Trust me on these:

1) Warranties: You will never need them. And if you do, it’ll still cost you money in fees. So just say no and save the monthly payments.  A recent study by the Wall Street Journal found 95% of buyers didn’t save money at all with warranties.  Take iPhone AppleCare.  It costs $99 for a year of coverage.  Then charges you a service fee when you need it of $30-$79!  I broke my iPhone screen and a third party repair company fixed it for $99 flat. 

2) HDMI Cords: I’m a video pro: you DON’T need expensive cables.  No matter what the salesman says, gold plated HDMI cords have no extra value than the $9 cords from Amazon.  Even with 4K.  The reason tech stores like Best Buy sell expensive cords is because they make no money with just a device sale.  The money  goes back to Samsung, Apple or LG.

3) Expensive SD cards: I use expensive cards because I’m shooting 4k footage for hours at a shoot.  If you buy a camera, the salesperson will likely try to push a high memory SD card to store all your photos/videos.  Believe me, an 8 gig SD card will be plenty.  Don’t waste the money on a 64 gb card.  You upload it all to Instagram and YouTube anyway.  

Remember, stores only make money on accessories.  So shop smart this holiday season.