Add to cart: If you’re buying something online, try my go-to trick to save money. Add it to your cart, start the checkout process (including putting in your email address), then close the site. Give it a day or two, and you’ll probably get a coupon sent to your inbox.
It’s getting hot in here …
If your late-night Zillow scrolling has gotten more desperate lately, you’re not alone. Home prices are going bonkers. In the past decade, home values shot up 47.1%, beating out the 2010s and 1990s. U.S. home prices are expected to rise another 1.6% over the next year alone. And I found a few markets that are growing nearly five times faster than that.
Red-hot real estate markets
💰 Where home prices are increasing by 3.7%:
- 22. Clarksville, Tenn.: $268,967
- 21. Greenville, N.C.: $215,500
- 20. Durham-Chapel Hill, N.C.: $371,083
- 19. Wilmington, N.C.: $411,583
- 18. Albuquerque, N.M.: $322,333
- 17. Boise, Idaho: $448,317
💰💰 Markets where home prices are rising between 3.8% to 4.5%:
- 16. Yuma, Ariz.: $283,300
- 15. McAllen-Edinburg-Mission, Texas: $192,867
- 14. Fayetteville, N.C.: $218,500
- 13. Muncie, Ind.: $137,377
- 12. Santa Maria-Santa Barbara, Calif.: $852,250
- 11. Charlotte-Concord-Gastonia, N.C.: $348,667
- 10. New Haven-Milford, Conn.: $307,817
- 9. Johnson City, Tenn.: $226,160
- 8. Manchester-Nashua, N.H.: $434,489
- 7. Portland-South Portland, Maine: $475,000
- 6. Jackson, Tenn.: $183,167
- 5. Athens-Clarke County, Ga.: $323,333
- 4. Syracuse, N.Y.: $193,667
💰💰💰 And the top three fastest-growing markets are:
- 3. Rochester, New York: Homes here don’t just sell quickly (think eight-days-on-the-market quickly), but average home prices are expected to increase by 5% this year. It’ll still cost less to live in Rochester than other locations on this list; the median home price here is $199,975.
- 2. Flagstaff, Arizona: Mountains, desert and an expected 5.3% price hike in the next 12 months. The median home value here is $593,833, but it’s a less competitive market; it typically takes around 27 days for a listing to become a pending sale.
- 1. Knoxville, Tennessee: This riverside town is expected to see the highest home price increase by far, at 6.1%. The median home sales price is $321,000, and the average listing sits on the market for two weeks.
Looking to buy?
If you’re in the market, tech tools are your friend.
- Set up alerts on sites like Zillow for homes that match your buying criteria so you never miss a listing. I’ve got a how-to on my site!
- Use MortgageCalculator.org to see your estimated payments.
- Check your credit for free at AnnualCreditReport.com. Click that link or type the address directly into your browser’s address bar. Scammers love to lure you in with “free” reports on fake sites that trap you with monthly fees.
🏠 Pro tip: Winter’s the cheapest time of year to buy. There might be less inventory, but sellers who do list at that time usually want to sell ASAP. Real estate agents are also more open to negotiating closing costs and commissions!
The art of the upsell
Did you hear United Airlines is going all-in on a new, premium, expensive business class? Private check-in, a fancy lounge with sit-down dining, nice pajamas and a mattress pad, extra food on the plane, and (my favorite) press a button and someone will whiz over with champagne. Cha‑ching.
The generation of new car deniers
The average age of cars in the U.S. is now over twelve and a half years, the oldest ever. I’ll explain why people aren’t buying new ones. Plus, police using AI for surveillance, a warning about AirTag stalking, and how to use your Amazon Echo as an intercom.
Apple Pay Later is dead: Apple is ending its buy now, pay later service that breaks up purchases into four payments. Regulation is coming to BNPL, and Apple probably wanted no part of it.
