PSoTD

Doesn't sound like it is a vocation that will be around much longer.

I mean the price.

Planning a party and thinking about having helium balloons? It may cost you more to have them.

A helium shortage has prices rising.

Helium is used for a whole bunch of things from cooling medical equipment to welding projects.

The experts say there is a shortage because demand is exceeding supply.

Peggy Faraos is planning a big New Years Eve party at her bar where there will be lots of party favors and dozens of floating balloons. She's well aware she'll be paying extra for helium that will make those balloons float.

“I don't mind at all. I like to give my customers a good time and what I am doing I am doing for my customers,” Faraos said.

The experts say helium is going for a premium this year because the U.S. is running short on supply. Demand is up and industries that use helium like hospitals and factories are at the front of the line. Party supply stores are at the back.

Managers at Bartz say the price the pay for a tank of helium has tripled in the last year alone. Because of that, they say they've had to increase the cost of a balloon by a nickel to meet the rising costs

Because the day after Christmas, they spam you.

If you need quick cash to expand your business or increase inventory, don’t miss this opportunity to let your home’s equity work for your business. While interest rates are still low, lock in a guaranteed fixed rate you can count on with a Capital One® Home Equity Loan.

• Fixed APRs from 8.42%1
• Loan amounts available from $20,000 to $500,000
• $0 closing cost options available
• No hidden fees

Like there was a need - or a chance in the world - that I would do that.

This just in: too late, Nintendo. We bought an XBox instead. Kids don't like opening up a present on Christmas Day to see an IOU. And parents don't like doing that.

Interesting article about home builders, and the atmosphere they're now working in:

One mid-sized private builder told a friend of mine that potential customers coming through their model-home doors are openly hostile. They’re not just looking for good deals; they’re looking for payback.

Apparently some of today’s new homebuyers blame the builders outright for the current housing predicament. They are telling unwitting sales reps that they are to blame for running up prices and foisting untenable loans on clients during the latest housing boom. Buyers are telling the sales people stories of how rudely they were treated during the boom, how they were told that if they didn’t want to take the deal they could stick it, because there was a line of buyers right behind them.

I can say that I've felt the attitude by builders and realtors on new builds as well - felt like we were treated like livestock. 3-4 years ago, my wife and I had decided to build a new house in a new development. The first round of properties were gone, and we went on a waiting list for the next series of lots to become ready for building. We were told they would call us when the next series of lots were available, and the real estate agent informed us that at that point, we could start planning on our next house.

About 8 months later, I get a call from the real estate agent, saying that the lots were now available. This was a Wednesday. They wanted us to pick our lot by Friday, and to put a downpayment down on the lot, or they couldn't promise us a lot. It was March, and the roads weren't down in the new area, so it meant trudging through mud just to check out the lots.

There was a big difference between the drawings and the actual lot because of the hilly terrain. We had been told there would be some flattening, but it was minimal, and the lots we thought we wanted were no longer our choice, because they had steep slopes and very unusable yards for kids to play in. There were a couple of flatter lots, and we put down a deposit for one and on Friday we were informed we had reserved it.

The following Monday we were also informed that we had 30 days to decide on the house we wanted to have built. We were going to have to use the builder and the designer provided. None of this information had been provided to us before our downpayment, and it hadn't occurred to us to ask about this. I explained to the real estate agent that I couldn't work this way with the biggest one-time expense in my life, and would need a longer time to figure out what we wanted, and was told that the best we could get was another 30 day extension. They were going to give us 60 days to figure out everything about the house we were going to have built for us.

This felt like a big dump taken on our birthday cake, and we decided pretty quickly that we couldn't do business with either a real estate company or builder that treated brand new customers in such a manner - regardless if it was some sort of mythical "standard". We pulled our money out, and I'm glad we don't live in that development now. We chose to remodel and stay where we're at, and it's worked out pretty well so far.

From March 21, 2005:

Though executives at high-flying luxury home builder Toll Brothers Incorporated insist the so-called housing bubble is not ready to burst, the recent actions of company co-founder and chief executive Robert Toll could be interpreted to indicate otherwise. He and his brother, Bruce, sold $241 million worth of Toll Brothers stock when the shares hit an all-time high last month. The company's chief financial officer insisted to The New York Sun that the shares sold were part of Robert Toll's estate planning and portfolio diversification plans and that he still has almost $1.1 billion in company stock.

Many investors, who argue that senior corporate executives use their superior company knowledge to make profitable stock purchases and sales, closely watch these trades. This scrutiny often becomes acute when a company's stock price has a year-long run like Toll Brothers, as the stock went to over $91 from $36. Robert Toll's sales were made at $87.74 and $88.60; the stock closed Friday at $77.13.

