Thursday, June 27, 2013

Super Model Secrets: The Surprising Ingredient to Youthful Skin


Super Model Secrets: The Surprising Ingredient to Youthful Skin
Every once in a while a discovery is made that really revolutionizes a field.
When it comes to keeping skin looking younger, there’s no shortage of products claiming revolutionary breakthroughs. The problem is that most claims tend to be untrue.
But not this one.
Our story begins some time ago, when French dermatologist, Dr. Sebaugh noticed a unique property of the Charentais cantaloupe melon, which grows in a certain region in the South of France. This melon, after being picked, decayed at a significantly slower rate than other melons.
Dr. Sebaugh speculated that there was something remarkable that protected the melon from aging and after years of research finally isolated a super-antioxidant called superoxide dismutase, or SOD. SOD has since been referred to as a "youth molecule" for its miraculous age-defying properties, and is believed to be one of the most powerful antioxidants known to science.
Dr. Sebaugh tested SOD as part of a skin care regimen and was amazed by its ability to restore the appearance of youth and vitality. He then got together with beauty powerhouse Guthy-Renker and Super Model Cindy Crawford, and created a first-of-its-kind skincare regime using the rare melon extract.  It’s called Meaningful Beauty®, and it helps boost the skin’s resilience while reducing the visible signs of aging. It’s naturally enriched with SOD, as well as other powerful ingredients such as coenzyme Q10, lipoic acid, and restorative minerals.
Already popular among in-the-know stars and models, Meaningful Beauty's Advanced Anti-Aging System is now available to the average gal on a budget. And the results are real. It works to smooth the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles, add radiance to your complexion, preserve skin’s youthful vibrancy, and protect skin from environmental damage. Results can be seen in as little as four weeks.
To achieve these remarkable results, Dr. Sebaugh formulated the product into a complete 5-step system – that’s all you will need to keep your skin looking youthful and beautiful:
1 .        The softening cleanser cleans the skin with a gentle formula designed to remove makeup and skin impurities without stripping your skin of essential oils.
2.         The antioxidant day crème protects the skin with one of the most advanced sunscreens on the market.
3.         The anti-aging night crème and lifting eye crème restores the skin, so that you're boosting collagen while targeting wrinkles, fine lines, and other visible signs of aging while you sleep.
4.         The glowing serum, wrinkle smoothing capsules, and firming chest and neck crème, revitalize the skin by improve firmness and evening out skin tone.
5:         The deep cleansing masque replenishes and revives stressed-out skin by lifting away dead surface cells and skin-dulling impurities.
But, perhaps the best thing about Meaningful Beauty® is the price. It's produced by industry leader Guthy-Renker, and right now the company is offering the entire 5 step system consisting of 8 separate products for just $39.95 (plus shipping and handling).
It really is an amazing deal, and in fact, they are so sure you’ll see results from the Advanced Anti Aging System that they’re offering a 60-day money-back guarantee on this product. If you’re not completely satisfied, send back the bottles (even if they’re empty) and receive a full refund (minus s&h).
Thousands of women, including many well known celebrities, are now relying on the Meaningful Beauty® system to deliver younger looking skin day-in and day-out. And, at this price, you don’t have to be a supermodel to afford it.

Homes Of The World's Most Powerful Celebrities!!!!

There’s a certain kind of luxury real estate in Los Angeles that passes from celebrity to celebrity. Take the Beverly Hills estate that Ryan Seacrest is in escrow to buy for $37 million from Ellen DeGeneres and her wife, Portia de Rossi. The gated compound in Coldwater Canyon includes a 9,200-square-foot main house, plus three guest houses, a swimming pool and koi ponds.
Perhaps its most valuable amenity: privacy. L.A. has ordinances that prevent new construction of high walls and hedges, which means there’s a limited inventory of homes that can keep prying eyes at a distance. The glitterati tend to trade them among one another.

“The number one feature celebrities need in a house is that it’s ‘stoparazzi,’ ” says Billy Rose, president of The Agency, a Los Angeles-area luxury real estate firm he co-founded with Mauricio Umansky, husband of reality TV star Kyle Richards of Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. He says it’s not uncommon to drive a house-hunting celeb around L.A. with paparazzi in tow. His clients tend to like homes quietly tucked behind long, gated driveways, outfitted with extensive security systems and guard houses.