$100,000 set aside
By Minnesota lawmakers to buy Dorothy’s stolen ruby slippers. They could go for 100 times that at auction. The shoes were stolen in 2005 while on loan from their owner to the Judy Garland Museum in Grand Rapids, Minnesota (her hometown). After being recovered in 2018, they’ll be back up for sale at the end of the year.
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New scam alert: A Boston woman lost $40,000 buying an SUV on Facebook Marketplace. The Carfax report looked legit, and she received a clean title from the licensing agency — smooth sailing for almost three years before the vehicle was seized by police. It was a VIN cloning scam; the SUV was stolen when she bought it. I’ll be writing more about this soon, with ways to stay safe!
🛸 The truth is out there: A Pentagon official says in 2013, a U.S. Department of Defense contractor and two others saw a giant, glowing, blue UFO for seven minutes. They stated the barbell-shaped craft was half the length of a football field and 20 feet tall. When they tried to record it, the UFO disrupted their phones and cameras. If their reports are true, the craft’s energy field would’ve been big enough to power a small city! Do you buy it or not? Let me know.
Watch out, dieters: A diabetic woman nearly died after buying fake Ozempic online. It turned out to be an insulin pen, which can cause diabetic shock if misused. Scammers are peddling “weight loss” drugs on websites and social media, luring buyers with phony reviews, no prescriptions and crypto discounts. Do not buy it, please.
The new generation of car deniers
Beyond the high cost of buying a new car, there are other reasons people are moving away from car ownership altogether. Here’s the story.
💵 Wads up? Want to pay with cash? You might be directed to a “reverse ATM.” They put your cash on a debit card so you can pay at card-only businesses. It’ll cost you; a man at the newly cashless Yankee Stadium had to pay an extra $3.50 just to buy popcorn, and he was not glovin’ it.
If I could turn back time: Graphics card and chipmaker NVIDIA just overtook Apple as the world’s second most valuable company. The AI boom has companies gobbling up NVIDIA’s chips at record rates. Bet you wish you’d bought stock in them at $4 a decade ago. Today, it’s about $1,200 a share. Hey, I didn’t buy it either.
Buy a Tesla truck and you're stuck
Thinking about buying the new stainless steel Cybertruck? Here’s why reselling it might not be so easy.
🦈This is so-fish-ticated: “Shark Tank” investor Kevin O’Leary, aka Mr. Wonderful, wants to crowdsource a TikTok acquisition. It’s pretty ingenious: If just 59% of the 170 million Americans on TikTok wanted in, they could contribute $1,000 each to collectively buy it for $100 billion. I’m just not sure that many Americans have a rack lying around.
Social media is overrun with pics and videos of celebs: These product endorsements are mostly AI-generated scams. Recently impersonated? Jennifer Lopez pushing skincare, Tom Hanks promoting a dental plan and MrBeast hawking iPhones. Don’t fall for it. Look for reviews, don’t buy directly from social media, and stick to well-known brands.
Hotel booking scam: If you’re planning a trip, scammers are buying up Google search results with legit-looking hotel and travel sites. They’ll take your info and leave you nothing but a hefty credit card bill. Double-check URLs for typos, and don’t trust a site just because it popped up first in your search results. Chances are, it’s a sponsored ad.
Lipstick on a pig: The feds now consider buy now, pay later (BNPL) apps a type of credit card. Uh, ya think? Now, buyers will get the same refund and fraud protections they do with plastic while they’re putting off those payments. BNPL companies say they’re a totally different model. Nope.
I told ya this was coming: Google’s AI search results will soon be loaded with ads. Ask something like, “How do I get wrinkles out of clothes?” and you’ll get summarized suggestions, plus ads for stuff like wrinkle spray, along with links to buy them. Google says it’ll only show ads when it’s relevant. Doubt it.
🏠 Pro moving tip: Never pack the bottle opener … You can now buy a tiny home on Amazon that comes complete with doors, windows and even bathroom fixtures. What a time to be alive. Here’s one for $26,000!
We may receive a commission when you buy through our links, but our reporting and recommendations are always independent and objective.