Toll Brothers CFO Joel Rassman said that Mr. Toll sold the shares for several reasons, including repaying lines of credit that he used to pay his 2004 tax bill. He said the stock sold included a sale of 500,000 shares by his adult children from a trust that bore his name, but over which he had no control. Mr. Toll, as the owner of about 18% of the stock outstanding, also "felt a need to diversify his assets slightly," said Mr. Rassman. Moreover, Mr. Toll has taken his bonus in company stock for the past nine years, he said, and hadn't sold a share. Finally, Mr. Toll, according to Mr. Rassman, approached the board of directors and renegotiated his 2004 total compensation down to $30.4 million from the $49.8 million he was originally entitled to under the board's executive compensation plan. "It was too much money. We take appearances seriously, plus, he didn't really need the extra $20 million."

The company, seen by many investors as a bellwether for the fortunes of publicly traded homebuilders, had an epic 2004, with its net income doubling as low mortgage rates fueled consumer demand for the company's high-end homes. However, as the Federal Reserve continues to hike interest rates and housing prices continue to rise, short-sellers - who borrow stock and sell it, on the view that they can make money buying the stock back at a lower price - have been betting aggressively that Toll Brothers' customers are going to get squeezed, hurting company sales. An unusually large amount of money has been bet by short-sellers, with nearly 15% of the company's available stock sold short, according to Yahoo! Finance.

Mr. Toll dismissed the short-sellers, declaring in a February 21 CNBC interview, "They will get crushed," just days before his stock was sold. Mr. Rassman took a more conciliatory tone, and said of Mr. Toll's comments, "They were off the cuff." Still, he added, "When we give investors guidance that we are looking at around 60% income growth for next year and the short position grows, you wonder what's going on."

One short-seller of the company, as well as other home builders, Seabreeze Partners founder Doug Kass, said he had none of the traditional short-seller concerns about unethical corporate management or hidden losses about Toll Brothers. "They are a great company, but the stock is too high and the home builders have economic fundamentals against them at this point," he said. He said these include the fact that the company depends on sales to higher-income buyers, which are going to decrease in number as the economy slows down. "Look at the stock's drop since the bond market started selling off. Think of higher mortgage costs and less disposable income. That's why I'm short."

How much does the United States spend on electricity for Christmas lights each year, I wonder?

Hungary's electricity consumption record has been broken twice in the last week: On Wednesday it reached 6565 megawatts, surpassed by 6602 megawatts on Thursday, Mavir Zrt. general manager András Vinkovits told Napi Gazdaság.

After the decrease in Hungary's electricity consumption in the nineties, it is now growing consistently. Vinkovits said that the company is prepared for the growing need of electricity, and covers extra demand with imported energy. Most electricity is consumed in December, due to the extra consumption of Christmas lights.

I'm going to have to get something like the DeckMate Privacy Wall for the hot tub patio. But it's kinda pricey.

The Mechanicsburg Toys-R-Us told customers that late last night they were to receive 50 Wiis. Here's what they offered customers:

The first 50 people waiting in line at 7 AM on Sunday morning would get a ticket. At 8 AM they would open their doors. If you had a ticket, you could buy a Wii. Otherwise, no.

This, of course, leads to lots of people getting up very early in the morning to wait in line. In expected cold, and wet, weather. The staff at Toys R Us told us that people actually camp out for these things.

Isn't there a better way to distribute the ability to buy something in demand? There seems to be a general unfairness in this concept that is disregarded by stores when they do this. Yes, I know, the stores want people to come in and buy more stuff than just the newly available item, and this practice must provide some evidence that the "lineup" works. But what happens to the people who just can't stay in the cold overnight - older folks, people in ill health, people who actually have to get to work on Sunday, or youth that shouldn't be out overnight without a guardian?

Why not use a lottery system for these "golden tickets" to buy the item instead? Post the winners on a web site, or through email, or on the door of the store, and have at it like that. This seems like a fairer way to provide access to the sale of such a hot item.

My wife and I discussed participating in this menagerie. We decided not to - people have a choice in this matter, whether they want to be treated like cattle or not. We don't moo for Toys-R-Us. And the kids have said they'd be happy with an XBox, which we will NOT be buying at Toys-R-Us.

But for the folks that will moo for Toys-R-Us, it seems like a simple way to reduce this practice by the store in the future - don't buy anything else while you're there to buy the "hot" toy. That's what Toys-R-Us is banking on. If you don't like waiting in the cold all night for the hot toy every Christmas, do your part to keep the store's receipts down when they sponsor a rush like this - that's the power you have. Use it.