Forbes just released its annual Celebrity 100 list, a ranking of America’s most powerful stars. With the help of Realtor.com, Trulia.com and others, we’ve investigated where these actors, singers and personalities bed down for the night. We included homes bought and sold in the past year as well as a few long-term nests of the stars. Perhaps not surprisingly, most are nestled in and around the Los Angeles area.
Jade Mills, a Coldwell Banker Previews International luxury real estate agent who has reportedly worked with everyone from Britney Spears to Jerry Seinfeld, says she has seen a lot of celebrity sales activity in Hollywood Hills and Trousdale Estates, Beverly Hills. Both neighborhoods offer seclusion. “Hollywood Hills … has a feeling of privacy,” explains Mills. “There are no windows on the front side of most homes there and then the whole back is explosive views.”

Take Katy Perry. Despite divorcing Russell Brand, the pop star is hanging onto the Hollywood Hills home the couple purchased for $6.5 million last summer. Grossing $45 million and No. 8 on Forbes’ Celeb 100 list, she is reportedly spending $1 million to remodel the estate, which features a 8,835-square-foot, three-story main house, guest house and a patio with swimming pool and rock features. The doomed duo recently unloaded a penthouse they shared in New York City’s celeb-centric TriBeCa neighborhood, where neighbors included Jay-Z and Beyonce and Bethenney Frankel. It sold for $2.75 million earlier this year.
Jennifer Aniston (No 22 on the Celeb 100) has long favored Trousdale Estates herself. The A-list actress renovated and sold her Beverly Hills abode known as Ohana last year for just over $37 million, deciding to up and relocate to her hometown of New York City. After dropping $7 million on two neighboring Pre-War condos in the West Village, she fled back to L.A. after reported issues with, well, paparazzi. Less than a year later she has sold off her Manhattan digs for a half-million dollar loss, picked up a $21 million Bel Air estate in need of renovations and decided to shell out $40,000 per month on another Trousdale Estates home with four bedrooms, six and a half-baths and a gated driveway sure to ward off prying photographers.
Many of the newest generation of Hollywood elite have been parking their newfound millions in property as well. Bieber Fever hit the real estate world recently when stories surfaced that Justin Bieber, No. 3 on the Celebrity 100, was angling to scoop up a Hollywood Hills lakefront Modern, crafted from glass, steel and concrete, for as much as $10.8 million. Turns out the home’s tenant, Ashton Kutcher (No. 51 on the Celeb 100), who had rented the 9,400-square foot home through tech startup Airbnb (in which he is an investor) following his split from Demi Moore, decided to beat his Punk’d partner to it. The “Two and a Half Men” star snapped up the hillside bungalow after the Biebs texted him while touring the house. “I had to buy the house because I thought he was going to buy it out from under me,” Kutcher jokingly admitted on Jimmy Kimmel Live.
That didn’t deter the 18-year old Canadian pop singer from buying something else however. Bieber is said to have recently settled on a 10,000-square foot Calabasas, Calif. home in the celeb-centric gated neighborhood, The Oaks, where the Kardashian clan resides and famous renters have included Britney Spears. Boasting six bedrooms, seven bathrooms, two separate garages and an elevator, the home had been asking $6 million.

NEW MEN’S EVERYDAY COLLECTION!!!





NEW MEN’S SKINCARE COLLECTION

Power-packed with essential oils, REFINERY is a pioneering shaving and skin care collection specifically formulated for men by men.

REFINERY is inspired by the renowned men's grooming salon in London, includes nine targeted formulations blended with the latest cutting-edge ingredients and naturally active essential oils such as ballon plant, bisabolol, creatine and sodium hyaluronate to care for pre shave and post shave skin to improve and maintain the health and vitality of even the toughest of skins.





CLEANSE


Cleansing your skin daily is the foundation to healthy looking skin and takes just a few minutes morning and evening. Choose from a unique non-drying soap or a foaming wash for the face to keep skin looking fresh and clear and keep any excess oil under control.

