next screen should give you pause: 21 Questions is requesting permission to … (a) access your name, profile picture, gender, networks, user ID, friends and any other information shared with everyone … (b) send you email … (c) post to your wall … and … (d) access your data any time … regardless of whether or not you’re using their application.

Can you take that access back — ever? It sure doesn’t look like it. There’s no reference to how you can stop them from future access to your data in their “terms and conditions.” Worse, it appears that to “unlock” the answer in your friend’s post, you need to answer a bunch of questions about your other friends and violate their privacy too. I didn’t give 21 Questions access to my information, but the roughly 850 people who joined “People Who Hate 21 Questions on Facebook” apparently have and can give you insight into just how pernicious this program can be.

[7 Products That Are Getting Cheaper]

3. LOL. Look at the video I found of you!

This is the most dangerous of all the spam messages and it comes in a variety of forms, says Clare. It’s actually a bid to surreptitiously install malware on your computer. This malware can track your computer keystrokes and record your sign-in and password information with all of your online accounts.

How does it work? When you click on the link, it says that you need to upgrade your video player to see the clip. If you hit the “upgrade” button, it opens your computer to the crooks, who ship in their software. You may be completely unaware of it until you start seeing strange charges hit your credit cards or bank account. Up-to-date security software should stop the download. If you don’t have that, watch out.

Better yet, if you really think some friend is sending you a video clip, double-check with the friend to be sure before you click on the link. When I messaged my high-school classmate to ask if she’d really sent this, she was horrified. Her Facebook account had been hijacked and anyone who clicked through was likely to have their account hijacked too. That’s how this virus spreads virally.

[5 Common Money Tips You Should Ignore]

4. We’re stuck!

It started out as an email scam, but now the “We’re stuck in [Europe/Asia/Canada] and need money” scam has moved to instant messages on Facebook, where it can be more effective. Most people have learned not to react to the email, but instant messages help crooks by forcing you to react emotionally — They’re right there. They need help, now. A friend got one of these messages last week from the parents of a close friend. Her reaction was the perfect way to deal with it: She immediately called her friend and said “Have you talked to your parents lately?” The response: “Yeah. They’re right here.”

Facebook has launched a security system to combat account hijacking that allows crooks to send messages and posts through your account. You can get updates on what they’re doing at Facebook’s security page, where they’ve also got a nice little security quiz that’s definitely worth taking.

Logging in allows you to save your favorite properties and get instant updates (price changes,  new pictures and open houses on the property.

As a Reno/Sparks real estate professional, I encourage all questions and comments on the Reno/Sparks real estate market or any of the articles posted in this blog. Please feel free to use my back door to the MLS and search the houses available in the Reno/Sparks and most Northwest Nevada neighborhoods. I can be reached by email @ chance@ballard-company.comhttp://www.myspace.com/chancegates .  You can also follow me at http://www.twitter.com/chancegates .  If you are behind on your house payment and looking for a loan modification, go to making homes affordable For a free copy of my report   “5 Steps For Reno/Sparks Homeowners To Prevent Foreclosures” go to my about page http://chancegates.com/about and ask for more information on preventing foreclosures. or   to request a modification.  If the modification fails, contact your local real estate professional to help short sale your home.  To make sure there is no deficiency judgment a homeowner might find it necessary to hire an attorney.

The Grille at the Reno  Gold Dust West salutes the police, fireman, paramedics  and any other first responders on Saturday Sept 11.  So if your a first responder and hungry just swing over to the Grille and get a free meal.   All you need is your uniform and identification to receive your free meal.  The service is usually really fast and friendly and the meal are pretty good.  I personally like the Western Omelet  for breakfast.

If  you have  heard of any other business saluting our first responders please feel free to enter the business into the comments section.

As a Reno/Sparks real estate professional, I encourage all questions and comments on the Reno/Sparks real estate market or any of the articles posted in this blog.  Please feel free to use my back door to the MLS and search the houses available in the Reno/Sparks and all Northwest Nevada neighborhoods.  I can be reached by email @  chance at ballard-company.com or http://www.myspace.com/chancegates

This week I had the unpleasant fortune of having my battery die.   I was really impress that it lasted over 6 years.  Naturally I drive over to the place that help me change my headlights last year.  Since I had to have a jump to get my car started I drove straight over to Kargens.  I had no tools so they handed me a crescent wrench.  Well that worked on all the bolts but one, which had a tight fit.  So they opened two other wrenches for me to try and neither of those worked.  Finally the handed me a 10ml wrench which was the perfect fit.  Once again the only thing I was charged for was the new battery which I needed.  All the tools of theirs I used and any help I received was free.

