• It’s a new and challenging world for both mortgage lenders and customers

  The mortgage lending industry on Cape Cod is adjusting to rapid – and often unprecedented – challenges. It’s not just the succession of interest rate increases and a slowing sales market. It’s also increased competition created by a surfeit of mortgage products and providers, combined with advances in technology that lets customers find lenders as far away as California.

• The Law at Work: Background checks; compensation for travel time

  Cape Business consultant Beth O'Neal, Esq., of Masterman, Culbert and Tully LLP discusses background checks and compensation for travel time in this column.

• Q & A with Michael Robinson and Gary Sheehan, co-founders of the Cape Cod Young Professionals

  Cape Business spoke with Michael Robinson and Gary Sheehan, co-founders of the Cape Cod Young Professionals.

• How to increase your hiring success by 30 percent

  There is nothing that improves the company bottom line faster than having employees motivated to do their jobs well, achieving success for the company and themselves. Without the right people, predisposed to excel in the right jobs, organizations won’t thrive as they should.

• Sell smart!

  Charitable gift annuity trusts can reduce the tax burden on the sale of your home.

• Home staging hits the Cape

  Home staging is a relatively new trend, but it has begun to take a foothold on the Cape, where real estate is a profession for many and a hobby for many more. We have profiled a few of the firms on Cape Cod exploring this new field.

• Does a modular home make sense?

  If pre-fabricated housing conjures an image of a trailer home, think again. On Cape Cod, modular residences easily could cost $1.5 million or more.

• Strategic reversal

  Should you consider turning your equity into income during retirement?

• Catering to the wedding crowd

  “Always the caterer, never the bride,” quips Cathy Cugini, who spends virtually all her time preparing and managing weddings. For all but the coldest weeks of the winter, Cugini will begin her day at 6 a.m. and often continue past midnight, seven days a week.

• What did you just say?

  She did not plan it this way, but Dr. Theresa Cullen could not have chosen a more fertile location for her audiology practice than Cape Cod. Consider that the average age of residents here is among the oldest anywhere in the nation.

• Bridging land and sea

  Karen Kraus has a view that spans Cape Cod’s geography and economy. It is a vantage that measures the region’s economic maturity and its poetic majesty.

• She envisions a new tourism built around food

  She is among the wave of corporate émigrés enriching the Cape. Along with her husband, Dianne Langeland has joined thousands of 45- to 65-year-olds who are saying “enough” to big-business stress and “yes” to quality of life.

• Meet Magnolia and Heather: These harps are Katie Lynch’s coworkers

  Katie Lynch may have one of the more unique home offices on Cape Cod. Her living room is bursting with music. A piano dominates one wall; an organ another. And two majestic harps claim its heart.

• Tending mind, body and the garden

  Take a dollop of horticulture; mix it with yoga; and for good measure, throw in some ‘ultimate’ stretch therapy and massage at a Mashpee spa. It is not your typical career – but it is one that is prototypically Cape Cod.

• No more clowning around

  Less than two years ago, Shafeena Rahman traded in her clown’s nose for a banker’s suit. At the time, she was helping her husband market his new company, Clown Around Town, and she frequently attended events at local chambers and associations.

• An Internet business built on passion and place

  Rachel Smith came home from Hollywood in 2002 to help her mother, Judith, during a busy July Fourth weekend at the Giving Tree Gallery and Sculpture Garden in East Sandwich. She never left.

• Demystifying technology

  From her windowless office in the basement of the Cape Cod Community College library, Teresa Martin has a clear, bold view of the region’s technology future.

• Getting the lay of the land

  Terry Warner has grown up, built a business and raised a family all within a block of where she was born in Harwich. To say she is rooted is quite an understatement.

• The rest of the year

  Two of the women featured in the ABWA calendar, shellfisherwoman O’Hara Martin and stable owner Micki Quinn, were not able to be profiled for this issue due to the seasonal nature of their jobs. They do provide added dimension to the breadth of fields embodied by the calendar subjects.

• What’s ahead in 2007

  Cape Business met with its panel of home builders and suppliers to gauge their mood about the housing economy and to hear their predictions for the year. We hope this report provides guidance to you as you build and protect your real estate investment on Cape Cod.

• Beyond lawns

  Not long ago, landscaping on Cape Cod was limited to seeding and mowing lawns – maybe some sod, if you wanted to get fancy – and trimming hedges. And it was reserved for front lawns; back yards were by and large left alone, with pine needles providing a carpet for bare feet.

• Home insurance market remains frustrating

  The New Year did not bring good news on the homeowner’s insurance front. Cape Cod continues to see the effects of hurricane modeling; insurers are leaving this market and rates are continuing to rise.

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