Regular use of an exfoliator will remove dead skin cells, lift the beard, unblock pores and help prevent in-grown hairs.



 SHAVE


Always cleanse and exfoliate before shaving so that the blade glides smoothly across the skin. Whether you prefer a gel or oil, always make sure your blade is sharp and clean, shave in the same direction as the hair growth and rinse with cool water to tighten the pores.
For thicker beards or extra protection for sensitive skin massage the oil into the skin first and then apply shaving gel over the top.


 MOISTURISE


Daily moisturising is the key to supple skin that looks and feels healthy and vibrant.
Moisturising helps protect the skin from the environment and keeps the signs of ageing at bay.
Cool and calm the skin after shaving with a balm that contains ingredients designed to help heal minor nicks and cuts. For mature or very dry skin the shave oil doubles up as a great nourishing face serum. The eye area ages fastest and the skin is more delicate so a specially formulated eye gel will help minimise puffiness and fine lines.



 TREATMENT


Every now and then our skin needs a boost, whether it's due to the environment, jet lag, stress or a late night out. Indulge your skin with a specially formulated treatment mask and feel the difference in just 5 minutes.

How Gentleman should choose and use a SCENT....the honest way you never knew!!!


We wanted to start off this week’s two part item on the correct way for men to use scents or colognes by talking to an expert so I slipped into Claridges to talk to Deborah Gayle, General Manager of The Refinery grooming emporium which has its headquarters just opposite the famous Mayfair Hotel.
I started by asking how men should use a scent or cologne. Deborah is “I think there should always be a few choices of scent because I think we have all been in the tube when someone has been wearing a night time scent on during the day and that is really too much so even if they only have 2 they should have a daytime and nighttime scent. The day time should be fresh and not overpowering because it’s not very pleasant and then a different scent for the evening”.
In terms of correctly using a scent Deborah says “The really important thing is to layer so if you particularly want to smell of a specific fragrance, everything else that you put on your body should be as un-fragranced as possible in terms of soap, body lotion deodorant, whatever else you are putting on. Make sure you use unscented ones because otherwise what is going to happen is all the chemicals, which are in these different cleaning products, and the chemicals in the perfume all start heating through your body heat and will start fighting with each other. That will create a quite strong sour smell when it all clashes and I think people forget that and the thing is people at the lower end of the market, there deodorants are heavily chemically perfumed. There is nothing very natural in there.”
Deborah is also a believer in the complete range of bath and body products from one company  “If you are going for a scent which offers the full range of deodorant, shower gel and body lotion you have to make a big commitment to that one scent but you can be sure that there will be no clash of different scents.”
We talked briefly about where a man should apply a scent. “A lot of guys get it wrong and think that a scent, a man’s smell, should be an ‘aftershave’. In my view you should avoid putting spirit based scent directly onto your face after shaving because many have a lot of alcohol in them and that’s when you get the shouts and the pain. Ideally what you should do after you shave is either use an aftershave balm or an oil, something that will calm the face down. Do not spray your face with aftershave or perfume. What you should do you should put the fragrance on your pulse points on your neck area.  One of the nicest things to do is to spray it into the air and then walk into it.  But to have it shovelled onto your face is not clever and not good for your just shaved skin you will find it is much too fierce. “
So finally we moved on to how a man should test or select an aftershave. ” The most important point is not to just spray and buy, spray and go away, have a coffee.  Everyone’s body is different and there are different chemical in our bodies and our bodies have different heats. Our skin is made up of different elements and a fragrance on your skin could smell quite different to  a fragrance on my skin. The smell won’t develop fully until it’s sunk in and the body heat has gone through it, about 20 minutes.
Whatever you do, do not buy on the basis of a scent sprayed on a piece of paper, that is never going to change. There is nothing human about paper. You must always try it on your own skin. I could smell a scent on two different men and it would smell completely different.”
We trust that all of you budding Gentlemen will take Deborah’s advice and smell wonderful.
The Refinery is London’s one-stop Grooming Emporium for men. Established in January 2000 it offers barbering, skincare and spa treatments in exclusive luxury retreats in Mayfair, Harrods and Knightsbridge. It combines the comfort and atmosphere of a gentlemen’s club with the vitality and sense of well-being of a health spa.

breaking news!....America's Most Expensive Homes for Sale !!!