As a Reno/Sparks real estate professional, I encourage all questions and comments on the Reno/Sparks real estate market or any of the articles I posed on this blog.  you can email me at chance@ballard-company.com or http://www.myspace.com/chancegates

I usually would not do this but my family has started a biggest loser contest, with weekly weigh ins and all.  It is kind of fun heckling those who are behind (my family way).  Have you ever noticed when your on a diet all the good food you see.

I guess it like when your buying a house, in the Reno/sparks area,  you start to see all the for real estate signs.

So I came across this recipe today and it sure does look good tell me what you think.

White Peach Pie

8-12 ripe white peaches, washed, split, pits removed and wedged into 8ths (leave peels on!)

1 cup vanilla sugar (I use two or three vanilla beans, split and scraped, submerged in 5 lbs. sugar)

1 lemon, cut in half

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon ground ginger

1/2 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg

3 tablespoons corn starch or tapioca flour

pinch of kosher salt

Grab a big bowl and go to town on the peaches. Wash them gently, cut in half and take out the pits. Use a paring knife. Then cut each half into eight wedges. Use a big spoon to gently mix with remaining ingredients and squeeze lemon juice over everything. Set aside while you make the dough.

Here’s what you need to know about pie dough. There are those who use shortening, and those who use butter. By now you should now I am the butter kind. So. Just use it.  At the restaurant, we make about 20 balls of pie dough at a time. This is the scaled back version.

2 1/2 cups all purpose unbleached flour

2 sticks COLD sweet salted butter, chopped up into little bits

ice water

In the bowl of a stand mixer (or just a mixing bowl if you’re working by hand) add the flour. Add the chopped up COLD butter. Quickly mix on medium low speed so the butter is in little bits. With the motor running on low dribble in a bit of ice water. Keep dribbling until the mixture comes together, but isn’t too dry or too wet. Just watch. It will happen. Stop the motor…..if you are working by hand, dribble the water and work the dough until it comes together. At this point, you can make two disks, wrap in plastic wrap and store in the fridge. If you want to make this for the freezer, wrap in plastic wrap, then store in a freezer bag. Defrost on the counter or in the fridge.

To roll out: flour a board or counter with a little flour, and start rolling with a pin from the middle out.  Roll north, south, east, west. Then flip the dough, adding more flour if you need to. Roll again, north, south, east, west, until it’s bigger than a pie plate, about 12 inches across. Spray a glass deep dish pie plate with cooking spray. Lay the crust inside, giving a little room for shrinkage. Roll out the second crust. Fill the first crush with fruit and dot with butter. Lay the top crust over the fruit, sealing and crimping the edges. Score the top and sprinkle with sugar. Bake on a sheet pan lined with parchment or foil for 1 1/2 hours at 375 degrees until the center filling reads 180 on an instant read thermometer and is bubbling.  Cool on a rack and eat warm or room temperature. Enjoy!

This happens to be one of the recipes from Dish Cafe and Catering Co.  You can see more of her recipes  at http://dishingup.wordpress.com/

As a Reno/Sparks real estate professional, I encourage all questions or comments on the Reno/Sparks real estate market or any of the articles posted.  I can be reached by email at  chance at ballard-company.com or http://www.myspace.com/chancegates

My wife and I were talking about where to go for breakfast, somehow  we decided it would be nice to try the Gold Dust West.  Like any casino it has changed drastically since my drinking days.  The coffee shop seemed to be in the same spot although it has gone through some major upgrades.  The staff was friendly, the service was good and the prices were reasonable.  The patty links were a little over cooked but the food was still really good.  My biggest complaint would have to be the food arrived before I even had time to finish my first cup of coffee,  something my wife really enjoyed.   I will go to the Gold Dust West again, it was an enjoyable experience.

As a Reno/Sparks real estate professional, I encourage all questions or comments on the Reno/Sparks real estate market or any of the articles posted on this blog.  I can be reached by email at:   chance at ballard-company.com or http://www.myspace.com/chancegates

One of the great things about doing real estate in the Reno/Sparks area is being associated with Realty World.  When it comes to the new technology being brought to the market, Realty World has some of the best technology people you will ever meet.  They make it appoint to keep us all informed on what is new and a must have for the industry.

The newest is the Apple iPad.  If I had to describe the Apple iPad in one word, that word would be “wow”.  The new iPad will be available in 60 days and starts below $500.00 and goes up from there.  It has 9.7″ screen and a battery life up to 10 hours.  16GB – 64GB flash storage memory.

One of the best accessories is the keyboard doc/charger.  By placing the iPad into the keyboard a person has a full size keyboard while charging the Ipad.

