Author: Money Mechanics

Starter-home sales rose 4.9% year over year, increasing for the 14th consecutive month. In comparison, sales of mid-priced homes inched up 0.7%, and high-priced home sales rose 0.8%. Starter home sale prices rose 2% year over year to a median $260,000 in October. Active listings of starter homes rose 13% year over year, pushing inventory to its highest October level since 2016. San Francisco recorded the biggest jump in starter-home sales (+19.5%), followed by Providence (+13.0%) and Portland (+12.9%). San Antonio saw the largest decline (-9.6%), trailed by Detroit (-7.9%) and Nashville (-5.5%). Starter-home sales jumped 4.9% year over year…

Salesforce shares climbed Thursday amid signs its AI offerings are taking off, though they remain in negative territory for the year. Wall Street analysts are widely bullish on the stock, suggesting investors are underestimating the software giant while waiting to see more evidence of its advances with AI. Does Salesforce’s new momentum have the stock on track for a comeback? The shares climbed about 4% to close Thursday near $248, making Salesforce (CRM) one of the top gainers in the S&P 500, a day after the company posted a better-than-expected profit boosted by demand for its AI offerings and hiked its…

Key Takeaways Warren Buffett chose Greg Abel as his successor in 2021.Abel is expected to run Berkshire Hathaway like Buffett, although he is said to be a much more hands-on manager. Replacing Warren Buffett is perhaps the ultimate poisoned chalice. With him at the helm, Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (BRK.A, BRK.B) has delivered a staggering total return of more than 5,500,000% to shareholders since Buffett took over the company in 1965. That track record, combined with his down-to-earth, humble personality, transformed Buffett into a Wall Street icon and the most famous investor on the planet. His replacement, Greg Abel, has the…

Key Takeaways According to Fidelity, millennials (ages 29-44) had an average 401(k) balance of $67,300 in 2024, with an 8.7% average contribution rate—the second-lowest among generations.  The Transamerica Center for Retirement Studies put the median millennial retirement savings even lower at $65,000—meaning half had less than that. Many millennials savers increased their contributions to retirement accounts in 2024. The average millennial had about $67,300 saved for retirement, according to Fidelity Investments—a figure that looks modest next to Gen X’s $192,300 or boomers’ $249,300, though these generations have had longer to save. The story brightens when we look at contribution rates…

Key Takeaways A new study found that more than half of 401(k) plans from 2009 to 2013 offered consumers at least one investment fund option that shared revenue with the plan’s administrator.That means higher hidden costs, which can add up to thousands in lost value by the time you retire. Do you really know how your 401(k) plan is invested? If not, you might be putting your money in costlier mutual funds and not know it, new research suggests. Researchers analyzed the 1,000 largest 401(k) plans between 2009 and 2013—the only years when the Department of Labor required detailed public…

Key Takeaways Net worth is valuable as a personal progress tracker rather than a comparison tool.  Keep your debt-to-income ratio below 36%, and prioritize eliminating high-interest debt first.  Traditional retirement benchmarks suggest having 1x your annual salary saved by age 30, 3x by 40, 6x by 50, 8x by 60, and 10x by 67.  Maintain an emergency fund of three to six months of essential expenses in a high-yield savings account. Most people know how they feel about their finances—they may feel stressed, secure, behind, or ahead on their goals. However, relying on your feelings alone will not give you…

Key Takeaways Buffett, an avid reader, says one of the keys to being a good investor is “turning every page.” This means examining every sentence of investment literature published by publicly traded companies. Reading and analyzing everything can help you to better understand companies and increase the chances of making the right investment choices. Turning every page helped Buffett unearth the undervalued businesses with strong fundamentals that made him billions. One of the keys to Warren Buffett’s success is not taking shortcuts. While many investors rely on news sources for brief information about a company’s latest financials, the world’s most…

WASHINGTON — Higher jury awards against trucking companies involved in road accidents are no longer driven primarily by crash severity but by pre-crash negligence, according to the latest research from the American Transportation Research Institute (ATRI). ATRI’s Trucking Litigation: A Forensic Analysis, released on Wednesday, found that allegations related to a carrier’s organizational failures now carry financial multipliers that exceed most on-road infractions, marking a shift in plaintiff strategy since ATRI’s 2020 report on nuclear verdicts in trucking. Substance abuse or driving while under the influence was the most potent financial multiplier identified, which is associated with an expected increase…

The Government Accountability Office said Thursday that it has opened an investigation into Federal Housing Finance Authority Director Bill Pulte, who has served as an attack dog against President Donald Trump’s enemies.The congressional watchdog’s probe was requested by a group of Senate Democrats, who had asked the GAO to determine whether Pulte and other FHFA employees “misused federal authority and resources” in pursuing information about targets of Trump.”Specifically, we request an investigation into Director Pulte’s recent referrals of New York Attorney General Letitia James, U.S. Senator Adam Schiff, Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook, and Congressman Eric Swalwell to the U.S.…

David Madison/DigitalVision/Getty ImagesFollow ZDNET: Add us as a preferred source on Google.ZDNET’s key takeawaysDebian and Ubuntu are similar, but they’re not the sameDebian is more stable, and Ubuntu is easier to use.I’d only recommend one of them to users new to Linux.Ubuntu is based on Debian, and hundreds of distributions are based on Ubuntu. They are both known for their stability.Ubuntu and Debian, however, are not the same.Which should you choose?I’ve been using Ubuntu-based distributions for a very long time. Currently, my distribution of choice is Pop!_OS, but I’ve also used Zorin OS, elementary OS, Ubuntu, Bodhi Linux, Linux Mint,…