The Most Expensive Homes For Sale In America Right Now


There are many reasons the de Guigne estate in Hillsborough, Calif., could be called a trophy property. For starters the 16,000-square-foot Mediterranean mansion was constructed a century ago and has remained within the same family since. Located at the end of a 4,500-foot driveway, the historic home has a grand ballroom, a flower arranging room and staff quarters that include two chauffeurs’ rooms.  But the property’s most unique feature isn’t the home itself – it’s the land.
The estate encompasses 47 prime acres 20 minutes south of San Francisco, halfway between the city and Silicon Valley. “This is the first time since this land was acquired 150 years ago by the de Guigne family that such a large amount of land in such a desirable location is coming to market,” says Gregg Lynn, a Sotheby’s International Realty agent co-listing the property with colleague Bernadette Lamothe. “In the town of Hillsborough all of its large estates have been subdivided over the last 50 years and this estate remains one of the only two [of this size] left.”
The sizeable acreage is the main driver behind the listing’s lofty price tag: $100 million. That princely sum makes the de Guigne estate one of the most expensive homes for sale in the U.S.
To compile our annual list of America’s most expensive homes for sale, we sorted through listings on Realtor.com, Trulia TRLA -0.07%.com, Sotheby’s International Realty, Christie’s International Real Estate (and its affiliates), Coldwell Banker Previews International (and its affiliates), The Agency, and others. And, since some ultra-expensive homes never officially hit the market, with their owners choosing to shop quietly for wealthy buyers through well-connected brokers, we included pocket listings that could be confirmed. The resulting list encompasses more than 30 homes, all priced $60 million and up.
While real estate across the U.S. slowly recovers from the collapse of the housing bubble, the super luxury market is currently rivaling, and in some cases even trumping, bubble-era prices. Thanks to a handful of recent record purchases – including a November $117.5 million Silicon Valley sale – an increasing number of high-end home owners are attaching ambitious nine-figure price tags to their digs.
Like the de Guigne estate. There are other properties on the market in the $100 million range, but this home comes with an unusual condition attached: the owner, Christian de Guigne IV, 75, is requiring that the buyer allow him to inhabit the premises until his death. Nonetheless, there’s plenty of interest, according to Lynn, particularly from wealthy foreigners looking for a hard asset in which to park their cash.
On the East Coast another similarly enviable slice of land is listed for an even larger sum. Copper Beech Farm encompasses 50 exclusive waterfront acres in Greenwich, Conn., a tony Wall Street-centric suburb of New York City. At $190 million, it is far and away the most expensive home for sale in America.
“There’s nothing like this and the second-to-last one that existed, on about the same acreage, sold in 1952,” listing agent David Ogilvy of David Ogilvy & Associates, a luxury Greenwich realty firm affiliated with Christie’s International Real Estate, told FORBES in May.
For that staggering sum, the buyer gets an 1890s French renaissance-style mansion encompassing 13,519 square feet that includes 12 bedrooms, seven full baths and two half baths, a wood-paneled library, an ornate dining room with a tracery ceiling and oak columns, a solarium, a wine cellar, a third-floor staff wing, and a three-story, wood-paneled entry foyer. The grounds, which include two islands in Long Island Sound, boast a clock tower-bedecked carriage house, a guardhouse, formal gardens, multiple greenhouses, an apple orchard, a grass tennis court and a 14-sided swimming pool with an accompanying octagonal pool house.
Ogilvy says he calculated the $190 million asking price off of numerous comparables (of which none are even remotely as large), having crunched the average sales prices per acre for close to a dozen nearby properties.
New York City has about two dozen available homes priced $30 million or higher, according to Jonathan Miller, chief executive of New York-based real estate appraiser Miller Samuel.  Eight make our list, including the penthouse atop the Hotel Pierre. Located on the south side of Manhattan’s Central Park, it’s listed for $125 million, tying it for fourth most expensive home in the country (alongside Los Angeles’ $125 million Fleur de Lys).
The Pierre penthouse spans 12,000 square feet across three floors that tout five bedrooms, six full baths, staff quarters, a marble staircase, a private interior elevator, a 3,500-square-foot ballroom-turned-grand salon and sweeping 360-degree views of Central Park and the surrounding city. The unit boasts access to hotel amenities like room service as well – for a hefty monthly maintenance fee of $42,720, or an annual expense of $512,640.
The co-op apartment first graced the sale block in 2004 with a $70 million price tag. After a wealthy buyer capable of passing the building’s infamously exclusive co-op board failed to materialize, the home, owned by finance maven Martin Zweig, was quietly delisted. After Zweig passed away in February, it came back on the market – at nearly 80% more.
The Big Apple AAPL -1.15%’s super luxury market has diverged from city’s general real estate trends, notes Miller. Several unprecedented sales including a $88 million penthouse in 15 Central Park West and two penthouses in up-and-coming One57 in contract for $90 million-plus apiece have propelled some owners to optimistically list their abodes with lofty price tags in the hopes of securing similarly deep-pocketed buyers.
Among the most expensive: hedge fund billionaire Steve Cohen’s $115 million Bloomberg Tower duplex, a 9,000-square-foot condo designed by architect Charles Gwathmey; real estate developer Steven Klar’s $100 million CitySpire penthouse, an octagonal-shaped 8,000-square-foot condo now offered as a For Sale By Owner listing after it failed to find a buyer while listed more traditionally via luxury brokers; and a $95 million Sherry Netherland full-floor co-op, a 15-room flat touting a solarium, separate staff quarters on separate floors and a $54,000-per-month maintenance fee that includes daily housekeeping, turn-down service and room service from posh restaurant Cipriani’s.

