Guest Columnist

In 2019, the average sales price for single-family homes was $1,117,353 and the median sales price was $1,000,000. This compares to 2018, where the average was $1,195,194 and the median was $1,008,000, so an ever-so-slight downtick in price in 2019. But, the volume was...

There’s a Chinese proverb, “A journey of a thousand miles begins with one step.” It makes me think of the Triple P – Positive Parenting Program motto, “Small changes, big differences.” Together, both quotes provide a helpful reminder that in this lifelong journey called “parenting,” the greatest growth and change often comes from taking one small step at a time.

A Review of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 — At the end of 2017, Congress passed the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. Under that piece of legislation, Congress slashed the top corporate tax rate for businesses from 35 percent down to 21 percent.

I recently read that “According to a [2007] report by the A.C. Nielsen Company, parents spend only 39 minutes per week in meaningful conversation with their children.”

By John Hibble, Aptos History Museum The native people who lived here and gave Aptos its name, lived on the land and were stewards of it. They may have been territorial, but they did not have the concept of land ownership. The first owners of this...

Sept. 15 marked 10 years since the collapse of Lehman Brothers. The Financial Crisis of 2008 wiped out about 8.8 million jobs, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and caused about $19 trillion in household wealth to evaporate. While the recession officially started in December 2007, we wanted to review a timeline of some key events and also look forward to the future.

The Friends of the Aptos Library have started a new program called Our Community Reads, which asks everyone to read the same book, and then a series of special events are planned to enrich the experience for those people who did read the book. The Friends also hold book sales and fundraisers to make our library a better place for all of us. But, what if there were no Aptos Library? Our story begins with the very first “friend” who started the library.

In December 2019, Congress passed the SECURE Act which is the first major change to retirement legislation since 2006 with the passage of the Pension Protection Act. The passage of the SECURE Act will affect retirement savers in a number of ways from changes...

The industrialization of Aptos as a lumber town and competition from new hotels in Santa Cruz, Capitola and Monterey, caused Spreckels to close his Aptos Hotel. In 1896, Spreckels tore down the Aptos Hotel and used the materials to build the factory and town of Spreckels near Salinas. He moved several whole buildings from Aptos to Spreckels.

You walk into your local mortgage office (keep it local!) with that smirk on your face that only you and your wife recognize. Right off the bat you announce you have the down payment money and right off the bat you get asked, “you also have the closing cost, I presume…?” Closing cost? What!? You mean everyone in this process doesn’t work for free? Let me tell you, not only do they not work for free, some work for more than others! There are two sections of cost when referring to the closing cost of a home loan. One is recurring closing cost; the second is non-recurring closing cost. The first includes items like your pre-paid property taxes, hazard insurance and that first payment that you don’t send, you know, the one that everyone thinks is free, it’s not.