Read more: http://www.realtyworldnca.com/2010/01/27/apple-ipad-revealed/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+RealtyWorldNorthernCaliforniaNevada+%28Realty+World+Northern+California+%26+Nevada%29

As a Reno/Sparks real estate professional, I encourage all questions or comments on the Reno/Sparks real estate market or any of the articles posted on this blog.  I can be reached by email at:   chance at ballard-company.com or http://www.myspace.com/chancegates

Hidden Valley is located in the Southeast Area of Reno.  It is strictly a residential community with a few condos around the Golf Course, otherwise all single family dwellings. A down side is there are no services, such as grocery stores, gas stations,  within the boundaries of Hidden Valley.  The upside is traffic into the area is mainly residents.

A major shopping center is located about just minutes away. The area does have two golf courses

:Rosewood Lakes - a public course

Hidden Valley-  private course.

Hidden Valley does have an elementary school as well as County Park which was recently outfitted with all new play equipment. There are equestrian trails and a gazebo with a BBQ which you can reserve to hold private picnics or gatherings.  The dog park is fully fenced, and comes with  plenty of water and doggie bags.

Many of the homes in Hidden Valley are constructed on large lots, close to .50 acre. Many have RV access and parking.  Some of the homes in Hidden Valley  have no HOA dues. Some of the newer homes built surrounding the original Hidden Valley development do have HOA fees but are what I call reasonable – $45 month or so for now.

Hidden Valley does host several annual events:  An Easter Egg Hunt, a community picnic, a pumpkin growing contest, a holiday Christmas Parade of lights and a winter dinner and dancing social which is held for residents at the Country Club.

As a Reno/Sparks real estate professional, I encourage all questions or comments on the Reno/Sparks real estate market or any of the articles posted on this blog.  I can be reached by email at:   chance at ballard-company.com or http://www.myspace.com/chancegates

As a full time Reno/Sparks Realtor, I learned that I need to spoil my wife on occasion.  So I took her to the Siena  Hotel for breakfast the other morning and was not impressed to say the least.  Service was a little slow, and the food  was a little undercooked.  However, being a positive person I try and look for the good in most things.  So on the bright side, the coffee was pretty good and one of the bus boys was pretty quick.  Which at least aloud me to have some quality time with the wife and some good coffee at the same time.

As a Reno/Sparks real estate professional, I encourage all questions or comments on the Reno/Sparks real estate market or any of the articles posted on this blog.  I can be reached by email at:   chance at ballard-company.com or http://www.myspace.com/chancegates

As credit card companies continue to hike rates and continually change the terms and conditions of your account, it is crucial for credit card users to make the most of their credit. The following tips will help you get on track to using your credit card wisely.

1. Pay on time. Paying your credit card account on time helps you avoid late fees as well as penalty interest rates applied to your account, and helps you maintain a good credit record. A good credit record leads to a higher credit score, which helps you qualify for lower interest rates. Know the date your payment is due. If your bill is due at an inconvenient time of the month- for example, if it’s due on the 10th and you get paid on the 15th- contact your credit card company to see if they will change your billing cycle to fit your cash flow.

2. Stay below your credit limit. If you go over your credit limit on your card, your card issuer could charge a fee and increase your interest rate to a higher penalty rate. To avoid this, keep a record of your spending or check your balance online. Also, be aware that some merchants (for example, hotel and car rental companies) put a “hold” on your credit card based on their estimate of the amount you will charge. This can reduce your available credit until the final charge is processed.

3. Avoid unnecessary fees. Credit card companies not only charge late payment and over-the-limit fees, but also fees for cash advances, transferring balances, and having a payment returned. Some companies charge a fee when you pay your bill by phone. Pay attention to the transactions that trigger these fees. If you need a cash advance, withdraw enough so that you don’t have to take a second cash advance and incur a second fee later in the month. Read your credit card agreement to learn more about the fees that your credit card company charges.

4. Pay more than the minimum payment. If you can’t pay your balance in full each month, try to pay as much of the total as you can. Over time, you’ll pay less in interest charges- money that you will be able to spend on other things, and you’ll pay off your balance sooner.

5. Watch for changes in the terms of your account. Credit card companies can change the terms and conditions of your account. They will send you advance notices about changes in fees, interest rates, billing, and other features. By reading these “change in terms” notices, you can decide whether you want to change the way you use the card. For example, if cash advance fees increase, you may decide to use a different card for cash advances. If you have a card with a variable rate or if you have an introductory rate that is ending, be aware that credit card companies are not required to send you a notice about raising your interest rate. Interest rates are listed on your monthly bill. Read your bill carefully and take note of any changes.

For more information, visit www.federalreserve.gov.