Six Los Angeles County abodes grace our list, the majority located within the coveted Platinum Triangle of Holmby Hills, Bel Air and Beverly Hills.  Fleur de Lys, socialite Suzanne Saperstein’s Holmby Hills mega mansion, is perhaps the best known thanks to a steadfast asking price of $125 million — despite bouncing on and off the market for six years.
Compared to that, the Carolwood Estate, located directly across the street, seems like a relative bargain at $90 million. Known best as Walt Disney DIS +1.02%’s former family home, the compound occupies four gated acres that include a 35,000-square foot mansion built in 2001, a pool with accompanying pool house, a tennis court, a putting green, a wine cellar and best of all, remnants of Walt Disney’s Carolwood Pacific Railroad, the one-eighth-scale backyard train said to have inspired Disneyland.
Other opulent abodes include the nearby Beverly House, the former Beverly Hills estate of William Randolph Hearst , which can be purchased for $115 million (or rented for a stunning $600,000 per month) after the owner hiked its original $95 million price tag, and Dallas, Texas’ Crespi-Hicks Estate, a 25-acre Mayflower Estates compound also listed sans MLS, with an asking price of $135 million.
Several homes that have graced our list in years past remain on the market, albeit with price chops. The most notable perhaps is Casa Casuarina in Miami. The South Beach home-turned-boutique hotel, better known as the Versace Mansion due to its tragic history as the former residence of the late fashion designer, first came to market in 2012 for $125 million. Several pending foreclosure-related lawsuits later, the manse has undergone two reductions and currently is on the block for $75 million.

the best Style Tips For Petite Women especially you!


Some of Hollywood’s most beautiful women are on the very petite side. From Jada Pinkett-Smith to Drew Barrymore, Reese Witherspoon, Scarlett Johansson, Lucy Liu, and even Anjelina Jolie, half of US women are shorter than 5’4, and only six percent are above 5’9.
But there seems to be a dearth of great shopping opportunities for smaller girls and even less people to guide us while trying to find our “look.” Uber famous and ubiquitous Hollywood stylist Rachel Zoe is herself very short, but at a reported $10K a day, most women can’t afford to get styling tips from her.
One of the latest petite style-advisors to hit the scene is Caroline Alvo; founder of the newly launched women’s fashion site Gambita (meaning ” little shrimp” in Spanish). Alvo’s made it her mission to help diminutive girls find trend-setting style, and says the new site is her answer to a  lifelong hatred of shopping.
“I wasn’t able to find contemporary great-looking clothes that fit me–even living in the mecca of the fashion industry (New York City). Shopping for amazing fashionable looks for smaller women shouldn’t feel like a treasure hunt.  We’re not alone. This is not a niche,” Alvo says.
We asked Alvo for her genius tips on buying and putting together looks for those of us who aren’t the size of runway models–which is mostly everyone–complete with examples fresh off her new site.
Style Advice:
1. V-neck and scoop neck tops or rompers give an elongated look to the body. With a little space or skin showing, it give the illusion of height.
vneck
2. Make sure the top of the sleeve lies at your shoulder. Droopy seams make everyone look dumpy. Consider a man’s suiting. A great fitting blazer has the same rule.
droopy shoulder
3. Three-quarter length sleeves are flattering to most women. They show off the best part of your arms–unless you’re ripped like First Lady Obama, then release the guns ladies.
3 quarter length
4. Don’t be afraid of cropped jeans as long as they are proportioned correctly for smaller girl.  They also look great with heels or flats as long as they expose your ankles.
cropped jeans
5. The best skirt length for petites is at the knee or shorter. Don’t be afraid to show some leg in a mini-skirt. If you’re at the office, you may want to keep the skirt length modest, but once the season turns warmer, be bold.
skirt length
6. Stay away from pieces with a lot of excess fabric or lack shape. A petite frame can easily get lost. If you’re going with something like an A-line or shift dress with less structure, try a belt to trim the waist.
petite dress
7. I’m a big believer in fun prints. Just make sure the print doesn’t overwhelm you, otherwise it can throw off your proportions.
print dress
8. Skirts should sit at your natural waist. These are a great option for shorter women, but make sure to tuck your top into the skirt, otherwise you’re back to #6 shapeless gal.
skirts at the waist
If you like what you’ve seen, Gambita is offering our readers a 30% discount with the code at checkoutGambita4Knoworthy.

How To Choose A Career now that you are uncertain about one!


how to pick a great career

How To Choose A Career

Finding a career you love is a priceless thing. However, economist Neil Howe says that only 5% of people pick the right job on the first try. He calls those people “fast starters” and in general, they are less creative, less adventurous, and less innovative. It can take time to land the perfect gig, but mostly it takes an honest look at yourself and an honest examination of what will really make you feel the most content.
Pick a lifestyle, not a job titleBarbara Roche, author of Commit To Confidence, executive coach, professor, and public speaker recommends asking yourself the question “Which camp are you in? Do you live to work? Or do you work to live?” Even if you already have a job, it’s important to figure out how much your passion to do something plays a role in your job choice. For example, can you work as a bank teller by day and singer at night? Or do you need to commit yourself to becoming a professional singer and allow for the fact that you may end up pretty impoverished in the pursuit?
Don’t over commit–The important thing is to not overcommit to one path. Graduate school, for example, is overcommiting because if you don’t end up liking that field, you will have spent four years gaining entrance into the field. Taking on college debt is over committing because you are, effectively, saying you will only take jobs that are relatively high paying in order to service the debt.
Pursue Your Passion– Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook and author of the book Lean In, has a buzzy new catchphrase for ambitious young women: in a new video and accompanying Tumblr, her organization asks, “What would you do if you weren’t afraid?” Well says Roche, that’s all well and good, but it’s also important to dispel the myth that it’s easy to find your calling. It takes work.
Larry Smith an Economics professor at University of Waterloo in Canada believes the only people holding themselves back is themselves.
“No matter how many people tell you that if you want a great career, pursue your passion, pursue your dreams…you will decide not to do it.” Excuses, he says, are holding people back.  Smith says he’s angry and bewildered by the lack of conviction. He says he’s spent his entire teaching career coaching students to find careers they love, but he still hears excuse after excuse for not following one’s passion.
Create a compelling resume–Focus on the impact you have made and how you have added value instead of just describing your career history. Target your resume to address the needs of employers – to really address what they’re concerned about and how you can help. (And take the time to research what that might be). Remove all ‘resume speak’ by which I mean “filler” words that sound good but don’t say anything.
Develop the skills you’ll need–Whether you need to do an internship, volunteer, or take an adult education class, if you want to pursue a goal, you’ll need to figure out what the key skills are and learn them.
Dig your heels in try to truly assess yourself. You may need to go old-school and pay for an Aptitude test through the trusted site Johnson O’Connor Research Foundation. Here you’ll find your natural talents and special abilities–the components that may suit you to your desired profession.
Finally, as a writer who gets to do what she loves every single day, I use the quote of one of histories greatest writers–William Shakespeare…his character says it better than I ever could.
Hamlet Act 1, scene 3. Polonius’s last piece of advice to his son Laertes before he leaves to catch the next boat away from dad.
“This above all: to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.
Farewell, my blessing season this in thee

A Financial Checklist For The Savvy Bride-To-Be...a must read for you-especially!


Bride to Be Featured image


Before hitching your wagon to the star partner of your dreams, there are a few questions and tips to consider. It’s wonderful be a hopeless romantic, but you don’t want to be hopeless living on Skid Row.  When it comes to your money take the bull by the horns, and know know there’s nothing more sexy, beautiful, and feminine than being in charge of your finances. The editors take our economic concerns to financial expert Matt Pavich,  a 30 year veteran Financial Advisor and Money Manager with Presidential Brokerage Inc.
Here’s the Pavich pointers:
1. Ramp-up your learning curve. Find a mentor, advisor, website, classroom setting, or books that help you connect the dots about all of the aspects of your money. Lifetime financial planning is a multi-faceted subject involving investments, insurances, taxes, and estate planning. These are dynamic topics that most often change over time. Finding a strong resource who will help speed-up your learning curve or develop your resourcefulness is key.
2. Do not depend on the groom to make the financial decisions. Do not be intimidated by him or the topic. Whenever in doubt refer to Rule #1.
3. Keep things separate initially…Or maybe forever. Getting into the groove of living together, sharing expenses, and saving for the future often takes some getting used to. Finding out how you might do things differently and a comfort level before co-mingling is a good idea.
4. Establish an emergency fund. Having three to six months of income saved will allow you to overcome those curves life tends to throw at us.
5. Start investing early. Making mistakes when not a lot of money is at stake, as is with most young people, makes the lesson a little easier to handle. Losing $10,000 versus $100,000 is much easier to swallow.
6. Learn to manage debt. Debt can be your friend (especially when rates are low as they are now) or they can be a hole that takes years to dig out of. Make sure you are aware of all his debt by running a credit check. Do NOT take on the debt of your fiancé.
7. Open a retirement account ASAP. The company 401k or your own IRA is essentially a freebie from Uncle Sam you lose each year you’re not participating. Compound interest is the eighth wonder of the world.
8. Start charitable giving. Giving to charities that are effective in your community is good karma for everyone involved.

You can register for THE MBA TOUR today ....its a great opportunity so hurry now!!!


THE MBA TOUR PARTNERS WITH EMMANUEL TV
In line with Prophet T.B. Joshua’s newly launched initiative to assist graduates with employment, a wonderful development has taken place! The MBA Tour, an international event organised to link prospective students with top level business administrative educational institutions around the world, have partnered with Emmanuel TV.
HANNAH ACQUAH [MBA TOUR REPRESENTATIVE]
The West African representative of the MBA Tour, Hannah Bertilla Acquah came to The SCOAN to officially announce the unique partnership. She said, “The MBA Tour is here to officially partner with Prophet T.B. Joshua and Emmanuel TV. Our partnership is based on our mutual commitment to nation building through skills development for the young and corresponds with the man of God’s current project of assisting graduates with employment.

“Our partnership will enable African students who demonstrate outstanding potential, access to Fellowships at the world’s top business schools and academic institutions – including: Columbia Business School; Harvard Business School; MIT Sloan School of Management; Yale School of Management; IE University, Spain; Erasmus University, The Netherlands; INSEAD Business School, France.

“Representatives from these renowned institutions will identify the qualifying students and Prophet T.B. Joshua and Emmanuel TV will assist with financial scholarships.”

The MBA Tour which is just one of the hundreds of organisations across the world that have indicated interest in partnering with Emmanuel TV to see to the actualisation of the campaign. Talking about the need to commit resources into such charitable ventures, Prophet T.B. Joshua asked, “What is the value of money but to change lives, change nations and change the world”. He further added that “Our tomorrow should be better than our today.”

You can register and find more information online at www.thembatour.com.

What Many People Are Missing About HP..including you!

What Many People Are Missing About HP

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On October 3, HP held their Securities Analyst Meeting, which I attended in person at the Concourse Exhibition Center in San Francisco. This is a day, like all major public companies have, where senior management discusses their plans for the future with the major institutional investors. Based upon the reduced stock price afterwards, the message didn’t please financial analysts. I heard the same content as everyone else and some of it wasn’t pretty, but I also think people missed a lot, too.
I am an industry analyst, not a financial analyst, which means I am looking at companies, products, and technologies through a different lens. A spreadsheet isn’t my primary lens, it’s nearly 25 years’ experience of watching the relationships between buyers, products, markets, technologies and the companies who deliver them. Through that lens, I saw the following:
Openness, Honesty, Humility
I have sat through more corporate presentations than I can even count. Most of them involve mountains of industry jargon, big flowery words, and a complete denial that challenges exist. Big business has become a culture of spin, and therefore these kinds of meetings provide a lot of that. I can’t blame some companies for sticking to a positive message, as financial analysts bite on negativity like a dog biting onto a towel and never letting go.
While HP’s presentations contained a little corporate-speak, they provided an honest assessment of where the company is, where it came from, and where it is going. When HP didn’t know the answer, its execs said it straight and didn’t spin it. Whitman was criticized a bit for talking about prior regimes as part of the issue, but the fact is that having that many CEOs in that short of time, 7 CEOs in as many years, does create utter chaos. If you have ever worked in a large corporation, you would know that. I have never seen this level of honesty from any company this size and I applaud HP for it. Others should, too.
Forecasted $7B Profits for 2013
During the meeting, HP talked quantitatively and qualitatively about the present state of its businesses. They also talked about the future. For 2013 HP forecasted $7 billion in profits, specifically $3.40- 3.60 EPS and also $5 billion in free cash flow. How does this compare to other companies? Here is a smattering of a few select companies’ latest annual profits:
Lenovo $0.273B
HP $7B
Dell $3.5B
Cisco $8B
EMC $2.5B
Oracle $10B
SAP $4.5B
Google $9.7B
While HP has a ways to go to catch up with IBM, most companies would kill for $7B in annual profits.
Impressive Share in Many Markets
Sure, HP has its challenges as they acknowledged, but another big thing people fail to recognize is how successful HP is in so many markets when measured by market share. In most of its product markets, HP is #1 or #2 by revenue and/or market share, in servers, PCs, workstations, printers (laser and inkjet), software (quality, infrastructure & operations management, big data with Autonomy), and service lines of business such as storage.
Here is some data that comes straight out of HP’s SAM presentations and from Q1/Q2 IDC numbers:
Servers, Storage, Networking:
  • #1 server vendor in shipments for 10+ consecutive years
  • #1 x86 server vendor in revenue and units for 16+ consecutive years
  • #1 x86 blade vendor in revenue and units for approximately six years
  • #2 branded tape drives
  • #4 external disk storage systems
  • #2 in external storage revenue in EMEA
  • #2 switch share WW in revenue at 11.5% and ports at 18.2%
  • #1 switch share in China at over 30% revenue share
  • #2 Ethernet switches share
  • #3 wireless network revenue share
  • #2 router revenue share
Software:
  • #6th largest software company in the world
  • #1 distributed systems management software
  • #1 automated software quality
  • #1 enterprise search and discovery
  • #1 archiving
PCs and Printers:
  • #1 PC market share, including workstations
  • #1 workstations
  • #1 desktops
  • #1 notebooks
  • #1 laser printers
  • #1 printer supplies
  • #1 graphics printing
  • #3 printing software and services
Absent in the SAM presentations were market share figures on enterprise services, but even without this, the share stature speaks for itself. HP is #1 or #2 share in a mind-boggling amount of markets.
HP Said it would Take 5 Years
In scanning the articles and financial analyst briefs after HP’s SAM, one thing that I thought was puzzling was the amount of people who were surprised that Whitman said it would take 5 years to turn around HP.
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